This picture of Texas Jack, previously unpublished online, made its way through the hands of some of the finest Old West collectors and historians. It was a part of the collection of Herb Peck Jr, of Nashville Tennessee. Herb was a photographer who worked for Vanderbilt University's Department of Fine Arts and was the foremost collector of Civil War, Old West, and Native American images and artifacts in the world.
In 1978, Mr. Peck's collection, which police called "the largest Civil War Artificial collection ever recorded" was stolen from his home. Peck slowly rebuilt his archive, gathering new images and artifacts like this one of Texas Jack.
Joseph G. Rosa, the eminent Wild Bill Hickok biographer, eventually acquired the photo from Hank Peck, probably while working on his landmark They Called Him Wild Bill. Rosa was a British writer, and when he died this image along with a large portion of his archive was given to Tony Cairns, who generously shares it with all of us now.
Just last year, 42 years after the burglary of Hank Peck Jr.'s home and the theft of his world-class collection, police in Ethridge, Tennessee, recovered a large portion of the stolen items.
Here's the same image, run through the Remini AI algorithm for clarity.
A comparison between the original and the enhanced versions.
Adjusted for tone and contrast, as well as touched up to remove problems with the photo, like white spots on Jack's coat, etc.
And finally, run through the Deep Nostalgia AI for animation.
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