Men in Vintage Photos

Eight guys lined up in a row to pose for this early twentieth-century photo. See also the full version of this real photo postcard.

I've been dreadfully busy over the last few weeks with work and family. When Ipernity editing stopped working for a while in May, I fell way behind in posting and even further behind with commenting than I already was (if that's possible). I hope you will forgive my extreme tardiness and allow me to catch up with the topics I've missed from past weeks. I'm glad that we've been able to keep the group going, and I appreciate all of your postings here in the Vintage Photos Theme Park. A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of windows and windshields (photos through or of) . Printed on the back of this real photo postcard: "Novelty Photo Studio, 13 Federal St., N.S., Pittsburg, PA." An early twentieth-century photo taken when driving a car was still a novelty.

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of number(s) in a photo . Printed on the other side of this real photo postcard: "The Automatic Vaudeville Co. , 9 Tremont Row, 634 Washington St., Boston, Mass." The "23" on the one fellow's hat is a reference to the "23 skidoo" fad that became popular in the United States beginning in 1906 or 1907. Back then, telling someone "23 skidoo" meant "scram" or "beat it," and using "23" in an unexpected place like this was a way to let others in on the joke. For another example of "23" used in a photo for humorous effect, see Too Many Places to Go and Too Much to See .

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the monthly topic of slides and color photos . In this puzzling scene from a Polaroid photo, a man is speaking from a podium as a woman stands nearby. On the front of the podium is a sign for "Sears" (surely not the department store -- could it be a name or acronym?) and a drawing of what looks like three biplanes that's labeled "Shoot down von Rottenspotten." On the table next to the podium is a wrapped gift or rolled-up certificate secured by a red ribbon. Is the man presenting the woman with some sort of award? The image on the wall behind the woman makes me wonder what kind of award she might be receiving. It shows a flying saucer leaving earth for a destination somewhere in the field of stars painted on the wall. The numerical code printed on the back of this Polaroid indicates a manufacturing date of December 1978. Could the drawing on the wall be a logo for some kind of UFO group that held a meeting in 1979? But then where do "Sears" and "von Rottenspotten" fit in? See a cropped version of the photo for a closer look at the proceedings.

A puzzling Polaroid photo. For more information, see the full version of this photo.

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of television sets in the living room . Handwritten note on the other side of this photo: "George Vogt & Housekeeper, 1960." Printed on back: "This is a Kodakcolor Print made by Kodak, January 1960 - RC." The woman on the sofa is holding a glass in her hand, and there's a second glass on the tray that's on the coffee table. A small basket on the tray probably contained snacks of some sort. Wallpaper with a distinctive design surrounds the television in the corner. For some more TVs, see my album of Televisions .

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of stores (interiors or exteriors) . In this snapshot taken in the interior of a grocery store, a man is holding a pack of Old Gold cigarettes in one hand and a whole box of the cigarette packs in his other hand. Perhaps he's posing as if he's going to refill the cigarette racks that are positioned above each of the six cash registers that are visible in the photo. Hanging from the ceiling above the man are fifteen "January Jubilee Sale" signs. After enlarging the photo and spending some time studying the signs, I was finally able to determine that the logo on them says, "Mohican Markets," which identifies the store as one of the more than 50 groceries established by Mohican Stores, Inc., in the first half of the twentieth century. The January 18, 1952, issue of the Troy Record (Troy, New York), p. 23, featured an advertisement for a "Mohican Jubilee Sale," which included "Home Style Layer Cakes. . . . Specially presented for our January Jubilee Sale!" A year later, the same paper ran a second Mohican "January Jubilee" ad (January 6, 1953, p. 10). Two years after that, the Bridgeport Telegram (Bridgeport, Connecticut), January 7, 1955, p. 11, ran an ad for a "January Jubilee" sale at a different Mohican Market. Although I couldn't determine the location of the Mohican Market in this picture, it seems likely that it was taken sometime in the 1950s, when the same sales event was taking place at other stores. See also Stores in Vintage Photos and Postcards .

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of bands (music groups) . The Dover Gutter Band from Dover, New Jersey, played Dixieland, performed on an antique fire engine, and played at picnics, parades, and other events in the 1950s and 1960s. This real photo postcard likely dates to the 1960s. For more info, see Glimpse of History: George Peer and his Gutter Band Brought Dixieland to Dover .

