The Interesting Story Behind the Iconic Photograph of Richard Gere at a Gas Station in San Bernardino, 1977

Back in 1977, Herb Ritts, then an amateur photographer, met up with his good friend, the equally unknown actor Richard Gere. One day, the two were cruising together around San Bernardino, California when their car got a flat. As legend has it, the two ambled into a gas station, and while they awaited service, Ritts started shooting his pal. Three months later, the well-oiled images landed in the pages of Vogue, Esquire, and Mademoiselle.

© Herb Ritts Foundation, courtesy of the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Gift of Herb Ritts Foundation

In an interview with François Quintin in 1999, Ritts talked about this famous picture of his friend Richard, which depicts Gere as a new American hero—and which launched Ritts’s photography career. Here’s an excerpt from the interview:

“I knew Richard’s girlfriend, Penny, who was an actress, and she introduced me to Richard. Actually, when I first started dabbling in photography, I was still working for my parents as a salesman. Penny was supposed to come to my house to take a head shot, but she never showed. Richard arrived; he was going to meet her there. I asked if I could take a picture of him, and he said no—he was very shy and had very long hair—but finally I did. 

“A week or so later, we were driving around in Penny’s car and got a flat tire and ended up in a desert gas station, where we took pictures. Later that year, Richard told his new publicist, “Oh, Herb took a couple of rolls of me.” He had fairly well-known photographers shooting him already; it happened quickly for him. So I sent the negatives and forgot about it. What did I know? I wasn’t a photographer. Three months later, the pictures appeared in American Vogue, Esquire, and Mademoiselle. Big spreads. One day soon thereafter, Mademoiselle tracked me down and asked me to do Brooke Shields, and I said sure. I didn’t say I wasn’t a photographer.”

On the eve of the Getty Center’s retrospective, the actor recalled the distinct style of the late artist and longtime friend:

“I was 26 or so when I met Herb Ritts. Somehow he was in this group of actors. He was the one who was really nice to be around, unlike a lot of people in that group who weren’t, including me. Sometime in the mid-’70s, I remember him telling me that he was going to take night classes in photography. Later, I remember calling him and saying, “Let’s go riding into the desert and shoot some stuff.” The car in that shot (right) was my girlfriend’s, and we got a flat tire. That’s why it’s at the gas station. We didn’t have a sense that it was significant. We were just shooting, having fun. But it’s actually a complex photo with the juxtaposition of hard and soft and different angles.

“There’s a very real reason why Herb was on top of everyone’s list of still photographers. He captured something in his subjects — an essential quality. We recognize ourselves. He had a warmth in his photographs that everyone liked.

“Herb shot people he knew and had a feeling for, and if he didn’t know them, he had a respect for them. I don’t think he shot someone if he didn’t like or respect them — I don’t think he could have done it.

“On set, Herb created a very easy, flowing atmosphere. He’s one of the warmest human beings I’ve ever known. He loved to use natural light, and he knew which hours of the day and which sides of the studio the light came in and how to bounce it the right way. Something that I don’t think everyone realizes about Herb is that he was an artist. He did fashion photography as a job but had the soul of an artist, and he wanted that shot.

“He was the kind of guy that whenever I see mutual friends who loved Herb, we start crying.”

Gorgeous Vintage Portraits of Ingrid Bergman in the 1940s

Ingrid Bergman found her first success in the United States for her critically acclaimed performance in Intermezzo: A Love Story (1939). Hailed as a fine new talent, Bergman appeared in three films in 1941: Adam Has Four Sons, Rage in Heaven, and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde—the last earned her even more praises. That same year she was also successful on her second stage appearance in Anna Christie. In 1942 Bergman had her most famous and enduring role as Ilsa Lund in Casablanca. Despite receiving numerous acclaims, the film was not one of Bergman’s favorite performances.

Bergman received her first Oscar nomination for For Whom the Bell Tolls in 1943. Ernest Hemingway himself stated that “Miss Bergman, and no one else, should play the part.” Her performance as a “wife driven close to madness” in Gaslight (1944) won Bergman her first Academy Award. She received her third consecutive Oscar nomination for her role as a nun in The Bells of St. Mary’s in 1945. That same year Bergman also appeared in Spellbound, the first of her three collaborations with Alfred Hitchcock. Notorious, her second film with Hitchcock, was released in 1946. Bergman won a Tony Award for her performance in Joan of Lorraine in 1947. Joan of Arc (1948), the movie adaptation of the play, would later earn her another Oscar nomination. Bergman’s last film of the decade, also the last of her collaboration with Hitchcock, was Under Capricorn (1949).

Take a look back at the legendary actress in the 1940s through 30 stunning vintage portraits:

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32 Lovely Portrait Photos of Japanese Children From Between the 1930s and ’50s

These vintage photos were found by Vintage Japan-esque that show lovely portraits of Japanese children, possibly from between the 1930s and 1950s.

