Vintage Photos of Things

A real photo postcard. Date and location unknown.

When I purchased this unused real photo postcard at a postcard show a few years ago, I thought it would be a straightforward matter to determine whose shoes these were. My first thought was that they belonged to someone like Robert Wadlow (1918-1940), who at 8 feet 11.1 inches "was the tallest person in history for whom there is irrefutable evidence." But since Wadlow was born in 1918, the smaller shoe from 1882 couldn't be his, and the larger shoe from 1926 dates to when Wadlow was 8 years old. Surely he wasn't wearing shoes that large at such a young age!

Because it just doesn't look right sitting there on top of it. -------- Thanks to Angelica's sharp eye (see her comment below), I've confirmed that the image on the television shows the first moonwalk in July 1969. For more info, see Live Coverage of the Moonwalk! (below).

Or at least it was live back on July 20 and 21, 1969, when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were the first astronauts to walk on the moon. The TV screen on the left (above) is an enlargement from a photo ( Don't Give Your Television the Boot --see below) that initially attracted my attention because of the distinctive boot-shaped vase that was on top of it. I couldn't determine what was on the screen, however, and didn't give it a second thought. Thankfully, though, when I posted the original photo, Angelica Paez noticed the date printed on the photo (August 1969, reflecting when the photo was developed) and suggested that those might be astronauts walking across the screen. After searching on YouTube, I located a video, CBS News Coverage of Apollo 11 - Moon Walk 06 , which shows the scene on the right (above) at 6 minutes and 57 seconds. Although the image on the left is faint, the white areas where sunlight is striking the lunar lander, flag, and astronaut seem to match up nicely with the corresponding parts of the image on the right. I'd like to thank Angelica for spotting this!

An slide, circa 1959, from Pipe-Smoking Man's family .

This slide is dated January 1960, so I'm assuming that these Christmas gifts are from December 1959. See also Christmas Gifts, 1961 .

This slide is dated July 1962, so I'm guessing that these Christmas gifts date to December 1961. See also Christmas Gifts, 1959 .

"Dreamland at Legat Garden. Boudnek Photo. 58." This "Dreamland" castle was constructed in the 1920s by a man named John Legat as part of a garden in Fox River Grove, Illinois, that also included a wishing well, windmill, and fountain. Legat, who was married to the town's doctor, gave tours of his garden and sold postcard views of it (including, possibly, this one). Legat's land was later turned into building lots, and the garden gave way to a neighborhood of houses. Some of Legat's structures--including the castle--still remain, although they're in a state of disrepair. Check out Google Maps for a current view of the castle, which is located in a front yard at the corner of Grove and Lincoln avenues in Fox River Grove. For additional information, see the article, " Fox River Grove’s Other Castle ," which was originally published in the Northwest Herald , June 7, 2011. (The title of the article refers to another castle that's a full-size residence known as Castle Vianden or Bettendorf Castle; see the Wikipedia entry for Fox River Grove, Illinois , which provides a brief history and photo of this second castle.)

A flowers photo for the Vintage Photos Theme Park. A slide dated April 1959 shows an elaborate planter stand with flowering plants (violets?) situated in front of a window. Trendy curtains with geometric shapes flank the stand on both sides, and other household furnishings--a lamp, stereo, framed photo, artwork on the wall--are also visible. For another slide taken in the same house (with the same distinctive style of curtains), see Here's the Lady You Ordered! Where Do You Want Us to Put Her?

A Vintage Photos Theme Park photo for the theme of lamps, chandeliers, candlesticks, and other types of lighting . This is a color slide, circa 1959, that shows two flower paintings hanging on a wall. Below them is a Motorola "Stereophonic High Fidelity" console. Based on the online documentation for a similar model, the top of the stereo lifts up on the right for access to a record player inside. The six knobs on the left are labeled Function, Compensator, Loudness, Treble, Bass, and Balance. On top of the left side of the stereo are a decorative porcelain table lamp and a framed photo. This is another slide from the collection of the Pipe-Smoking Man's family . I only recently realized that two other photos from the collection show different parts of this same room. A photo taken to the left of this one also captures part of the stereo console (see Flowering Plants and Groovy Curtains ). The door, wall thermostat, and chair in this photo are visible in a photo taken to the right of this one (see Still Life with Television ). The flower paintings may be the work of "Ethel", a relative of the Pipe-Smoking Man (see Ethel's Oil Painting, 1967 ).