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of extraordinary (anything) . A few years ago I posted the following image of a real photo postcard featuring an unknown man playing an extraordinarily complicated One-Man Music Machine : The photo was a mystery—I wasn't able to determine who the man was or what kind of contraption he was playing. Later I bought what I thought was a duplicate of the card and filed it away without inspecting it too closely. More recently I was looking through a copy of Real Photo Postcards: Unbelievable Images from the Collection of Harvey Tulcensky (Princeton Architectural Press, 2005). To my surprise, there on page 97 of the book was the same man and machine, and the caption indicated that there was writing on the other side of the card that provided a description: "Handwritten: Nelson's 32 piece one man band, took 35 years to build, has 6,000 ft. of rubber tubing, 50,000 parts, weighing 2,800 lbs. Albert Nelson, Buffalo, NY." When I pulled out my two copies of the card to compare them with the one in the book, I realized that I had two similar but different photos. Both showed the man seated at the machine, but in the second one I purchased the man is looking to his right so that his face is visible in profile. The machine is configured differently, too. For one thing, in this photo the fan-shaped shield at the lower right has one belt coming out of it while the image I previously posted has two belts. With the information from the book, I was able to identify the man as Albert Nelson (1884-1964), who was originally from Buffalo, Minnesota ( not Buffalo, New York). He spent many years working on different versions of his machine—called The Nelsonian —and became famous when he was hired to play it at the Ripley's Believe It or Not Odditorium during the Chicago World's Fair in 1933. A history of the man and his machine was published in 2006. Gary Albert Hukriede, Nelson's grand nephew, authored the book, The Mighty Nelsonian: The Story of Albert Nelson, Inventor of "The Nelsonian One-Man-Band," 32 Musical Instruments Played by One Man (Minneapolis, Minn.: LifePath Histories). Although Albert Nelson, who passed away in 1964, was the only person who could play and maintain the Nelsonian, his remarkable music machine is on display today at the Wright County Historical Society Heritage Center in Buffalo, Minnesota.

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of swings and hammocks . This is an unused real photo postcard with an Azo stamp box on the other side (four corner triangles pointing up) that suggests a date that may be as early as 1904 to 1918. A barn and other farm buildings appear in the background of the inset photo of a man and woman posing on a hammock. The surrounding scene of a house on a lake doesn't quite fit with the agricultural setting of the photo. See a cropped version of the photo postcard for a close-up of the couple on the hammock.

With farm buildings in the background, a man and woman pose for a photo while seated on a hammock. For more information, see the full version of this real photo postcard.

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of statues and monuments . Inscription: "Las Fuerzas Armadas de la nación a Eduardo Abaroa defensor del litoral Boliviano." (Translation via DeepL: "The nation's Armed Forces to Eduardo Abaroa defender of the Bolivian coastline.") A statue of Eduardo Abaroa (1838-1879) located in Plaza Abaroa (Abaroa Square) in the city of La Paz , Bolivia. According to Wikipedia, Abaroa was "Bolivia's foremost hero of the War of the Pacific (1879–1883), which pitted Chile against Bolivia and Peru. He was one of the leaders of the civilian resistance to the Chilean invasion at the Battle of Topáter ." This slide was taken in the 1950s by an unknown photographer who was visiting Bolivia and other South American countries. The base of the statue and the buildings surrounding the plaza have changed significantly in the intervening years. Compare this slide with the Eduardo Abaroa Hidalgo 4 image in Wikimedia Commons. See also South America in Vintage Slides .

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of fields or forests . Photo shop ink stamp on the other side of this snapshot: "Sweigart’s, 278-80 W. Market St., York, Pa., Oct. [11?], 1943." A farmer on a tractor pulls a corn harvester and a wagon through a field of corn in York County, Pennsylvania, in 1943. It appears that the photographer is riding in the wagon among the ears of corn. On the left, someone's hand is reaching toward the front of the wagon. For an earlier harvest photo, see Bringing in the Corn .

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of on the beach . Handwritten caption on the other side of this real photo postcard: "Atlantic City, July 5, 1925." On the day after the Fourth of July in an unidentified photo studio in Atlantic City, New Jersey, this couple posed on the real sand of a fake beach. Behind them is a painted backdrop of dramatic ocean waves and an extremely long pier that extends the whole way to the horizon. For other studio beach scenes, see Two Woman Posing for a Boardwalk Souvenir, Atlantic City, N.J. , and Women in Swimsuits .

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of down on the corner, out on the street (people on the sidewalk or in the street) . Caption: "Middletown Fire, Apr. 9, 1910." This is a real photo postcard of a man walking down the street past the burned-out shells of buildings in Middletown , Pennsylvania. A fire on Saturday, April 9, 1910, decimated the town, destroying 75 commercial buildings and residences in a four-block area of the business district. Notice the dog that's following along behind the man. On the right-hand side of the photo, a second dog is walking past a barrel at the side of the street. Visible in the distance beyond the man, a crowd of people -- probably sightseers -- has gathered in the street.

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of ain't we got fun (people obviously enjoying themselves) . Handwritten note on the other side of this snapshot: "Sharon, Gale, Mert, & Claude. Taken at Mystery Spot." Signs in photo: "Brig." "Confusion Hill, Redwood Hi-way 101." Sharon, Gale, Mert, and Claude were obviously having fun as they posed for a photo at the Redwood Shoe House at Confusion Hill in Piercy, California (see a cropped version of the picture for a better view of their funny facial expressions). The note on the back of the photo is a source of confusion since it misidentifies the location as the Mystery Spot , which is a separate tourist attraction located in Santa Cruz, California.

Four adults make funny faces as they pose for a photo at the Redwood Shoe House at Confusion Hill in Piercy, California. For more info, see the full version of the snapshot.

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of something fishy (fishing or fish) . This is an unused real photo postcard showing two men posing with a big fish. The name "Harry Kehn" is written on the front, and "Florida" is penciled in on the back. The Azo stamp box (with four corner triangles pointing up) on the other side suggests a date that may be as early as 1904 to 1918. For a similar photo, see Sailfish Caught on Yacht Skip Jack, Floridian Hotel Dock, Miami Beach, Florida .