Nancy Ford Cones (September 11, 1869 – January 3, 1962) was an early photographer from Loveland, Ohio, where she documented country life.
Born in Milan, Ohio in 1868, Cones was a doctor's daughter. When she was 25, her father sent her to a photographic studio to learn how to retouch after which she began taking photographs herself in the pictorial style. Impressed by her early work, her father bought her an interest in a studio in Mechanicsburg, Ohio. In 1900, she married James Cones, also a photographer, who assisted her with darkroom work, frequently using the gum bichromate printing process. The couple first moved to Covington, Kentucky where they ran a studio together before settling at Roads Inn farm near Loveland, Ohio in 1905. That year, with a photograph title "Threading the needle", Cones finished second to Eduard Steichen in an Eastman Kodak competition which attracted 28,000 entries.[1] Her "Calling The Ferryman" came in first in the Photo-Era contest in 1907. Most of her photographs were of family and friends on the farm. They proved popular for the advertising campaigns of Eastman Kodak, Bausch & Lomb and other camera firms. Some of them also appeared in Country Life in America and Woman's Home Companion. In 1926, the couple spent a year in Mariemont, Ohio, where they had been commissioned to photograph the new town.[2] [3]
Nancy Cones' interest in photography came to an end after her husband's death in 1939. She remained on the Loveland family farm where she died in 1962.[3]