We owe a big thank you to past scientists who set the stage for today’s modern technologies even though some of their creations can be puzzling to us now. Think of Leonardo Da Vinci and his flying car or Thomas Edison and his discovery of the light bulb. Their brilliant ideas have shaped the world we live in and continue to inspire innovations.

There was a time when certain things were seen as chic, but now they’re simply odd. The Instagram account ‘Got Weird‘ is all about that. It shows both strange inventions and odd moments in time that demonstrate how perspectives change over the years. So take a trip down memory lane and explore what used to be cool – it might bring a smile to your face or a sneaky chuckle.

#1 Nathan Hahn Was Arrested In 1940 For Wearing Female Clothing And Refused To Wear The Male Clothing Presented To Him By Detective Holt

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Different generations redefine what’s ‘in’ – cultural shifts and tech advances can make old trends seem odd. Since the Industrial Revolution, the world has changed incredibly fast, making us forget how strange things used to be. It’s likely that people from a century ago would find our modern behaviors equally weird.

#2 A Memento Mori Photo For A Lost Soldier Husband And Father, 1925. The Boy Wearing His Father’s Uniform Cap And The Wife/Mother Linking Her Arm With His Coat Sleeve Is So Touching

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#3 American Rock Star Alice Cooper At His Home With His Girlfriend Wearing A Mask Imitating The Creature From The Black Lagoon, The Low-Budget Film Which Was Re-Released In 1975

The photograph was taken by Terry O’Neill in August 1975. The house burned down later that month, while he was away in New York. The woman in the image is Cindy Lang. She and Alice separated in 1975 at which time Alice began a relationship with dancer Sheryl Goddard. Cindy never had any children. The kid is Micky Dolenz’s daughter Ami whom Alice used to babysit

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For example, in the United States, many big cities had laws against being ugly a hundred years ago. If you were thought to be too ugly to be seen in public, you’d have to pay a fine of $1 to $50 ($30-$1500 nowadays) or be sent to a poorhouse, which was a place for poor people with problems. We might think we’re more enlightened now, but a thing like fat-shaming still exists, showing we have progress to make.

#4 The Cast Of “Monty Python’s Flying Circus,” 1976

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#5 Anne Francis Wearing Aviary Earrings With Real Budgies In ‘Forbidden Planet’ (1956)

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#6 Leaving A Bad Review In The 1920s

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On Thanksgiving, folks dressed up in costumes, made noise in the streets, and had costume parties. According to NPR, “The tradition was so well loved that in 1897 the LA Times reported that Thanksgiving was ‘the busiest time of the year for manufacturers of and dealers in masks and false faces.’ And if that isn’t enough to make your head spin, costumed kids would also march in troops around their neighborhoods and ask adults ‘Anything for Thanksgiving?’ And then the adults would give them candy.”

#7 Zardoz (1974) Is Quite Possibly The Weirdest Film Ever Made

As 1970s as prog rock, fondue and woodchip wallpaper, and mad as a lift full of wolves, it’s a film full of intriguing ideas, pretentious chatter and incongruous images. Set in the year 2293 on a post-apocalyptic Earth, Zardoz is a science fiction film written, produced and directed by John Boorman. The film starring Sean Connery as Zed, who dressed in a scarlet mankini, his plaited ponytail flowing in the breeze, escapes the thrall of the Eternals and smashes their regime with sex and death

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#8 The “Kiss Of Death” By Bruna Kazinoti, 1988

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#9 Italian Actress Marisa Allasio Surrounded By Young Priests, 1957

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In the past, cigarette companies did something sneaky. Doctors sometimes appeared in tobacco ads, saying smoking had benefits like relieving asthma. These ads featured authoritative figures claiming that thousands of physicians agreed or a respected scientist endorsed cigarettes, but these experts were usually unnamed. In the early 20th century, people were catching on that smoking might be bad for health. Sadly, those doctor-backed cigarette ads kept going until the ’60s, when the surgeons finally said, “You were right, smoking is harmful.”

#10 Christmas At The Hospital, Sweden, 1953

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#11 Francesca Woodman (April 3, 1958 – January 19, 1981) Is Best Known For Photographing Herself

But her pictures are not self-portraits in the traditional sense. She is often nude or semi-nude and usually seen half hidden or obscured – sometimes by furniture, sometimes by slow exposures that blur her figure into a ghostly presence. These beautiful and yet unsettling images seem fleeting but also suggest a sense of timelessness.

