Floyd Edgar Quick was the third of four children born to Albert Johnson and Lovilla Pittinger Quick in Crawfordsville, Indiana on November 2, 1877. During his childhood, his family moved to Danville, Illinois, where he completed his public education and went to work at a photography shop after graduation. He completed a correspondence photography course and briefly opened his own business. By age 21, Mr. Quick was back in Indiana, where he became an employee of the Indianapolis Photo Button Manufacturing Company. On November 5, 1901, he married Claudia Barnes. The following year, he became a staff photographer for the Indianapolis Sentinel newspaper.

After a few years, Mr. Quick again went into business for himself, opening the Quick Photo and Engraving Company at 77 North Jersey Street. In 1908, he opened the F. E. Quick Photo Company at 229-1/2 Massachusetts Avenue, but that business closed within a year. Despite his several business setbacks, Mr. Quick continued making his living as a photographer, taking several stereo views of Indianapolis and the surrounding areas. Several of these images were featured in the regional volume, Hyman's Handbook of Indianapolis, first published in 1907. He went wherever he could find work, often traveling with circuses and carnivals. Mr. Quick devised a mobile unit that enabled him to set up an onsite photo booth where tourists could pose for postcards against studio backdrops. He also sold postcards of circus and carnival performers. Tired of scraping by as an itinerant photographer, Mr. Quick once again tried his hand at commercial photography, opening the American Commercial Photo Company in Detroit in 1905. The business was a modest success for nearly 40 years.

In 1942, shortly after the United States entered World War II, the 64-year-old photographer entered the draft. After the war, he moved to California, settling in the Los Angeles suburb of Montrose, where Floyd Edgar Quick enjoyed a peaceful retirement, which was in sharp contrast to his years as a traveling photographer. He died in 1962. His postcards, once considered merely novelty items, have now become highly sought-after collectibles. Several of Mr. Quick's letters and personal items from 1905 to 1942 currently reside in the Detroit Public Library.




Ref:
2012 1910 RPPC Postcard Traveling Photographer Gallery Amusement/Wild West Show (URL: http://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/1910-rppc-postcard-traveling-48753931).

2012 1911 RPPC Postcard Photo F E Quick Elephant Advertising Promo Circus Wild Animal (URL: http://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/1911-rppc-postcard-photo-e-quick-51249921).

2016 Getting That Poster Up on the Wall – Not the Best Job in the World! (URL: http://theruckerarchive.com/getting-that-poster-up-on-the-wall-not-the-best-job-in-the-world).

1907 Hyman's Handbook of Indianapolis: An Outline History (Indianapolis: M.R. Hyman Company), p. 207.

2006 Real Photo Postcard Guide: The People's Photography by Robert Bogdan and Todd Weseloh (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press), pp. 251-252.

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