Introduction:
The Idyllic World of Dillman Bomberger
Above: Dillman's self-portrait with friends and with his two brothers: Norman (far left) beside Guy.
Dillman Bomberger's photographs reveal a bucolic life in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.
Dillman's world is a quiet world of Sunday-afternoon picnics and family reunions at the farm. His world is filled with rural ease and small-town comforts.
It is a romanticized world of well-mannered pleasures and bountiful tables. Dillman's world is a village dressed up in its Sunday best. His photographs capture the evening breezes of a front porch in August, and the frost of a sleigh ride in December.
Dillman's idyllic world lives on, if only in our memory.
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Dillman's Pennsylvania-German Freundschaft (Family)...
...Mennonites, Brethren, Moravians, and More:
Lancaster County is a smorgasbord of many religious groups. Dillman's close-knit family reflected that diversity. Dillman's parents were members of Erb Mennonite Church near Lititz. The Bomberger family had been Mennonite for generations.
Dillman's wife Aimee Brubacher and his mother Emma Dillman both came from families associated with the Church of the Brethren, although the Brubachers had historically been Mennonite. Meanwhile, the town of Lititz had a predominant Moravian community, so Dillman and wife Aimee joined the Moravian Church as adults.
Dillman's relatives spoke the Pennsylvania-German dialect, "Pennsylvania Dutch", at one time or another. So Dillman undoubtedly had his fair share of Schmearkase and Lattwarick (cottage cheese and apple butter) on homemade bread at his summertime picnics and lawn parties.
Above: Aimee and Dillman Bomberger. They married in 1910.
Dillman created a beautifully-crafted tribute to his Lancaster County community with his photography. He used his camera to paint a remarkable portrait of his people and of his place in time. The stories Dillman tells with his glass-plate images feel like a gift from him to the future.