This image, slightly altered, appears on a business card included in the Motz family fonds (direct link here). The business card says "at it for forty-nine years". Since Rittinger & Motz was founded in 1859, this implies the business card is from 1908. The image was therefore from that year, or earlier.
The building was moved into in 1906 (Robinson, Curtis B. (2019). Ethnic Elites, Propaganda, Recruiting and Intelligence in German-Canadian Ontario, 1914–1918 (PhD thesis). St. John's: Memorial University of Newfoundland. pp. 74–75.). In addition, on the side of the building, it lists three newspapers, the last of which (Stratford Kolonist) was acquired in July 1906. This image was therefore likely taken between July 1906 and sometime in 1908.
Assuming this picture was taken in December 1908, the photograph entered PD in Canada in 1983 (75 years after its creation, 1908 + 75 = 1983) making it PD on the URAA date (1 January 1996).
Image first published in the Kitchener-Waterloo Record in 1959 without either a copyright renewal or notice included.
Public domainPublic domainfalsefalse
This Canadian work, of which the author or authors are unknown, is in the public domain in Canada because:
It was published before January 1, 1970; or
It was created before January 1, 1945; or
75 years have passed since the end of the calendar year of its creation, without it ever having been published while still in copyright.
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it meets three requirements:
it was first published outside the United States (and not published in the U.S. within 30 days),
it was first published before 1 March 1989 without copyright notice or before 1964 without copyright renewal or before the source country established copyright relations with the United States,
it was in the public domain in its home country (Canada) on the URAA date (1 January 1996).
For background information, see the explanations on Non-U.S. copyrights. Note: This tag should not be used for sound recordings.