Floyd Reed

Floyd Reed, with his brother Harry, established Reed Bros. Photographers at 319 Vine Street in downtown Poplar Bluff in May 1924. Working as a photographic studio at a time when portraits, postcards, and photographs of local buildings and events were central to how a community saw and shared itself, the brothers produced work that documented Poplar Bluff and the surrounding Ozarks. Their known work includes a panoramic photograph of the Butler County Courthouse made in 1925. The studio advertised “Portraits, Commercial Photos, Circuit Panoramas” and “Genuine Velox Kodak Finishing” in the 1926 city directory, and was listed in the 1931 directory at 319 Vine Street under Photographers, Photo Finishers, Picture Framing and Kodaks. The circular stamp the firm used on the backs of its postcards offered enlarging, Kodak finishing and portraits. Three years after the studio opened, the tornado of May 9, 1927 destroyed much of downtown Poplar Bluff; a Reed Bros. postcard cataloged as HPB-PHOTO-003 preserves the aftermath on Broadway Street. The stamp on the reverse associates the image with the studio but does not identify which brother made the exposure.