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#12 This Little One Made Us Shudder, Ca. 1950s

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Nowadays, most folks don’t find public drunkenness cool or funny, and they don’t think driving drunk is okay either. But it wasn’t always like this. According to Russman Law, “In the 1960s, most people thought that drunk driving was a ‘folk crime.’ In fact, it was kind of thought of as a rite of passage so when parents found out their boy was caught drinking and driving, it was more like a ‘boys will be boys’ thing than an ‘Oh my god, give me the keys, you’re never leaving your room again’ thing.” Juries felt the same way too. In those times, if you were caught drunk driving, you didn’t admit to it; you asked for a jury trial. This was because, in most states, there wasn’t a fixed alcohol limit, so proving your guilt wasn’t just about a breathalyzer test. The state had to prove that you were not only drinking but also that the alcohol had made it unsafe for you to drive.

#13 People Used To Go To Record Stores And Listen To Records In A “Listening Booth”… Quite An Event

At His Master’s Voice (HMV), customers could buy records and record players, but also listen to the latest songs. In the 1950s, HMV introduced special sound-isolating booths where customers could sample new sounds without having to wear headphones. They also had enough room to squeeze in a close friend or two.

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#14 This Is Not A Painting! The Photograph Was Taken In 1911 By Francis James Mortimer (1874–1944), A Pioneer Of Pictorial Photography

The sea his favorite subject, he captured the shipwreck Arden Craig, a three-masted wheat ship that slammed into rocks in nine feet of water after the captain became disoriented in a heavy fog. An article from The Barrier Miner (New South Wales). Tue 10 Jan 1911 reads: “The wheat ship, Arden Craig, from Melbourne, which foundered in a fog at the Scilly Isles, off the English coast, called at Queenstown, and was ordered to proceed to Calais. Distress guns fired from the ship were heard at Bishop Lighthouse, and led” to tho launching” of the St. Mark and St. Agnes lifeboats. The fog lifted, for half an hour, and afterwards the ship struck. The watchers on the Scilly Isles saw tho Arden Craig drifting, with its foreyard aback. An hour later it rolled to port and foundered. A sensation was created ashore until the boats were seen alongside. Captain Dunning, of the Arden Craig, states that he thought he was 20 miles south off the Scilly Isles, when he was really only three miles away. When the ship came off the rocks there was nine feet of water in the hold. It was ubandoned, as it was impossible to save it.” The Arden Craig was a British cargo ship built in 1886. She was used to transport wheat from Melbourne, Australia to ports o the coast the United Kingdom. Her captain was Thomas Dunning. It was 277.7 feet long and 40 feet wide. Her draft when loaded was 24.9 feet. She weighed 2,153 tons. She was built by Russell & Co. of Port Glasgow on the Clyde river in Scotland. The Arden Craig was propelled by 149 square yards of sail on three masts. Her hull was iron/steel

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#15 Gang Of Teen Girls, Estonia, 1930

This photo was given to Kaisa Kaer by her grandmother Aino, the girl on the far right in the second row, lighting her ciggie on another ciggie. “She was about 15 when this picture was taken and these are her friends,” Kaisa said. “However, I have no more specific info on who they are. They used to do amateur theatre, and as far as I know, this picture was taken when they were messing around with a production or some such. My grandmother never smoked but she did have a wicked sense of humor, which was all the more striking because it stood in such a contrast with her very poised and polished appearance (among other things, she left me a pair of lace gloves).” Kaisa said her grandmother married a pharmacist, her grandfather Nikolai. They lived and worked in a small town in Estonia during the Second World War and a German officer, who was billeted at their house, got along so well with them that when the Soviets started advancing, he asked them to go to his family home in Germany (somewhere near Frankfurt) to get away from the war. “My grandparents refused and well,” she added, “my grandfather was deported to Siberia, was released with Khrushchev’s amnesty and returned home, but died only four years later because his health had been ruined.” “The most distinct memory I have of my grandmother is going to visit her with my parents and brother, and we sitting around her kitchen table, playing Mahjong for hours on an intricate set which my grandfather had made by himself.” Aino passed away in 2009

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Now, picture folks from a hundred years ago in our world today. They would also find some new things strange, such as feminism or the legalization of cannabis. Even thinking about your childhood, some stuff may have seemed weird, but now it’s totally normal and even liked. Being emo/goth or nerdy, enjoying anime and video games used to be seen as odd. Now, it’s considered cool and trendy. Ripped jeans or thrifting were considered as signs of being poor. Our entire lives we were told to never get into a stranger’s car. Yet now, we have an entire business based on just that, like Uber.

#16 You May Not Know His Name, But You Know His Cars

Jay Ohrberg is Hollywood’s favorite car designer, having built hundreds of experimental vehicles with an incredible range of features. His creations have appeared in more than 100 movies, TV shows and videos, earning him the title “The King of Show Cars.” The “wide limousine” was just one of longtime custom car impresario Jay Ohrberg’s crazy concoctions, which spanned 2.5 cars wide and 30 feet long. Powered by two ’75 Cadillac FWD engines with eight wheels per side, the limo had to be disassembled to be transported from show to show. Amazingly, each half could be driven separately

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#17 There Were Two Types Of Kids In The 1970s And 1980s, Those Who Were On The Bike Doing A Jump, And Those Who Were Lying On The Ground Being Jumped Over

Taking poorly made bike jumps without a helmet was the norm

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#18 Two Wax Department Store Mannequins Melt During A Heat Wave In London, 1929, Allegedly. They Also Live In Your Closet And Spy On You When You’re Asleep

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Trends come and go and so does our perception on things. We’re sure many things that seem normal today will be considered weird in the future. So, lovely Pandas, keep scrolling to discover the remaining ‘Got Weird’ posts and share your thoughts on what you believe could appear strange to the generations that follow.

