Vintage 3-D stereoviews of old Japan, Meiji and Taisho era swimsuit girls, working people, geisha, and kids, old Japan salt prints, dozens of T. Enami glass slides, and strange or offbeat images: all part of a vast and superb collection of Japanese photos from 1862 to 1930 by flickr user Okinawa Soba.
posted on Sep 9, 2008 - View this thread

A few hundred photos of Afghanistan by a Canadian photographer. Some from the 1970s, some since 2000. Just a reminder there's more to the country than a testing ground for military technology and terrorist tactics. Some beautiful images and some scenes of everyday life. Accompanied by the photographer's personal commentary.
posted on Aug 13, 2008 - View this thread

The Sidney D Gamble Photograph Collection at Duke University consists of about 5,000 newly digitised pictures, taken predominantly in China between 1917 and 1932. Browse by subject, category or location tags. Photos taken in 1908 are to be added in the future. [via]
posted on Jul 9, 2008 - View this thread

The first drive-in movie theater was opened on June 6, 1933, by salesman Richard M. Hollingshead in Camden, N.J. On the bill was a twilight showing of the British comedy Wife Beware. And so the drive-in era was born, peaking in 1958 with almost 5,000 theaters in the U.S alone. These days you'd be hard pressed trying to find one but thankfully there are plenty of handy lists online telling you just where to find one (there's even one for Aussies like me!). And that's not all we have to be thankful for; the drive-in scene is apparently witnessing something of a "mini-revival" at present. Don't feel like going out? Then why not make your own? First you'll need instructions on how to build one. Then you'll need intermission-advertisements (you can download or even just watch heaps of them for free here). And then you'll need a handy list of the kinds of films they used to show at the drive-in. If you're in the US, you'll need to know some of the special rules the FCC has for drive-ins, and if you have any more questions, I'm sure the fine folk at the United Drive-In Theater Owners Association could help. All of this sound like too much work? Then just sit back and check out the videos and photos on this nice site (it's about drive-ins, of course!).
posted on Feb 18, 2008 - View this thread

From about 1875 to the 1940s, cigarette cards spurred tobacco sales. Sets offer a glimpse into the popculture of the times, spanning newsmakers, cinema celebrities, and sports stars; cute illustrated subjects, like "frisky" and children with rosy cheeks; handy info like air raid precautions, first aid, and amusing tricks; and neat stuff like famous escapes, exotic races, and figures of speech. Browse more fun sets of vintage images.
posted on Dec 11, 2007 - View this thread

The great Seattle Fire. "The spring of 1889 in Seattle had been beautiful....Unfortunately, the unusually good weather proved to be disastrous, as the dry conditions conspired with a handful of other elements to allow for the worst fire in city history...the fire burned until 3:00 am. When it was done, the damage was enormous. 120 acres (25 city blocks) had been destroyed, as was every wharf and Mill from Union to Jackson Streets. Although the loss of human life was evidently low (no statistics were kept on that) it was estimated that 1 million rats were killed...." Photo gallery. A roughly contemporaneous account. A Historylink essay on the fire. How the fire changed Seattle's architecture.
posted on Nov 7, 2007 - View this thread

Sweet guinea pig of Winnipeg! 250 stories about Winnipeg! (and Manitoba...)
posted on Oct 12, 2007 - View this thread

Photographs of American Cities from the middle of the 20th Century.
posted on Sep 29, 2007 - View this thread

Circus History, with photos, logos, show routes, and more. See also Circus World, Circus Web, and Princeton's Circus Poster Archive.
posted on Aug 28, 2007 - View this thread

52 Influential Photographs: From the oldest survivng photograph, to images of revolution, misery, beauty and humility, to...goatse and LOLCAT? You win some, you lose some, I guess.
posted on Aug 4, 2007 - View this thread

The Third View project is a fascinating presentation of "rephotographs" of over 100 historic landscape sites in the American West that presents original 19th-century survey photographs, photographed again in the 1970s, then once again in the '90s - from the original vantage points, under similar lighting conditions, at (roughly) the same time of day and year. [Flash, and you'll probably need to allow pop-ups; a little more info inside...]
posted on Jun 15, 2007 - View this thread

No trip to San Diego's Historic Balboa Park would be complete without witnessing some awesome street performers.
posted on Jun 14, 2007 - View this thread

Northwestern University hosts a fine collection of historic East African photographs, viewable as sample sets or in their original photo-albums (requires flash). But the real prize is their wonderful collection of 113 historic maps of Africa, which are zoomable to incredible detail, also 1, 2, 3. via
posted on Jun 11, 2007 - View this thread

Russia in photos: 1941-1945.
posted on May 11, 2007 - View this thread

Shorpy is an unusual photoblog; billed as "the 100-year-old photography blog," it focuses on found images from many, many decades gone by. Some favorites, so far.
posted on Mar 19, 2007 - View this thread

