As early as the fifteenth century, baby walkers helped toddlers learn to walk and encouraged erect posture (which carried moral overtones of upright character). European book illustrations and paintings of the 17th and 18th centuries show similar baby walke…
In 1900s England, a mother-of-four named Mary Ann Bevan developed acromegaly and took up the title of being "the ugliest woman in the world" as a way to provide for her children. This is her tragic story, a reminder of how cruel the world can be. The Wo…
These glass-plate photographs depicting life in Japan were collected in Yokohama during the years 1908–1918 by Herbert Geddes, a manager for a Canadian import-export company. Originally, these types of photographs were sold as postcards or souvenirs to fore…
Henry Ford was not the first to create the assembly line, but his car and moving assembly line were certainly the most successful and memorable. After creating his version of the automobile in 1896, Ford moved workshops first to Mack Avenue and later to Piq…
Bugatti was founded in 1909 in the then-German city of Molsheim, Alsace, by the Italian-born industrial designer Ettore Bugatti. The cars were known for their design beauty and for their many race victories. Famous Bugatti automobiles include the Type 35 Gr…
These old color photos, part of Albert Kahn’s collection, were captured by photographer Stefan Passe in 1913 and depict everyday life scenes in Mongolia. At the time of Passe’s journey, Mongolia was under the protectorate of the Russian Empire with full aut…
When societies industrialize, food systems expand and specialize to meet the new waves of customers. These amazing old photographs show Japan’s demae, or delivery men, who braved the crowded streets balancing towers of dozens of piping hot meals on their sh…
Throughout the decades, a number of important and interesting sites and landmarks have been lost, many due to the urbanization of cities, sometimes they're torn down due to mounting maintenance costs after falling into disrepair, and sometimes they'll fall pre…
Many think that London was the best place in the world in the 1960s. Youth culture flourished and post-war austerity finally gave place to a decade of optimism and exploration. In this decade, the traditional hierarchies begin to dissolve paving the way for…
In 1953, the biggest vessel to travel the Mississippi River and Illinois Waterway (at the time) managed to wind its way downtown on the Chicago River. This steel hull behemoth was nearly 634 feet long (193m) and 70 feet wide (21.3m) and according to a Chica…
These photos show bizarre vintage inventions that quite often never caught on, but sometimes, they actually did. The weird inventions demonstrate ingenious efforts from the first half of the 20th century (and later) that helped people manage the pressures o…
From doll masks to decorated bags over heads to specially crafted outfits, these fascinating and nightmarish photos capture random people donning their Halloween costumes. It has to be said that these vintage photos were taken using much less sensitive came…
The Isetta was a microcar that was originally designed in Italy during the early 1950s. In the beginning, some people described it as a vehicle that looked like it had a collision between a refrigerator and a scooter. Initially manufactured by the Itali…
Nikola Tesla was a Serbian American inventor, electrical engineer, mechanical engineer, and futurist best known for his contributions to the design of the modern alternating current electricity supply system. Training for an engineering career, he attended …
Rainey Bethea (born in 1909) was the last person to be publicly executed in the United States. An African-American male, who was about 26 years old, he confessed to the rape and murder of a 70-year-old white woman named Lischia Edwards, and was publicly hanged…
Man-lifting kites are specially designed kites that can lift humans. Back in the day, when airplanes and helicopters were pure fantasy, these man-lifting kites were the closest that humans could get to their dream of flying. Originally, the kites were used …
The Warsaw Uprising of 1944 was a heroic and tragic 63-day struggle to liberate World War 2 Warsaw from German occupation. The Uprising began on 1 August 1944 as part of a nationwide Operation Tempest, launched at the time of the Soviet Lublin–Brest Offensi…
The Islamic Republic imposes strict rules on Iranian life. This extended photo collection shows Iranian society prior to the 1979 Islamic Revolution and, it’s obvious that Iran was a very different world. It was also a world that was looking brighter for wo…
Diana, Princess of Wales, commonly called Princess Diana was a member of the British royal family. She was the first wife of Charles, Prince of Wales (later Charles III), and mother of Princes William and Harry. Diana's activism and glamour made her an inte…
History is filled with unusual stories, and sometimes we're lucky enough to see them preserved forever in pictures. In this photo collection, you can see around 45 most unique and bizarre photographs in history. Photographs can give us a window into the p…