#19 Winona Ryder On The Set Of ‘Beetlejuice‘, 1988

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#20 There’s Nothing Quite Like A Possessed Doll To Give You Nightmares

Let’s face it, dolls are creepy as hell, especially old, raggedy dolls that smell like lighter fluid. Their glassy eyes reflect images and memories of unspeakable horror, yet their faces remain expressionless, content. These vintage dolls are the stuff nightmares are made of

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#21 Patrick Swayze Posing With His Beloved Dogs In The 1980s

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#22 A Russian Wedding Party Protests Against Air Pollution, Russia, Ca. 1980s. (Photo By A. Zhdanov

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#23 Self-Defense Glove For Ladies In London, Ca. 1850

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#24 In Goldfield, Nevada There Is A Grave For An Unknown Man Who Died Eating Library Paste In 1908

As the story goes, a vagrant wandering the streets of Goldfield, Nevada in 1908 was rummaging through the trash outside the local library, looking for something to eat. The best sustenance he came across was a jar of book paste. He would have found the paste surprisingly sweet, because in addition to flour and water, it was 60% alum. Unfortunately, the concentration was deadly. The legend continues to say that when the townspeople found the deceased drifter, he was buried in Pioneer Cemetery, which was little more than a dirt patch. The grave was topped with a headstone that stated what little they knew about him. It reads, “UNKNOWN MAN DIED EATING LIBRARY PASTE JULY 14 1908.” Skeptics point to the fact that the grave’s red paint is very bright for being more than a century old. That being said, some ascribe the fresh paint to sympathetic cemetery-goers who regularly paint over the epitaph so that the unknown man can be remembered for years to come. Others say the whole thing is just a local prank. Whatever the case, the grave serves as a cautionary tale: don’t eat glue.

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#25 From Mandate Magazine, December 1981

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#26 “Don’t Be Skinny!”

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#27 Pubic Wigs (Called Merkins) Were Worn By Prostitutes As Early As The 1450s

The reason for this accessory was that pubic hair was considered popular and attractive, but sex workers shaved their lower parts to avoid pubic lice and used merkin to cover up STD’s from their clients.

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#28 Actress Veronica Lake With Her Hair Twisted In A Drill Press, Demonstrating Potential Dangers To Women In Factories During World War II. November, 1943

During World War II, Veronica Lake (1919–1973) changed her trademark peek-a-boo hairstyle at the urging of the Government to encourage women working in war industry factories to adopt more practical, safer hairstyles. Although the change helped to decrease accidents involving women getting their hair caught in machinery, doing so may have damaged Lake’s career. She also became a popular pin-up girl for soldiers during World War II and traveled throughout the United States to raise money for war bonds

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#29 A Secret Meeting Of The Grandmas

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#30 A Concept Design For Car Safety Belts From The 1960s

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#31 A V-Shaped Bed Invented In 1932, Supporting The Body Perfectly At Every Point And Thus Promotes Better Rest

When unused the bed is straight like every other bed. However, one pull on a chain at the side of the bed immediately changes it to a V-shape. Another advantage claimed for the bed is that the covers are held substantially away from the person, thereby allowing the free circulation of air to the body.

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#32 “If You Want To Handle Large Groups Economically With Unusual Layout Flexibility, We Have Got The Homoerotic Bathroom Fittings For You”

Bradley Group Showers seem to have unintentionally gone down the same route with their ads designed to sell their plumbing systems to colleges and sporting teams.

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#33 Jodie Foster Holding A Lamb In A Promo Shoot For ‘The Silence Of The Lambs’ (1991)

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#34 Daguerreotype Portrait Of Blind Person From The Mid-19th Century

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#35 The Window Tent Was Originally Devised In Order To Give The Open-Air Treatment For Tuberculosis To Patients In Their Own Homes When They Could Not Procure The Use Of Porches Or Other Open Buildings For This Purpose In The 1910s

But as window tents have proven both convenient and economical, they are now used by many healthy persons who wish to sleep in the fresh air during the winter months without cooling off their houses. Window tents are all constructed practically on the same principle, the difference between them being largely in their shape and the manner of their manipulation. A frame, usually of steel, supports a canvas cover, and this canopy encloses a space inside the room connected with the window. The tent frame is either attached to the window casing or the head of the bed, and projects over the bed, covering the head and shoulders of the person lying on it

