Bring back some good or bad memories


November 16, 2011

The First Issue of 'The Girl Watcher': A 1959 Magazine That Encourages Stalking and Predator Behavior in a Seriously Misguided Attempt at Humor

The Girl Watcher was a "Handy Handbook for Girl Watching. Dedicated to all serious scholars and Connoisseurs of beautiful women." The magazine purported to have the "latest reports from enterprising, ardent devotees throughout the world."

An “official international journal” dedicated to “connoisseurs of beautiful women,” the Watcher discusses women in terms of prey (“The Hunter and the Hunted”), refers to stalkers as “resourceful and imaginative,” and creates a recipe for the perfect mate by combining body parts of four different women.

Also: Women are referred to collectibles, akin to “beetles, bottles and shrunken heads.” And there’s a lot of upskirt photography.

There is one interesting historical note here — an interview with Earl Leaf, the photographer who discovered Marilyn Monroe.

Otherwise? Please don't take any of this advice.










November 15, 2011

Believe It or Not, These People Submitted Their Actual Photos for Consideration as a TV Weather Forecaster in the 1980s

Increasingly, weather and all of its related catastrophes are never far from the front page of the news. Photographer Michael Jang’s photographs of weather reporter auditions from 1983 charmingly remind us of the bygone era when weather reporting was a more innocent undertaking.


Jang had been hired to take a photograph of each person who auditioned for the job of weather reporter at a San Francisco TV station, which was having a contest to fill the position. “Summer Weather” is the series of these headshots, and they are a unique look at a very specific segment of 1980s life.

"In 1983, a local TV station held a contest for anyone who wanted a chance at reporting the weather. My role was to take head shots of contestants after each screen test. Five winners were chosen out of nearly one hundred applicants. The pictures were never used, but I developed the negatives anyway (without proofing them). These images had been lost until recently and I am seeing them for the very first time." — Michael Jang

On top of being hilarious, the images are surprisingly powerful and arresting. The contestants' faces convey an overriding sense of hope and aspiration, and, in doing so, also a palpable vulnerability.










November 13, 2011

49 Candid and Intimate Photos Reveal the Glitz and Weirdos of Hollywood Club Scenes in the 1980s and Early ‘90s

Where can you spy Paul McCartney and his late wife Linda making silly faces, a brunette Madonna playing hide-and-seek, and Rob Lowe rocking adorably geeky glasses? At the Hollywood parties, art openings, and clubs of the late-1980s and early ‘90s, of course!

Photographer Stephen Jerrome covered the underground social gatherings and lavish soirees Tinseltown had to offer during that era, immortalizing movie stars, musicians, and fashion designers as they drank cocktails and schmoozed with other famous party-goers.

His series Hollywood: Uptown & Underground is a collection of all the photos from this period. From movie stars like Jack Nicholson and Madonna, these black & white photos capture a familiar but detached world, one full of unabashed mingling, open bars, and parties till dawn. Kind of sounds like our Saturday night.

Welcome to the underground.

Bruce Willis saying "Don't take my fucking picture." Stephen Jerrome was shooting at a private party hosted by Vanity Fair; the only photographer in the room. That's Demi on the left.

Artist Keith Haring during a rare visit to L.A.

Iggy Pop off-stage.

Clothing designer Pepito Albert during his L.A. heyday.





This Is What Air Travel Was Like in the 1930s and 1940s

While mankind's foray into flying began in the early 20th century, the modern air travel industry as we know it didn't truly grow its roots until the 1930s. The era marked the biggest leaps in the expansion of the industry, seeing the amount of people using aeroplanes to travel shooting from 6,000 annually in 1930, to 1.2 million by 1938.

As metal planes returned home from post-war posturing, a boom in passenger interest and sufficient technology to reach a slew of international destinations made the 1930s the start of something big.

But like any major technology, commercial flight didn't come without growing pains. If you think you have a lot to complain about now when it comes to air travel, take a look at what it was like to fly in the 30s.

An airplane from British Imperial Airways, taken in the early 1930's

This picture is from 1938, and famous chefs are shown loading cakes onto the airplane for the passengers

The picture was taken in Pennsylvania in 1938, which would have been the 75th Anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg

Stewardesses

Passengers at the airport in Washington DC, 1938





November 12, 2011

Pictures of High School Teenagers in Des Moines, Iowa, 1947

Long before the era of Facebook, texting, and clubbing, there's the hopping soda shop scene. LIFE photographer George Skadding documented the lives of Iowa high school teenagers in the late 1940s.










November 11, 2011

Amazing Color Photographs of American Store Fronts in the 1940s

A nostalgic collection of photographs has offered a fascinating glimpse of the American Main Street in the early 1940s.

As the nation recovered from the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl, and prepared for World War II, Main Street was a place where communities came together and the entrepreneurial spirit was able to flourish.

The romantic pictures show family-run stores and cafes lining dusty suburban streets. They capture old-fashioned cars parked out front bars, drug stores and general stores and the town's residents going about their daily lives, which often centred around the iconic hub.

The photographs show some of America's most loved brands, including Coca Cola, Rice Krispies and 7UP, advertised in shop windows, and fresh produce including oranges and potatoes selling for as little as 1c.

Before there was a Walmart on every corner and suburban malls inhabited most of the nations cities and towns, these photographs show Main Street as it always was, and in some places still is -- the heartbeat of small town America.

Grand Grocery Co., Lincoln, Nebraska in 1942 shows Rice Krispies cereal boxes in window below oranges.

View down the main street from the Grand Hotel, Charlotte Amalie, Street Thomas Island, Virgin Islands, 1941.

Main Street, Pie Town, New Mexico, in October 1940.

Boys looking at store window display of toys at Christmas time in either 1941 or 1942.

On the main street of Cascade, Idaho, in July 1941.







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