More Cheesecake

Not from the same album as the two yesterday but the same theme. Two attractive ladies in swimwear apparently on a somewhat chilly day. This one came from a nice lady who sells on ebay. I say nice lady not because she sometimes looks in on this blog but because she does seem to be a very nice lady.

The pic is great, added by the note from the girl with the check over her head as she sent it to a relative.

" This picture is really the snake's eye-tooth, but as you are both related to me I'm sending it along so's you can see my new bathing suit. It was taken outside our tent. Only hope it passes the censor."

So scandalous, I love it, passing the censor and that phrase "snakes eye tooth" is a new one on me.

Uncle Horace

Not my uncle Horace but somebodys at least according to the album / scrapbook he came from.. At first I thought Horace was a train conductor, engineer or something but there is another picture of him wearing a badge of some type so now I'm leaning toward maybe a fireman, nothing in the album to give it away. Whatever he did he obviously ate good and I like him, has a nice look about him. By surrounding pictures Horace had these taken in the mid twenties.

Vintage Family

Away from the postcards for a day anyway. Just going through my books today and saw this, one of my more favorite pics although I have no info on it aand its small. Just like the group, to me typical early America. Too bad their descendants got to the point where nobody was around to care enough and this ended up in an estate sale somewhere.

Bums

Thier discription, not mine. That being what they wrote on the bottom of this picture of two girls outdoors with parasols. Parasols something seen in a lot of these vintage snapshots but not so much on the street these days. The year isn't marked on the picture but it came from an album I bought and if I remember right it was all early 1920's or so.

Well Dressed Ladies

Two nice looking women dressed for another studio shot, also with a postcard back but this one trimmed down to fit whatever album it was in. Again I can't date it but guess maybe 1910 or so. Love the hats and the ladies muffler or whatever that handwarmer thing is. The headwear would have been good for keeping the sun out of thier eyes I imagine. I have read that with some of the large hats the girls would have to pin them to thier heads to keep them from blowing away.

Uncle Charlie

Away from the cars for a bit. I'll come back to them as I have a lot of car pics. No date but written on the bottom is Uncle Charlie so at least we know this dapper looking gents name. Looks to be professionally done although there is no photographers stamp on it. It has the postcard back which was pretty common back around the turn of the century for family photos. A lot of black backing stuck to it so it was in a family album at some point.

Girls and Car

Three girls hanging around the family car, maybe waiting for thier guy friends to come and go somewhere. This was one of a couple of pics from an album and in one of the others it showed one of the girls getting ready to crank the car up, crank should

be visable in enlargement of this (click for big size).

The fun part of vintage automobiles

I do have an obvious facination with the "olden days", sometimes even thinking to myself that I was born at the wrong time in history. I am especially fond of the early automobiles and my collection of vintage photos includes many. It's not hard to see though that the grass isn't always greener on the other side or the other time for that matter. No CD, MP3 players, no radio or heat and the roads weren't quite what they are today. ( well maybe not in places other then Illinois). Tires didn't have 30,000 or 40,000 mile quarentees either. I have a couple series of pictures like this in my collection and have an idea it was a pretty familiar sight along the roads in the early 1900's. I've seen more then one picture where the car was packing not one but two or more spares. From the looks of it it was a good workout changing one too.

Vintage Cheesecake

I think this is a sexy pic. The girl on the beach here is pretty and the pose is sexy. The obvious about it is of course how little flesh she has exposed.

I went to the 7-11 about an hour ago and where you check out they have magazines displayed, mens and womens and all with some young thing on the cover wearing little more then a strip here and another there. Showing up on a public beach like that when this girl was around would have gotten a young lady ushered off to the slammer. I sure don't have anything against the girls on the magazines. I'm at the age where I don't get too excited about it but what was nice to look at when I was twenty still is nice to look at but when I see a picture like this one that gives the same reaction I wonder if they haven't gone too far.

Soldiers again

Three more pics today of world war one era soldiers and I'll leave them alone for awhile anyway.

Two are of the same man, the one standing by the tent and the one in the vehicle. There was a third, the best of the bunch of the man with a lewis machine gun but I can't find it now. I don't actually have the standing or the lewis picture anymore, having sold them to buy more pictures but still have them stored on my puter somewhere. The other with the ladies in the trenches was obviously taken here in the US, actually I think they all were, like yesterday before they shipped out. The one not here with the Lewis gun was probably before the war as all the Lewis machine guns were taken away from the infantry to be mounted on airplanes, another new weapon turning up during that war.