LA6NCA's WW2 German Radio Collection Pictures and a little history on many WW2 German radios including a cute as a button spy radio and the Lichtsprechgerät 80, an incoherent light audio transceiver. Also featured are a few photo essays of the equipment in use (Enigma, Luftwaffe Signals unit redeploying). [dorian
posted on Feb 8, 2007 - View this thread

Search early 20th Century news photos. Welcome to the Library of Congress' new George Grantham Bain Collection: the extensive files of one of America's earliest news picture agencies. Some favorites after a morning spent perusing just a small number of the 50kish pics: The Whiteman Submarine Band, a fire truck heading to the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire, the flowers at Wilbur Wright's funeral, Ignaz Hildebrandt dead in Union Square, Theatre marquee, a fire in NYC, midday crowd in Union Square, Penn station on a Sunday, suffragettes......and many more.
posted on May 2, 2006 - View this thread

The Bancroft Library unveils a new 1906 San Francisco Earthquake site featuring a really cool clickable map that features photos from each section of town. Haight Street didn't look too bad, but just down the road, City Hall was leveled. The exhibit offers a guide to the event that look place nearly 100 years ago.
posted on Jan 14, 2006 - View this thread

Photos of Christchurch NZ. Walk the High Street, stop at the corner chemist, or catch the Gaieties. Contains more than a thousand historic pictures, some of startling clarity.
posted on Feb 3, 2005 - View this thread

Big Hats and Eroticism is just one of the many features of Tallulahs.com, an excellent site dedicated to images of the vintage nude. There's also lots of wonderful trivia and commentary, such as a brief biography of the Mante sisters (immortalized in the brilliant ballerina images of painter Edgar Degas), and the story of Liane de Pougy, convent girl turned runaway wife, turned celebrated dancer of the French stage, turned Romanian Princess. Or you can read about the mystery of H. Traut, elusive photographer of "the gentle eroticism of fairyland" whose images graced hundreds of postcards for several years until he seemingly vanished from the scene some time before WWI. Interested in drawing or painting nudes yourself? Here's a page of classical nude poses - studies in various categories that you can work from, including "The beauty of butts" and "seductive smoking"! Plus, you can peruse Tallulah's own art nudes, and a fabulous links page. NSFW, obviously.
posted on Aug 9, 2004 - View this thread

Dazzling, full-color shots of people long since dead, landscapes long since paved, and an empire long since overthrown.
A pre-WW I process for creating color image projections meets Photoshop®
posted on Jan 16, 2004 - View this thread

McIntyre, Pennsylvania, The Everyday Life Of A Coal Mining Company Town: 1910-1947.
posted on Sep 13, 2003 - View this thread

Staffordshire Past Track. History and images of an English Midlands county : old photographs and online exhibitions on historic churches, celebrations, birth, death, serial killers and mining (and the 1984-85 strike).
Related sites :- the Museums of the Potteries, the area around Stoke-on-Trent which played a major role in the Industrial Revolution; thepotteries.org, including postcards and photographs; In Search of Agenoria, black and white photographs of the post-industrial Black Country landscape; A Miner's Son- more mining history in the Midlands (with more on the 1984-85 strike, possibly the most divisive political event in recent British history); save Bethesda Chapel, a historic Methodist chapel in Stoke; panoramic views and history of Lichfield Cathedral and other Staffordshire places.
posted on Aug 25, 2003 - View this thread

Maps of Liberia , 1830-1879. The American Colonization Society was founded in 1817 to resettle free black Americans in West Africa. Here's a brief history of the American Colonization Society, with images of places, currency, letters etc.
The Yekepa Memory Project includes materials about Yekepa, Liberia, such as postcards and stamps.
Related :- Liberia, June 1999 photoessay.
Also of interest :- a collection of photos of neighbouring Guinea, 1905.
posted on Jun 13, 2003 - View this thread

The California Museum of Photography has several interesting exhibits currently online. The images taken in Iraq (ca. 1956) and Afghanistan (ca. 1933) are timely and timeless. Read the essay on the vernacular church exhibit for a wonderful and brief exposure to the language of art photography.
posted on May 6, 2003 - View this thread

The Gallery of Regrettable Food: "Frizzle slices of cooked ham in hot butter, adding 1 1/2 teaspoons of drained prepared horseradish to each 2 tablespoons of butter or margarine. Add cheese." Advertisements, Strange recipes from "the golden age of butter", and just plain weird stuff. Also, I think this guy used to do my tech support. with thanks to Television Without Pity and cakeman
posted on Feb 12, 2003 - View this thread

The Griffith Institute and Oxford's Ashmolean Museum have recently made the complete records of Howard Carter's excavation of the tomb of Tutankhamun available on the web. You can browse the complete list of objects as well as read all the original handwritten descriptive cards and view any or all of Harry Burton's original photographs (many taken in situ and never before published). You can also read Howard Carter's complete personal field diaries from 1922 and 1923. Although this is still an work in progress, its an easy way to lose a couple of hours for any MeFi Egyptology fans. with thanks to The Daily Grail
posted on Jul 8, 2002 - View this thread