Portraits of Japanese children from between the 1930s and 1950s

Photographs are from a large wooden box that appears to have belonged to a Japanese portrait photographer in Japan. One box of film included showed an expiration date of 1951.

A girl in braids, a dress, and flats holding Chitose Ame Shichi-Go-San candy

A Japanese boy and Japanese girl in traditional happi coats (he is wearing a headband as well)

A Japanese boy in a suit with hat and a girl in kimono with hair bow

A Japanese boy in a suit with traditional Shichi-Go-San (seven-five-three) candy

A Japanese boy in a traditional happi coat, a headband, and bells

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Beautiful Photos of the 1969 Ford Mustang Mach 1

The Ford Mustang Mach 1 is a performance-oriented option package of the Ford Mustang, originally introduced in August 1968 for the 1969 model year. It was available until 1978, returned briefly in 2003, 2004, and most recently 2021.

As part of a Ford heritage program, the Mach 1 package returned in 2003 as a high-performance version of the New Edge platform. Visual connections to the 1969 model were integrated into the design to pay homage to the original. This generation of the Mach 1 was discontinued after the 2004 model year, with the introduction of the fifth generation Mustang.

Ford first used the name “Mach 1” in its 1969 display of a concept called the “Levacar Mach I” at the Ford Rotunda. This concept vehicle used a cushion of air as propulsion on a circular dais.

Here below is a set of beautiful photos of the 1969 Ford Mustang Mach 1.

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No Safety Bars Needed, These Vintage Photographs of Snow King Chairlifts Will Give You the Anxiety!

Many people freaked out by these vintage photographs of Snow King chairlifts from between the 1950s and 1970s. The biggest issue is the lack of safety bars over the front, and people detailed how the images made them feel sick, anxious, or worried. It also might have to do with the perspective of the photos, which show the entire town of Jackson in the background and might be a forced perspective that makes the lift look much higher than it actually is.

Safety bars are sometimes used on chairlifts, but not always. Their presence arguably interferes with the primary application of chairlifts in their contexts — enabling riders to enter them and, a few minutes later, disembark onto ski slopes with ease.

In 1936, the Civilian Conservation Corps created a switch-back horse and hiking trail to the top of the mountain and the trail became one of Snow King’s first skiing race courses. The Jackson Hole Ski Club was established in 1937, and two years later lift-served skiing began on Wyoming's first ski area with the addition of a 4,000-foot (1,220 m) rope tow.

The first chairlift was installed in 1946, a converted ore tram from Colorado. It had four stations, with the first starting where 1 town hill apartments are located. Stations 2 and 3, which were up the hill, were for beginners and intermediate skiers and snowboarders. The lift to the top originally began as a single chair lift in the 1940s, but by the late 1950s, the single chair was replaced with a double. In 1981 the entire lift was replaced with the Summit Lift there now.

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Edwardian London as Seen Through the Eyes of a Russian Tourist

London entered the 20th century at the height of its influence as the capital of the largest empire in history, but the new century was to bring many challenges. London was the largest city in the world from about 1825 until it was overtaken by New York City in 1925.

The years between Queen Victoria’s death in 1901 and the start of the First World War in 1914 were years of growth and general prosperity, though the extreme inequalities which had characterized Victorian London continued. By 1900 one out of five Britons lived in London, with the population of roughly 5 million in 1900 rising to over 7 million by 1911.

These 20 amazing photographs below show street scenes of London at the turn of the 20th century. They were taken by an unknown Russian tourist in 1909.

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35 Beautiful Photos of Joan Leslie in the 1940s

Born 1925 as Joan Agnes Theresa Sadie Brodel in Highland Park, Michigan, American actress and vaudevillian Joan Leslie had her first film role in Camille (1936), and was selected to play a small role in Men with Wings (1938). She gained her first credited role in Winter Carnival (1939) as Betsy Phillips. Later that year, she co-starred with Jimmy Lydon in Two Thoroughbreds.

At age 15, Leslie was selected by a group of Hollywood directors as one of 13 “baby stars of 1940.” That same year, she appeared in the Warner Bros. film short, Alice in Movieland. Her big break came when she signed a contract with Warner Bros. in 1941. At the time, actress Joan Blondell’s name was considered too similar, so Brodel’s acting name was changed to Joan Leslie.

During World War II, Leslie was a regular volunteer at the Hollywood Canteen, where she danced with servicemen and signed hundreds of autographs. She was featured with Robert Hutton, among many others, in the Warner Bros. film Hollywood Canteen (1944). In 1946, an exhibitors’ poll conducted by Motion Picture Herald voted Leslie the most promising star of tomorrow.

