Bowman, W. S. (Walter S.)

William S. Bowman (1863-1938) was a photographer in Pendleton, Oregon.

Walter S. Bowman (1865-1938) was a professional photographer who worked in Pendleton, Oregon, from the late 1880s to the mid 1930s. Bowman’s photographs document daily life in Eastern Oregon, including special events such as the Pendleton Round-Up. He was particularly noted for his portraits of tribal people, many of which were destroyed.

The Bowman collection is one of a series of photographic collections from the Pendleton area, 1880s-1920s. As a member of the Pendleton Camera Club, Bowmen knew O.C. Allen and Lee Moorhouse, and may have been responsible for Moorhouse’s interest in photography. Bowman images also appear in the Moorhouse collection, the Furlong collection, and the Drake collection. Born on Birch Creek, Oregon, Bowman began studying photography under T.C. Ward in 1887. Bowman purchased Ward’s studio in 1890 and continued to work as Pendleton’s premier photographer until his retirement in the mid 1930s. The Bowman Studio was housed in a building right on the banks of the Umatilla River. Images of the original studio exist but its replacement sits on the original site, and continues to house a photographic studio.

Walter S. Bowman was a member of a prominent pioneer family in Pendleton, coming west from Iowa in 1862. While his cousin, Purl Oliver Bowman, was building the Bowman Hotel, Walter “wanted to use his camera to record the West.” Lee Moorhouse lived with the Bowman family when he first arrived in the area, and may have learned photography from Bowman.

Purl’s daughter, Florence Bowman Windsor, recalled that Walter owned the first car in Pendleton, possibly a Maxwell, and was arrested for driving twelve miles an hour down Main Street. Walter S. Bowman died from injuries received in a car crash that also injured his wife.