How one Altadena resident started reuniting families with their lost photos after the fires
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After the Eaton fire, Altadena resident Claire Schwartz realized she could use her hobby as an amateur photo collector to help people who had lost their treasured family pictures when hurricane-force winds picked them up and deposited them sometimes miles away.
She started collecting photos she found around the neighborhood – some with singed edges and notes on the back, some in strangely perfect condition – and created a website and Instagram called “Eaton Fire Found Photos” in the hopes that someone might recognize a person or place in a photo that could provide a clue about the family it belonged to. She cleans and stores the things she finds – the photos but also book pages and childhood drawings – in archival envelopes in temperature-controlled storage until they’re claimed.
She started collecting photos she found around the neighborhood – some with singed edges and notes on the back, some in strangely perfect condition – and created a website and Instagram called “Eaton Fire Found Photos” in the hopes that someone might recognize a person or place in a photo that could provide a clue about the family it belonged to. She cleans and stores the things she finds – the photos but also book pages and childhood drawings – in archival envelopes in temperature-controlled storage until they’re claimed.