In the early 1950s, Leslie chose to focus on raising her daughters, which resulted in a more irregular film career. Her last film was The Revolt of Mamie Stover (1956), but she continued making sporadic appearances in television shows while her children were at school. She retired from acting in 1991, after appearing in the TV film Fire in the Dark.

Leslie died in 2015 in Los Angeles, California at the age of 90. Take a look at these vintage photos to see the beauty of young Joan Leslie in the 1940s.

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“The Vertue of the COFFEE Drink”: The Earliest Known Advertisement for Making and Selling Coffee, circa 1652

Apparently, around 1652, an English merchant, Daniel Edwards, brought Pasqua (as he was probably known) from Smyrna (now Izmir) in Turkey to London as a servant to prepare the coffee to which Edwards had become accustomed on his travels abroad. Edwards himself is noted in The Little London Directory of 1677, a compilation of well-known merchants and bankers of the time. The Directory lists a “Dan. Edwards [of] Walbrook” as one of the “most eminent merchants of the period.” Every day in Edwards’ home Pasqua expertly prepared coffee for Edwards and his business associates, who ritually, and perhaps habitually, appeared early every morning. Edwards thought that sharing his coffee would foster goodwill and more business. Instead, with the daily intrusions, Edwards discovered that he could not escape his home early enough to conduct his business.

Thus, Edwards set up Pasqua in a shed in a churchyard in St. Michael’s Alley, Cornhill, where Pasqua could sell coffee. However, fearing competition, the nearby ale-sellers petitioned the mayor to remove Pasqua, who was not a freeman, from his shed. Pasqua’s business was saved by the intervention of Christofer Bowman, the free coachman of Daniel Edwards’ father-in-law, a Walbrook alderman named Hodge. Pasqua and Bowman became partners, but because of some unknown misdemeanor, Pasqua was forced to flee England at an unknown time, almost certainly before 1662. Parish records of 1662-1663 list a Christofer Bowman but no Pasqua Rosee (Lillywhite 1963, 438). Bowman moved the business from the shed, possibly to a tent, and ultimately to a building, which Bowman called “Pasqua Rosee’s Coffee House.”

The fate of Pasqua is unknown, although Robinson posits that he may have fled to Holland. However, his fortunes may have been profitable, at least if one can speculate on two 400 year old advertisements. The British Museum in London holds the “earliest known advertisement for making and selling coffee.” The advertisement originated between 1652 and 1666 and has been attributed to Pasqua. It reads in part: “The Vertue of the COFFEE Drink. First publiquely made and sold in England by Pasqua Rosee ... Made and Sold in St. Michael’s Alley in Cornhill, by Pasqua Rosee at the Signe of his own Head.” Unfortunately, the buildings in St. Michael’s Alley, including the coffee house, perished in the Great Fire of London in 1666.

A 1652 handbill advertising coffee for sale in St. Michael’s Alley, London. It is held in the British Museum.

Pasqua Rosee’s Coffee House was followed, also in 1652, by the Grecian Coffee House, which remained open until 1843, when the age of the coffee house largely expired. With coffee being advertised as curing “dropsy, gout, and scurvy”, coffee houses exploded in the 1700s, at one point numbering 3000 in London alone. They continued to prosper through 1809-1810, when a growing alcohol sobriety and a reduction of coffee taxes made coffee rather than old porter  or purl and gin the breakfast beverage choice. Business was so good that each coffee house even issued its own token, which could be used as currency at the issuing coffee house.

Coffee houses opened at 5 or 6 A.M. and closed at 10 P.M. or later. Customers might be charged a penny for admission and twopence for coffee or tea. The coffee house consisted of a large room that contained several tables for reading and writing. The room was similar in appearance to beer drinking rooms at some college student unions, or to “oak” or “cedar” rooms in bars that long for a wood motif. A customer might be charged half a crown (thirty pence) extra for the use of pen, ink, and paper for the season. Boys would rush about serving favorite dishes and chocolate, coffee, and tea, all of which were warmed on a large fire. The long bar near the fire held the pots that contained whatever bubbling brew had just been heated to a boil. History saw its first “barmaids” when coffee house owners hired the most attractive females available to take the particular brew from the bar to customers who were sitting throughout the coffee house.

35 Stunning Photos Show Annie Lennox’s Style in the 1980s

Born on Christmas Day 1954 in Aberdeen, Scottish singer-songwriter, political activist and philanthropist Annie Lennox was the lead singer of the Tourists, a British pop band between 1977 and 1980. After achieving moderate success with the band, she and fellow musician Dave Stewart went on to achieve international success in the 1980s as Eurythmics.

Lennox embarked on a solo career in 1992 with her debut album, Diva, which produced several hit singles including “Why” and “Walking on Broken Glass”. To date, she has released six solo studio albums and a compilation album, The Annie Lennox Collection (2009). With eight Brit Awards, which includes being named Best British Female Artist a record six times, Lennox has been named the “Brits Champion of Champions”. She has also collected four Grammy Awards and an MTV Video Music Award.