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#36 Back When The Rotor Rides Were Fun And Dangerous

The rotor is an amusement park ride, designed and patented by German engineer Ernst Hoffmeister in 1948. The ride was first demonstrated at Oktoberfest 1949, and was exhibited at fairs and events throughout Europe, during the 1950s and 1960s. The ride still appears in numerous amusement parks, although traveling variants have been surpassed by the Gravitron. The ride itself was a scientific experience as riders felt the force of centripetal acceleration seemingly sticking them to the wall. What is happening on the rotor falls in line with Newtonian physics in that a body in motion remains in motion unless acted upon by a resisting force. A rider traveling around the drum of a rotor is constantly changing the direction of their motion but at any given point Newtonian laws state that they would prefer, if unhindered, to continue traveling in the direction they are traveling at that particular moment in time. However, every split second whilst the ride spins the planar vector that defines what is perpendicular keeps changing, thus the rider feels that they are being pushed outwards against the wall of the drum. The sequence of the ride varied in the early machines. Some loaded at the top with the floor dropping as the riders are pinned to the wall and as the ride slows the riders slip ungraciously down to the floor and exit in the pit of the drum. Others saw the floor lower and then return to allow riders a bit more dignity as they left via the top of the drum. Finally some machines loaded at the bottom, pushed the riders up with an elevating floor, which then descended and re-ascended to pick up the riders.

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#37 Before Pumpkins, The Irish Carved Jack-O’-Lanterns From Turnips And Potatoes

The jack-o’-lantern tradition dates back centuries, when people in Ireland decorated turnips, beets, and potatoes to frighten away a mythical character named Stingy Jack. Irish immigrants brought the tradition to America, home of the pumpkin, and the popular fruit became an integral part of Halloween. According to the folktale, Stingy Jack was having a drink with the Devil but didn’t want to pay for his drink. To fix this problem, he persuaded Satan to transform into a coin that Jack could use. However, Jack decided to put the coin in his pocket, next to a silver cross. This silver cross prevented the Devil from changing back. Jack made a deal that the Devil would not bother him for a year and is not allowed to take his soul if Jack dies. A year later, Jack meets the Devil again. Jack convinced the Devil to climb a tree and pick fruit. Whilst the Devil was up in the tree, Jack carved a cross into the bark of the tree so the Devil could not come down. Jack then made another deal, which stated that the Devil could not bother him for 10 years. Jack died a while after this. He was going to go to Heaven but God did not want him there, so he was to be sent to hell. However, the Devil was not allowed to claim his soul and didn’t want him anyway, and so he was forced to wander the Earth. The Devil gave him a lump of burning coal, which Jack put into a hollowed-out turnip. The Irish people who saw him would refer to him as “Jack of the lantern”, which was eventually shortened to “Jack O’Lantern”. People in Ireland and Scotland would start carving faces into turnips and potatoes, to frighten Stingy Jack away and repel other wicked spirits. Immigrants from the British Isles who came to the United States of America bought the story with them. Except they started using pumpkins instead of turnips and potatoes, hence why carved pumpkins are called Jack O’Lanterns

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#38 A Dog Dressed In A Suit With A Kitten In It’s Lap, Ca 1950s

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#39 “Because Of Him,” Lem Billings Once Said Of President Kennedy, “I Was Never Lonely.” John Kennedy And Lem Billings Met In 1933 At Choate Rosemary Hall, The Teenagers Worked Together On Their Class’s Yearbook, And Billings Became Sexually Attracted To The Handsome Young Kennedy

Billings made his desire known while the two were still at school by writing Kennedy a love note on a piece of toilet paper. A startled Kennedy responded to the note by saying, “Please don’t write to me on toilet paper anymore. I’m not that kind of boy.” Although Joe Kennedy, the family patriarch, was reportedly suspicious of Billings’ close relationship with his son, the Kennedy family welcomed Billings into their exclusive family circle. Lem Billings would later confide in friends that his relationship with Kennedy was sexual, to a point, and “included oral sex, with Jack always on the receiving end.” Their arrangement, Quirk says, “enabled Jack to sustain his self-delusion that straight men who received oral sex from other males were really only straights looking for sexual release,” and, “Jack was in love with Lem being in love with him and considered him the ideal follower adorer.” According to Billings’ biographer David Pitts, “Once JFK decided that Billings was his best friend – like it or leave, everybody in the family sort of fell in line with that. The Kennedys were a liberal family and one that tolerated a lot of heterosexual promiscuity as well.” In her memoir, Times To Remember, published eleven years after JFK’s assassination in Dallas in 1963, matriarch Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy wrote that Billings had “remained Jack’s lifelong close friend, confidant, sharer in old memories and new experiences…He has really been part of ‘our family’ since that first time he showed up at our house as one of ‘Jack’s surprises.’” JFK even gave him his own room at The White House. Jackie was reportedly upset that her husband spent so much time with Billings and that he often spent the night at the White House. After Kennedy’s assassination, Billings was devastated. Biographer Sally Bedell Smith referred to Billings as “probably the saddest of the Kennedy widows.”

