| Sumario: | This article focuses on a small community of elite 'colored' women in Memphis. The origins of this community began with a limited number of free people that established roots in the city during the1830s. Using photography as the main resource, this article examines the role of controlled image-making in three 'families of color,' headed by Jane Wright, Louisa Ayres, and Martha Ferguson. The article argues that following the Civil War, photography offered those of mixed-race the means to reveal and document a legacy they could not previously claim, strengthening their sense of shared identity and status in the urban South during Reconstruction.
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