Waif's Home

This is a black-and-white press-style photograph mounted on a white card stock backing, depicting Louis Armstrong seated and singing into a microphone while holding his trumpet.

Prominently visible behind him is a Presto recording lathe, a portable disc-cutting machine widely used in the late 1930s for instantaneous recording, which places the image in a recording or broadcast context consistent with the 1938 date.

Armstrong is dressed in a suit and appears to be mid-performance or mid-recording session. The reverse of the photograph bears a purple rubber stamp reading: "CREDIT" / RICHARD MERKIN COLLECTION / 500 WEST END AVE. / APT. 12D / NEW YORK, N.Y. 10024. Richard Merkin was a noted American artist, illustrator, and jazz enthusiast whose collection of jazz-related photographs and memorabilia was well known.