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#40 These Oversize Boots, Or Rather Stilts Made From Fibre Glass, Were Worn By Sir Elton John When He Played The Pinball Wizard Character In The Film Tommy, The Rock Opera, 1975

Tommy, the Rock Opera by The Who originated in 1969. The musical, Tommy came out as a movie in 1975 with Roger Daltrey in the lead role. Tommy was Elton John’s first major feature film role. He’s remembered as the Pinball Wizard and is credited as the Local Lad. “The Pinball Wizard” was a hit song in its own right. Reports are that Rod Stewart turned down the part. As the Pinball Wizard, he wore giant Doc Martens inspired boots, standing 54”, 4 foot 6.5 inches high. They were modeled after ‘cherry red’ Dr. Martens. They were made of molded fiberglass by an English company, the Northamptonshire chemical firm Scott Bader. The boots themselves were put together by the props department of Columbia Pictures. Elton’s costume included a pair of his trademark glasses. The memorable piece was the giant boots. They had platform supports above metal calipers. Leather straps attached to his legs allowing him to move as if he were on stilts. After filming, Elton, an avid collector, asked if he could keep the large boots that he wore for the part. In 1988, the boots, hundreds of pairs of spectacles and other items of Elton’s personal memorabilia were auctioned at Sotheby’s. Boot and shoe-maker Stephen Griggs bought the boots for $20,200. The boots are currently on permanent display at Northampton Museum and Art Gallery in The Shoe Collection.

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#41 British Airways Flight 5390 Was A Flight From Birmingham Airport In England For Málaga Airport In Spain

On June 10, 1990, the BAC One-Eleven 528FL suffered explosive decompression resulting in no loss of life. While the aircraft was flying over Didcot, Oxfordshire, an improperly installed windscreen panel separated from its frame causing the captain to be sucked out of the aircraft. The captain, Tim Lancaster, was partially held through the window frame for twenty minutes until the first officer landed at Southampton Airport

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#42 Philip Garner High Heel Roller Skate, 1962

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#43 Photo Booth Selfies By French Surrealist Painter Yves Tanguy, Ca. 1928

Surrealism was born from a need to examine and understand the self; not the obvious visible self but the stream of one’s uncontrollable consciousness which the Surrealists felt was quotidian to human existence. When the Photomaton arrived on the Champs Élysées in Paris in 1928 it provided the perfect vehicle to make this cerebral happening a visual reality. This fascinating machine, invented by Anabol Josepho in 1925, produced an automatic strip of images without the intervention of an operator – it was the precursor and much more romantic version of today’s digital ‘Photo Me’ booth. Fuelled by photographic chemicals, it spat out a silver gelatin stream of images to the eagerly waiting sitter and provided almost instantaneous results. The Surrealists used and were obsessed by automatism, the act of letting thoughts flow freely without rationally thinking about them like free writing – the Photomaton (arguably) took control of the self, creating its own automatism. The automatic properties of the machine excited André Breton and immediately he related the unbiased and uncontrollable functions to those of the mind. Breton, said to be one of the first advocates of the booth, enthusiastically rounded up the Surrealists including Max Ernst, Luis Buñuel, René Magritte, Paul Éluard and Yves Tanguy (depicted in this photo strip) and put them one by one at its impartial mercy. The idea was that the impression produced would be an uncontrived imprint, a reflection of their psychological state or what they perceived as the ‘true-self’. Since the invention of the Photomaton, generations of artists have been fascinated by the ‘Photo-Booth’ concept and the human placed in its own very particular environment.

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#44 On A TV Appearance Toward The End Of His Life In 1988, Serge Gainsbourg Was Surprised By A Choir Of Children (Les Petits Chanteurs D’asnières) In Full Gainsbourg Regalia—black Jacket, Gray Wig, Sunglasses, Whisky, Cigarette, Unshaven—and Brought To Tears By Their Homage To One Of His Classics – “J’e Suis Venu Te Dire Que Je M’en Vais”

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#45 Irreverent Nuns And A Dog, Madrid, 1960. (Photo By Manuel Iglesias)

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#46 ‘Safety’ Car Seat From The 1960s

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#47 Weronika Gesicka Is A Polish Artist, Born In Włocławek, Poland

She has graduated from the graphics department of the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw and the Academy of Photography. With her series entitled Unhappy Families, Gesicka diverts old vintage photos of American families, transforming the American Dream into surreal and twisted creations. “The project is based on vintage photographs purchased from an image bank,” Gesicka said. “Most of these photos came from American archives from the 1950s and 1960s.” “Family scenes, vacation souvenirs, everyday life, suspended anywhere between truth and fiction. It is hard to figure out whether they are spontaneous or entirely staged. We know nothing of the actual ties between the individuals in the photographs; we can only guess at the truthfulness of their gestures and gazes.” “I try to erase, as much as I can, the difference between an original image and my own alteration, creating a completely new history at the same time. These photos, modified in various ways, are wrapped in new contexts: our recollections of people and situations are transformed and gradually blur.”

