In Pictures: A Romanian Century
A boy sleeps on a bus as the driver continues on his route in a photo thought to have been shot in Romania’s Mures County.
Famed ethnic Hungarian scientist Jeno Cholnoky photographed in 1910 in Cluj-Napoca, which was then part of the Kingdom of Hungary
Two shepherds in the Fagaras Mountains in 1963
These are some of the nearly 13,000 analog photos that make up Romania’s Azopan photo archive.
A gigantic woodsman pauses for a photo with his companion on a road near Lacu Rosu in 1940.
The archive covers a century of Romanian history from 1900 through 2000. The archivists rely on donated photos to grow the collection.
An early double-decker bus rumbles through Arad in 1915. Some photos in the archive, including this one, were shot in regions of Romania that were part of the Kingdom of Hungary before 1918.
Economist Edgar Szocs founded the archive with two friends -- a priest and a software developer. The Azopan website and Facebook page went online in early 2019.
Locals and a railway bridge over the Trotus River in 1908
Szocs told RFE/RL he began the project with his two high-school friends and a budget of “zero.”
He says the archive still operates without funding thanks to personal connections. Another childhood friend who runs a web company hosts the database free of charge.
A postcard of an ethnic Hungarian soldier saying farewell to his sweetheart in Transylvania in 1917. The text says: “The Fatherland is calling. We must part now. God be with you my darling. We will be together again after the great war!”
As well as the power of historic images like this one, Szocs says he is fascinated by the personal stories some of the photos uncover.
A photo of the Kron family in 1927
This photo is from a collection of pictures bought at a market by Szocs’ father. It was published on Azopan’s social-media pages without any information beyond the year it was made. Soon, people began commenting on the image and the entire family story -- including the later suicide of the girl at far left and the baby boy’s eventual career as a puppeteer -- was revealed.
Sportsman and mountaineer Karoly Both attempting to walk on the Mures River in 1935
The name Azopan is a homage to a brand of photographic film made in Romania until 2003. Szocs’ mother had worked at the factory where the film was produced.
A column of Hungarian soldiers marches near the Transylvanian village of Teaca in 1940.
Hungary briefly retook the Transylvania region from Romania during World War II, having lost it in the aftermath of World War I.
A woman kisses the hand of Magdolna Purgly, wife of Hungary's Regent Miklos Horthy as the couple visit the recently retaken Transylvania.
Men clamber a sharp peak in the Hasmasul Mare mountains in 1951.
A dance ensemble displays the grim aesthetics of communism during a performance in 1959.
Two young women in Busteni during the 1960s
Szocs says Azopan currently has tens of thousands more images in its collection. He says they are not yet published because of the archivists’ lack of time.
The Szabo family with a baby bear in Miercurea Ciuc in 1962
Szocs explained to RFE/RL: “We are working. We have families. If we had one person who we could pay some basic fee, we could have many more pictures online.”
A neighborhood of the eastern city of Galati in 1968
A “wedding party” at a restaurant that arranged cultural shows for mostly Western tourists in Eforie in 1974
Romanian soldiers pose with their knife bayonets in Targu-Mures in 1975.
A bear and some tourists on the Transfagarasan road in 1982
A commenter on the archive's Facebook page noted that the bear was known as a famous “beggar” in the mountain pass.
Women from the village of Ocna de Jos prepare a dummy endowed with vegetable genitals for a traditional carnival in 1983.
The dummy, known as the “village drunk,” is paraded through the village on Ash Wednesday to mark the end of Lent before being burned. The tradition is still very much alive today.
A rundown cultural center in 1987
Under the rule of Socialist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, ordinary Romanians were enduring miserable conditions by the 1980s.
A roadside sign photographed in 1988 by a Dutch priest in central Transylvania. It reads: “Ceausescu -- Heroism, Romania -- Communism.”
Such roadside propaganda was commonplace during Romania’s totalitarian era. It began with a focus on the goal of communism. But by the late 1970s and '80s, Romanian propaganda increasingly glorified the ruling dictator Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife, Elena.
A man wields a partially burned portrait of Ceausescu in Targu Mures on December 22, 1989, during the revolution that overthrew the country’s despised ruler.
Newly free Romanians enjoy a drink in Baile Seiche in 1990.