In 2002, Lennox received a Billboard Century Award; the highest accolade from Billboard. In 2004, she received the Golden Globe and the Academy Award for Best Original Song for “Into the West”, written for the soundtrack to the feature film The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.

Lennox’s vocal range is contralto. She has been named “The Greatest White Soul Singer Alive” by VH1 and one of The 100 Greatest Singers of All Time by Rolling Stone. In 2012, she was rated No. 22 on VH1’s 100 Greatest Women in Music. In June 2013 the Official Charts Company called her “the most successful female British artist in UK music history”. At the 2015 Ivor Novello Awards, Lennox was made a fellow of the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors, the first woman to receive the honor.

In addition to her career as a musician, Lennox is also a political and social activist, notable for raising money and awareness for HIV/AIDS as it affects women and children in Africa—this includes her SING Campaign which she launched in 2007. She founded women’s empowerment charity The Circle in 2008. In 2011, Lennox was appointed an OBE by Queen Elizabeth II for her “tireless charity campaigns and championing of humanitarian causes”. In 2017, Lennox was appointed Glasgow Caledonian University’s first female chancellor.

Take a look at these stunning photos to see what style of Annie Lennox looked like in the 1980s.

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See Rare Photos of a Young Michael Jackson in 1978, During a Photo Shoot on a Private Lake in Westlake Village

On a private lake in Westlake Village, Michael Jackson, not yet 19, was relaxed, smiling and polite as he and his brothers chatted on the dock and tooled around on an electric boat during a daylong photo shoot.

Having just left Motown and begun a new relationship with Epic Records, the Jackson 5 music group was preparing for the release of its first album on Epic, titled Destiny.

“They were very excited about a new level of their career, new opportunities,” photographer Gregg Cobarr recalled of the Jackson brothers and little sister Janet, making her public debut at the shoot on that warm summer day in August 1978.

Hired by Epic for the promotional shoot, Cobarr had done countless others like it for music industry clients including Columbia, Epic and Capitol Records, RCA, Curb and Warner Bros. For many years later, Cobarr still can recall details about the day, and about the very special young man he encountered in Michael Jackson.

“He had such a kind, sensitive, fun and charismatic nature,” Cobarr said. “It made a lasting impression.”

“We took a lot of photos that day. Some in color, some in black and white, and it was just a great day together. They were very professional and at the same time, they were able to be themselves. We took some really classic photos together that resonated with the time, and represented the class of The Jacksons. The photos were classy and so were they.”

A few of the photos from that day were used in promotional materials, but the vast majority never saw the light of day.

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Pictures of the Kremos, a Swiss Family of Acrobats, From the Late 19th and Early 20th Centuries

This amazing vintage footage depicts the Kremos, a Swiss family of acrobats, doing their act in Paris in August 1896. The short film was taken by the Lumière brothers.

 

The Kremos, produced two generations of remarkable icarists, followed by two generations of remarkable jugglers, Béla Kremo, and his son, Kris. All of them have been important circus and variety stars in Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries, and Kris Kremo, who also became a celebrated international star in America as well as in Europe, continued the tradition well into the twenty-first century.

The original Kremo troupe was created around 1880 by Josef Kremo (1854-1917), whose real name was Kremka, and whose family was of Czech origins—at a time when Czechoslovakia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. This first Kremo troupe was composed of Josef and his two eldest sons, Sylvester and Karl. Josef Kremo had been apprenticed to the Scheffers, an Austrian family of talented acrobats who performed the best and most celebrated Risley act of the late 19th century.

Josef had married an Austro-Hungarian equestrienne, Franzisca Allinger (1858-1940). Together they had had thirteen children, twelve of whom eventually participated in the family’s Risley act. At least three of their children, Anton, Franziska, and Viktor, could perform a triple somersault on the feet of their father, the most difficult trick of the specialty, then as now. Sylvester (1881-1962), Josef's eldest son, and Karl (1882-1958), his younger brother, eventually went on to create their own troupes, and continued the family tradition, each with his own troupe.

The Sylvester Kremo Family troupe consisted of Sylvester and his daughters, Sylvia and Selna. The Karl Kremo Family was a larger troupe, consisting of Karl, his brother Mark (1888-1945), his wife Margrit (1891-1923)—née Hanus in Hungary—and their children, Bellona, Béla, Bianca, and Bert, along with occasional partners. Both troupes brilliantly continued the Kremo tradition, performing in Europe’s leading circuses and variety theaters until the 1930s. The Karl Kremo Family was the most famous of the two, and of course, was survived by one of Karl’s sons, Béla Kremo, who maintained the name alive as a world-famous juggler.

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