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#48 In 1938 Betty Broadbent, The ‘Tattooed Venus’ Visited Sydney From America At The Invitation Of The Australian Sideshow Entrepreneur Arthur Greenhalg

PIX Magazine ran a story on Betty, who at that time had 465 tattoos on her body including a tattoo of the Madonna and child on her back and tattoos of Charles Lindbergh and Pancho Villa on her legs. She appeared on the cover of PIX Magazine on April 23, 1938 and she and the rest of the circus troupe performed at that year’s Easter Show in Sydney. Betty was born on November 1, 1909 in Philadelphia in the United States and her interest in tattoos began at the age of 14 when she met Jack Redcloud in Atlantic City. Redcloud introduced her to his tattooist, Charlie Wagner who gave Betty her first tattoos. By 1927 Betty’s entire body was tattooed and she was exhibiting her art with the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus where she also trained as a steer rider and performed with Tom Mix. Betty also learnt the trade and tattooed others, working in studios in Montreal, San Francisco and New York. Betty retired in 1967 and is often referred to as the most photographed tattooed lady of the 20th century. She died in her sleep on March 28, 1983.

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#49 Here’s The Original Mask That Michael Myers Wore In The First Two Halloween Movies

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#50 Back In The 1970s, A Young Man Went To Work For A Carnival Concessionaire Who, Each Summer, Took A Portable Photo Studio On The Road To County Fairs Across California And The West

For a few dollars, you could have a portrait-sized or larger photo of you and your loved-one to frame and put up on the wall, in only 15 minutes. Pre-digital, it was a good deal. But what kind of people had their portraits taken at county fairs? People without a lot of money. People who lived on the fringes. People whose life stories were written on their faces. But they wanted a record of who they were, that they could specify and dictate themselves, and they got that at the county fair. These portraits were made by the young man named Mikkel Aaland in a portable studio that was hauled from fair to fair between 1976 and 1980. The studio was complete with darkroom and a shooting stage and it took a crew of three to run it: a shooter, a front person to handle customers and a darkroom person to develop and print the 4×5 inch negative. “Because our prices were so reasonable, we often had lines of customers that lasted from ten in the morning to midnight,” Aaland said. “To give you an idea of our volume: on a busy day in Pleasanton, I shot over 450 portraits, averaging three people per print, meaning 1,350 mostly smiling faces.”

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#51 The Braathens, Sverre And Faye, Were Active And Avid Circus Fans And Collectors

Sverre’s passion for circus began in the early 1900s when he was a boy waiting for and later watching the Gollmar Brothers Circus unload, parade, and perform on the Great Plains in the small town of Mayville, North Dakota. Sverre mixed his love of music with his love for circuses and began collecting circus music material. Through the years, his collection grew to include route books, business materials, periodicals, and massive amounts of correspondence between all levels of circus personnel – from band members to performers, riggers to roustabouts. Every season found the Braathens following circuses throughout the upper Midwest and it was while following circuses that his photographic talents emerged. This image of a clown, who has always been an integral part of the circus, was captured in the saturated colors of Kodachrome slides and dates from the early 1940s to the late 1950s

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#52 Extreme Tree Pruning Before The Age Of Bucket Lifts From The Late 1800s

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#53 In 1971, French Designer Ruth Francken Took A Fine Looking Young Man And Copied His Beautiful Backside With Plaster To Create A Mold For The Homme Chair (“Homme” Is French For “Man”)

The procedure to create this unique chair is supervised by the artist. A limited edition of the chair in various colored plastic material was sponsored by Scte. Eric and Xiane Germain, Paris. The base is made of stainless steel tubing. The plaster is made directly on the model. In 1983, Francken reissued the Homme in a numbered edition with Felix Canetti and the Galerie X Plus. After Canetti’s death she continued production on her own and went on numbering the copies sequentially.

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#54 The 1950s Baby Safety Seat. Never Leave Your Child In A Hot Car While You Shop

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#55 Two Cub Scouts Taking Part In Operation Shoeshine, A Seven-Day Campaign During Scout Job Week

Their first customer was British actress Caroline Munro. Showing Ian Kinkaid (left) and Nigel Heap of Southgate, North London, polishing Miss Munro’s boots, 1972.