Doughboy

This picture is a "Great War" soldier with his sweatheart, maybe home on leave before heading off to France. The Great War is of course what they called it before WW II came along and now most of us call it WWI

The USA did it's best to stay out of both wars, almost kind of hard to believe that we tried so hard to mind our own business at those times. England in both instances wanted us badly to get involved which of course we finally did. My grandfather was a vetern of World War One, wounded by a chunk of German Artillery I believe before he ever got to the trenches. Probably a good thing as it turned out. He has passed on naturally now and when he was here I had no interest, missing out on the chance to ask him about how it was. He did leave a short diary talking about his trip overseas and some on the way into France but most of what he wrote about was food or the lack of it. Apparently rations were not quite what they are today.

Niagra Falls

Three images today from someones trip to Niagra Falls, 1920's I would guess from the cars in the one picture. I have never been so I have no idea how much it has changed but I'm sure a lot.

I went to the Official website to get a feeling for the history and didn't find much. They did say that the first to go over the falls in a barrel was in 1901, a woman schoolteacher in her sixties?

She did survive. They did say that the history of the falls would leave a history buff "captivated" and mentionedthe importance of the area in the war of 1812 but having said that there was nothing else, leaving me less then captivated. I guess to reach that state requires a little more effort and searching.

Aviator and Planes

Here are two photo's that came from one album I recently obtained. The album is one of those where they did not unfortunately write in any information as to the people or location so I have no idea who the aviator is. I'm going under the impression he was wwI era and from wealthy people and that he was USA. I did some googling on the names of the two planes and on aviators of that period but so far nothing. The planes look the same but I think one is a biplane and the other a single wing. Niether appear to be military. Guessing that they were the personal planes of the man and his wife. If they lived in the structure to the rear they certainly were wealthy. I'm thinking I should be able to figure out who this was but nothing so far.

More Fun Places

Along with the amusement park of yesterday two pictures of families on the beach. The suits of the period were a little different they what you see today, better I think. One of the pictures is dated on the back 1921 and both came from the same album in close proximity so are likely the same year. I don't know the location, lots of beaches but Atlantic City was the most popular spot it seems from pictures I see. The early part of the twentieth century seems to be the time America discovered vacations what with the automobile and maybe more time off for workers.

Sardine Sandwich Anyone?

Two small photo's that came in an album I bought. Love the prices on the sandwiches, a hamburger for a nickel is pretty hard to find anymore. There was nothing in the album to identify the location but if you look there is a pennant on the right side of one that reads Russell Point. Russel Point is a town in Ohio and a little googling tells us that there was near there a Sandy Beach Amusement Park near there at Indian Lake. It was apparently a pretty big deal, nicknamed "Atlantic City of the West" and "Ohios Million Dollar Playground" at one time. It existed from the early 1900's through the seventies. Apparently starting in 1961 there were riots there on July fourth and the problems became a tradition, trouble brewing every year until the park was forced to shut down. I didn't search far enough to find out what the riots were about but it's all too bad.

Knitting

Another larger image, about the same size as the one yesterday. This a group of ladies together for knitting and sewing. posing for this but must have been some kind of group or knitting society that got together regular. My wife knits now and then but do they still have groups like this? There's a candelstick phone on the desk lower left. I like the lighting , the only thing visable from the ceiling. Obviously the photographer brought some of his own but if that was all the ladies had to see by it had to be hard seeing what they were doing.

Vintage Store

A larger picture, about 5X7, of a vintage store interior with the ckerks and maybe a customer posing. Located in Chicago according to the seller although I see nothing to verify that. It's dated 1926 on the back in pencil which looks about right. Nice and clear and under magnification you can read some of the labels.

Aurora Trolley

I have a "thing" for trolley cars, not sure why. Just because they so symbolize a whole era that has my interest. Todays photo is a trolley, rail car that once ran between Aurora and Geneva Illinois, adding to my interest in it as those towns are near where I live now and I was born and once lived in Aurora. I can't date the photo at all although some research might narrow it down. My guess would be twenties or thirties.

For those that enjoy old photos if you never have you should visit WWW.shorpy.com. They have daily postings of several old photos of great interest and with quite a following usually a lot of follow up comments and information about the images. Images there are available elsewhere on the web usually but Shorpy picks out the good ones and posts high resolution. Worth a visit and if you haven't been there before have some sancks and be ready to sit for awhile as you will likely be tied up looking for hours.