Hand colored postcard of “Sunset at Silver Springs.” Prior to the development of color photographs, black and white images were hand colored using paints or dyes to make images more life-like. In this scene, an early glass bottom boat carries tourists down the Silver River framed by a glowing sunset. The earliest glass bottom boat at Silver Springs was essentially a canoe and was built by Hullam Jones and Phillip Monell in 1878 (the original boat is on display at the Museum of Florida History in Tallahassee). By 1910, row boats with glass bottoms were being used. As demand grew, larger wooden boats like the one in this image were in service by 1930 and saw use until the 1950s when aluminum boats began to replace them. Many of these aluminum boats are still in use and have delighted many thousands of visitors over the years (SRM2009-2-349).
