During the 1920s Paris had gained a reputation for the variety of its nighttime pleasures and for its free and easy attitude toward life in general. Within this climate of relative tolerance many gay and lesbian nightclubs opened and flourished. Among thes…
Members of the French Resistance are photographed in the midst of battle against German troops during the Liberation of Paris. We see a man in makeshift army fatigues to the left and a young man on the right. Then, most strikingly, we see a woman in shorts…
The photo was taken by the Irish photographer Colman Doyle. The original caption: "A woman IRA volunteer on active service in West Belfast with an AR18 assault rifle”. The IRA regularly conducted “show of arms” displays, showing off their modern and numero…
They are all wearing dance shoes so they are probably performers for a variety show. Since no one had decent air conditioning back then, practicing their acts outside on the roof was better than in a stuffy theater. Someone must have thought it'd make a go…
Female snipers of the 3rd Shock Army, 1st Belorussian Front. The 'Shock' armies were created with the specific structure to engage and destroy significant enemy forces, and were reinforced with more armored and artillery assets than other combined arms arm…
French women who befriended the Nazis, through coerced, forced, or voluntary relationships, were singled out for shameful retribution following the liberation of France. The woman photographed here, believed to have been a prostitute who serviced German oc…
Roza Shanina was a Soviet sniper during World War II who was credited with fifty-nine confirmed kills, including twelve soldiers during the Battle of Vilnius. Shanina volunteered for the military after the death of her brother in 1941 and chose to be a mar…
A room full of women are hard at work emulating the “real danger” present in the master poster hanging in the background. It looks like some kind of class, like a high school or college art class. They may be all working on the same poster because they’re …
Until the end of the 1930s the best women’s stockings were made from silk. This changed in the United States when DuPont began manufacturing nylon in 1939. Nylon stockings went on limited sale in October of that year followed by a national launch at selected…
Women in uniform have always an appeal. She is so amazingly beautiful. The uniforms were meant to be professional, feminine, attractive, and functional. Women were encouraged to be feminine (like wearing red lipstick) for morale. The Women's Army Corps …
Aleksandra Samusenko, born in 1922, was a member of the Soviet armed forces who fought during Winter War in Finland and during the Great Patriotic War. After successfully finished the tank academy, Samusenko received her Order of the Red Star when her tank…
Her name is Lam Thi Dep (Dep means beautiful in Vietnamese), the picture was taken in 1972 at Soc Trang Province by Vietnamese journalist Minh Truong. "You could find women like her almost everywhere during the war", said the photographer. "She was only 24…
These two men are manumitted slaves. Manumission is the act of a slave owner freeing his or her slaves. They borrowed the clothes and the hats just for the picture. It's a posed photograph and a statement about being manumitted rather than a picture of a w…