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 .

Some may dismiss it as a flaw in the film, but this Ektachrome slide, which is dated October 1969, reveals a mysterious beam of light descending to the ground next to the Eternal Light Peace Memorial in Gettysburg, Pa. It could be, I suppose, a divine light shining from above or simply a tractor beam emanating from a hovering spaceship. For a less perplexing and more recent view of the monument, see Eternal Light Peace Memorial, Gettysburg Battlefield, 2014 . For another inexplicable light beam captured on film, see A Light from Above .

For more information, see the full version of this real photo postcard:

From a Kodachrome slide, date and location unknown.

A photo of fences, walls, or other boundary markers for the Vintage Photos Theme Park. This slide, taken in La Paz , Bolivia, in the 1950s by an unknown photographer, shows some of the stone heads on one of the walls surrounding a replica of the Semi-Subterranean Temple, which is located at the Pre-Columbian Tiwanaku archeological site near Lake Titicaca in western Bolivia. The walls of the original temple at Tiwanaku are decorated with 175 carved stone heads, which apparently reflect "an earlier practice of exposing the severed heads of defeated enemies in the temple" (see UNESCO's description of Tiwanaku: Spiritual and Political Centre of the Tiwanaku Culture ). The replica of the Semi-Subterranean Temple was constructed in La Paz to hold the Bennett Monolith (see Monolito Bennett for a Spanish-language Wikipedia article), which was removed from Tiwanaku in 1933. See below for a second slide from the 1950s or 1960s that captures a view of the temple that includes the back of the Bennett Monolith. For other images of the Semi-Subterranean Temple replica in La Paz, check out the Wikimedia Commons photos of Monolitos Miraflores La Paz Bolivia , which presents a close-up of the layout of the temple replica, and Estadio Hernando Siles, Barrio Miraflores , which shows an overview of the temple with the nearby soccer stadium looming in the background.

The Bennett Monolith is the name of the large sculpture in the middle of this photo, which comes from a slide taken in La Paz , Bolivia, by an unknown photographer in the 1950s. In 1933 the Bennett Monolith was removed from the Semi-Subterranean Temple located at the Pre-Columbian Tiwanaku archeological site near Lake Titicaca in western Bolivia. As seen here in a rear view, the monolith was installed as the centerpiece of a replica of the temple that was constructed in La Paz. The removal of the Bennett Monolith from the archeological site was controversial, however, and in 2002 it was returned to Tiwanaku, which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site (see Tiwanaku: Spiritual and Political Centre of the Tiwanaku Culture ). A reproduction of the monolith now stands in place of the original in the replica of the temple in La Paz. For more information about the Bennett Monolith, see the Spanish-language Wikipedia article Monolito Bennett and view additional images of the monolith on Wikimedia Commons. The wall surrounding the replica of the Semi-Subterranean Temple (part of the wall is visible here in the background) was captured in another slide by the same photographer. See Wall of Stone Heads (below):

"'Blasting stumps' on the Isted Farm. Whipple Photo." A dramatic real photo postcard showing the detonation of dynamite or some other explosive in an apparent attempt to clear tree stumps from a field. Evidently, though, the blast didn't look impressive enough, so the photographer drew on the negative to add large pieces of fake debris flying high into the air. It also appears that the photographer crossed out an earlier caption and wrote the words "blasting stumps" over it. I haven't been able to determine the location of "Isted Farm" or the identity of the "Whipple Photo" photographer.

. . . or lyrics to that effect. 8-)