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#56 These Screaming Baby Dolls Made From Bisque Porcelain By German Doll Maker Kestner From The 1920s

Johannes Daniel Kestner, Jr., began producing high-quality dolls with papier-mâché heads and peg-jointed wooden bodies in 1805 in Waltershausen, Thuringia. By 1845, his J.D. Kestner doll manufacturing company had become a success. Following these wood-and-paper dolls, the company produced dolls with composition heads and cloth bodies. Kestner, was an early proponent of porcelain heads, so he added porcelain and bisque doll heads to his line in the 1850s. Around this time, the German dollmaking industry was exploding, with doll factories of every sort—some made only heads, some made only bodies, and some assembled doll parts made by others. Five years after Kestner died in 1858, his grandson Adolf Kestner took over. In 1860, he purchased a porcelain factory in Ohrdorf to make doll heads, which Kestner then attached to composition or stuffed-cloth or leather bodies. These heads were also sold to other doll makers around the country. Like every doll maker, Kestner produced a version of the universally popular “Dolly Face” head, which has the rounded, slightly double-chinned face of a toddler or baby. These dolls could be identified as a girl or a boy and featured an open mouth showing teeth, as well as inset, or sleeping, eyes. But the company also put out a wide variety of doll heads—some with long faces like Jumeau dolls, others with chubby square faces like Bru dolls, and yet others with character faces. One of Kestner’s innovations was an expensive leather body with riveted joints that allowed the limbs to move naturally. Kestner was one of the few German dollmakers that produced complete dolls all the way to the wigs and the fashion. These Kestner dolls were exported as far away as the United States. Kestner company first registered for a patent for its bisque heads in 1897, and the incised model numbers like “162” are often accompanied by “Made in Germany,” whereas bodies tend to have a red “Germany” stamp. The company finally closed its doors in 1938, 20 years after Adolf’s death

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#57 V-Flumes Were Used To Transport Logs, Lumber, Working Material And Supplies But They Were Also Used To Transport People And For Entertainment From The Early 20th Century

A sick or injured person from the mountains would many times be placed in a “flume boat” and sent to the valley, sometimes alone and sometimes with family or friends in attendance, for medical treatment. It was the fastest way to get them help. A very ‘trendy’ date night would include asking your date to walk with you along the flumes, especially at 100 feet above ground at the highest trestle points (which have no railing, but you are in a shallow flume), to show how much you cared for her and how bold and courageous you were. Including lunch or dinner only made the date that much more special. Loggers liked the flumes since it got them to town much faster for one of their few nights off. (Remember many logging towns did not allow drinking.) The loggers would build small boats to fit the flume with which they could ride down to town. But for the early loggers the most fun was the sport of flume riding. This daring sport gained popularity in 1865–1895 starting out as log-riding and then becoming the more ‘refined’ sport of flume riding. Some of the more interesting rides would have the ‘logger boat’ flying off the flume endpoint at an exorbitant height and speed where the passengers needed to make sure they ejected from the log before the log hit the water and they were safe and far from where the log would land. No one knows where flume riding started – probably in ancient Roman aquaducts – which more closely resembled the box flumes with large volumes of water moving at slow speeds. V-flumes changed the sport.

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#58 Considered Now To Be One Of The Greatest Milliners And Hat-Makers In The World, The Hats David Shilling Designed For His Mother Gertrude To Be Worn At Royal Ascot In The 1960s, 1970s And 1980s Were Anywhere From Over The Top, To Avant-Garde, To Just Plain Insane

For 30 years, until she was well into her 80s, Gertrude Shilling appeared at showy events in towering creations that took imagination to design and construct, and a very determined sort of cheek to wear. There was the five-foot tall giraffe design that she pioneered in the 1970s, a three-foot wide daisy hat – with a stalk embroidered down the back of her coat – and a massive concoction of an apple with a four-foot arrow pierced through it

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#59 Every Christmas You Try To Innovate And Surprise Your Visitors, Maybe It’s Time To Find An Old Cookbook

You will be able to create unimaginable things and put them on the dining table. Now, it’s time to introduce everyone to your famous Christmas tree with shrimp

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#60 Pictures Of Arnold Schwarzenegger Walking Through Munich In Swimming Trunks In Order To Promote His Own Gym, 1967

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#61 Could Be The Man In The Moon, Circa 1894-1895. (Photo By Nadar)

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#62 Strange Vintage Photos Of People Milking Cow Into Cat’s Mouth From The 1920s

If you’ve ever read children’s books where there’s a cat, you’re probably wondering, “Can cats drink milk?” The age-old myth that milk and cats go hand-in-hand has officially been debunked by veterinarians and cat experts. Regardless of how tasty milk may be to your cat, this is bad news for their stomach and digestive system. As it turns out, most cats are lactose intolerant. Just like humans, some cats can’t digest lactose, a milk sugar that’s found in dairy. The only time in a cat’s life when its body actually has enough of the enzyme lactase to properly digest lactose is at birth and during its early years of life. This is so the cat can feed off of its mother’s milk. After that, less and less lactase is produced, resulting in potentially increased digestive complications. “Even though some cats can tolerate milk and seem to enjoy it, cow’s milk just isn’t good for cats,” Dr. Gary Richter, a veterinary health expert with Rover, told Reader’s Diges. “Cats don’t need dairy milk, and the potential problems outweigh the potential benefits.”

