The term "burlesque" means a literary, dramatic, or musical work intended to cause laughter by caricaturing the manner or spirit of serious works, or by ludicrous treatment of their subjects. It’s a form of theatrical entertainment featuring parodic humor, …
These photos include old advertisements that preyed on women’s need for marital security in order to sell products in the mid-20th century and are collected by Andrew Heisel. It’s no surprise advertisers pay attention to consumers’ emotions in order to …
Advertising has always been an interesting way to trace how modern society has evolved. At the core, the marketing campaigns are based on what people want and what appeals to them. When you judge human history based on old advertisements, the past will …
These vintage photos show one of the unique features of Detroit in winter: the famous ice fountain on Washington Boulevard. Several jets of water are allowed to play all winter, resulting in tons of crystal and massive berg of ice that at times reached heig…
Mug shot photography revolutionized crime investigations and enabled the police to keep visual records of the arrested criminals. Beginning in the mid-1800s, police photographed the faces of known criminals. Called "mug shots" (after the British slang w…
These vivid photos from inside the 1972 Texas State Fair exhibition hall show people sampling a wide variety of the products of their state, from eggs and beef to pecans and spring water. The Dallas State Fair & Exposition, to which the present State Fa…
The Sámi form an indigenous ethnic group that settled in wide areas of Norway, Sweden, northern Finland, and on the Kola peninsula in Russia. It is difficult to establish their number, because ethnic definitions may vary, and the choice of identifying o…
Picasso’s self-portraits are important because they span his entire career, and we can trace how his manner of self-depiction changed over time. It’s interesting to compare the self-portraits from, for instance, the Blue Period to those done when he was…
The Great Migrations from 1910 to 1960 brought hundreds of thousands of African-Americans from the South to Chicago, where they became an urban population. They created churches, community organizations, businesses, music, and literature. African Americans …
These military portraits collected by Christopher B. Steiner, a professor of art history and anthropology at Connecticut College, capture moments of soldiers being goofy while posing with fake military props. Some images appear to be staged to accentuate si…
Spirit photography began in the late 19th century, around the time that the spiritualism movement was gaining traction across Europe and the United States. The photographers who practiced it claimed that they could capture images of portrait subjects and th…
These photographs, taken by the Lomen family, capture the indigenous Yupik Eskimo and the prospectors of the Gold Rush in Alaska during the early decades of the 20th century. The term "Eskimo" is used in Alaska to refer to arctic Alaskans including Inup…
This collection of photographs shows some of the world's oldest and oddest vending machines. Nowadays almost anything imaginable can now be purchased from the vending machines, however, the trend for automated purchases is nothing new, as these vintage phot…
The Golden State got its nickname from the Sierra Nevada gold that lured so many miners and settlers to the West, but California has earned much more wealth from so-called “black gold” than from metallic gold. When Europeans finally arrived in Californi…
At 240 feet (73 m) long by 62 feet wide (19 m) and reaching a height of 66 feet (20 m), the Great Sphinx is one of the largest statues in the world. Even the ancient Egyptians themselves were puzzled by the remote antiquity and purpose of the Great Sphi…
Although the birth control pill and other hormonal contraceptive devices are modern inventions, birth control forms have been around for thousands of years. The earliest known recordings of birth control methods date back to ancient Mesopotamia, around …
In this collection, creepy vintage photographs show anything from the primitive Halloween costumes of the past to Victorian-era portraits where something doesn’t feel quite right. Perhaps it’s grainy black and white, sometimes sepia feel to them. Or maybe b…
In the late 19th century and early 20th century, strongmen more often exhibited their incredible power as circus performers and entertainers than as competitive athletes. Originating in Europe and spreading to the United States, physical culturists incl…
Arguably one of the best-known and most recognizable bridges in the world, Tower Bridge was built in the late nineteenth century and immediately acclaimed as a feat of Victorian engineering. Designed to ease road traffic while maintaining river access, it w…
Dubbed by the media as the “world’s largest log cabin,” (actually, second largest), the Forestry Building was constructed as part of Portland’s Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition of 1905. The cabin was an enormous structure, measuring 206 feet long (…