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#63 A Couple At A Fair In Mexico, 1940

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#64 A Sailor “Meets” His Baby For The First Time After Fourteen Months At Sea, 1940s

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#65 Krampus Sees You When You’re Sleeping, He Knows If You’ve Been Bad Or Good — And He Is Coming For You!

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#66 An Iconic And Widely Influential Horror Film That Shocked French Audiences Upon Its Debut, ‘Eyes Without A Face’ (Les Yeux Sans Visage) Of 1960 Remains Powerful Today In Its Tale Of Obsession And Murder

A respected surgeon kidnaps young women in the hopes of grafting their faces onto that of his disfigured, imprisoned daughter, whose mutilated visage remains hidden behind an expressionless white mask. Georges Franju’s masterpiece, weighted in equal measure by poetry and camp, can be thought of as an early incarnation of French cinema’s fascination with exploring the dark realms of desire.

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#67 As Ridiculous Looking As It Was, The Braun Astronette Remained In Production For Many Years In Both Europe And South America. Some Units Were Made In Argentina Meaning You Can Still Find A 110v That Will Work In The United States

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#68 In 1956, British Photographer Grace Robertson Spent The Day With Women Who Drank At A South London Pub On Their Outing To Margate, Kent, England

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#69 Meanwhile, In 1898 Montana

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#70 Apparently In The 1930s, Pageants Requiring The Contestants To Cover Their Faces Was Quite Commonplace, Whether For The Purpose Of Judging Only Their Bodies, Or Only Their Eyes, Which Are Both Scenarios

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#71 The Cheerleader

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#72 Couple Cuddling While Sitting In A Hole As Others Enjoy The Beach On The 4th Of July In Santa Monica, California, 1950. (Photographed By Ralph Crane)

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#73 Vintage Portrait Of A Lady Known As “Tea Cup Sallie,” Ca. 1870s

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#74 In September Of 1992, Pearl Jam, In Order To Celebrate Their Seeming Overnight Success, Staged A Free Show In Seattle’s Magnusson Park For Over 70,000 People

At one point in the show, Eddie proceeded to climb the stage scaffolding in a death defying move, trailing 100 feet of microphone cable behind him in order to loop it over the top, rappel down and then swing out over the audience. “I was channeling something different,” he once said of his onstage escapades. “I got to that place you hear about where the mom lifts the car off the two-year-old kid. It was that kind of adventure. At that point in life and having at long last the opportunity to play for bigger crowds, I really and truly felt like I had nothing to lose. No thoughts of what may be waiting in my future. It was all about the now. And that was part and parcel with whatever message the group and I had to impart on the audience at that instance. Risking your hide to evoke that emotion became part of the program.” These photographs capture all the pent up rage and fury that was Eddie and the band at that time. In retrospect it was a really dumb thing to do – his career and life could have been over in a splat – the anxiety of 70,00 fans was palpable in the air – but thankfully it was a glorious rock and roll moment in what would become a long and storied career.

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#75 We Can Recognize The Pumpkin To The Right But It Will Probably Take Us Some More Time To Guess The Character To The Left

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#76 Harold Lloyd’s Magnificent (Year-Round) Christmas Tree

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#77 Doug Coombs Dropping Into Corbert’s Couloir, Jackson Hole, Wyoming. 1989

Doug was a trailblazer in adventure skiing and remains a legend in the community to this day

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#78 Original Polaroid Of Ventriloquist Head Circa 1975, From Jim Linderman’s Collection

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#79 This Mask Could Come Straight From A Horror Film, Originally It Even Had False Teeth Stitched Into Its Mouth. It Is Made Of Leather, With Real Teeth Fixed In The Mouth And Human Hair Attached To The Forehead

The mask is today in the National Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh. This mask was first discovered in the 1840s in a cottage near Cumnock. Along with the wig and a sword it had just been handed down from generation to generation as a family heirloom. This grim mask dates from around 1660-1670 and was made to disguise the identity of Alexander Peden “The Prophet of the Covenant”. Also known simply as “Sandy”.

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#80 It’s Dangerous To Leave A Small Baby Unattended In The Bathtub, And Yet, When The Telephone Rings Or The Doorbell Must Be Answered, It Is Sometimes Inconvenient Not To Be Able To Do So

In 1939, Carl H. Fischer, a Council Bluffs, Iowa, engineer and father of three youngsters, solved this problem with the ingenious device. The baby is strapped in a harness that is attached to a metal bar. When the bar is turned, rubber pads threaded to the ends press tightly against the sides of the tub and hold the safety bar firmly in place

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Source: boredpanda.com