Time is an odd phenomenon – it always appears to flow forwards. It might not, but it definitely seems like it does. Though, history is full of what we term “moments,” each in a large interstellar serpent, like a cross-section of unimaginable complexity. Any of those moments have been held on the camera and witnessed for future generations. That said, we bring you with a little bit story of 7 moments from history. Take a journey with these interesting and shocking images over the years.
The Average Cost of US Living in 1938
Even with a very little background, it’s impossible to imagine the past. This illustration gives us an understanding of how much it cost over a century ago. The prices after the Great Depression and the Great Recession were very low; unemployment rose to about 19% and the use of the annoying hipsters’ hats to almost 100%. Maybe.
Can you picture attending Harvard for just $420 a year? Well, if you didn’t account for over 80 years of inflation instantly, that isn’t really important because you wouldn’t be allowed into it. What is really shocking to us, though, is the price of cinema tickets. Who would pay 25 cents to see a movie in the 1930s when they could pay the same money on a California Alligator Farm to have their hand or foot maimed by a giant reptile?
The Future According to a Random German Margarine Company, 1930
Although mankind has always sought to forecast the future, it is never perfect. Surprisingly, this illustrated card from a collection sold by a German Margarine firm is more detailed than others – that is, yet not very precise.
We would give them five points to forecast video calls — but we deduct Three points to clunky equipment; threes to filthy jumpsuits; five to assume that we already accept wires; two to overestimate the appeal of what we hope will be lemonade; and two additional points to hideous caps. Oh, and -15 points, you monsters, to use plastic straws.
The Inventor of Basketball About to get Dunked On, 1928
You’ve learned about the future according to a margarine group. After the Great Depression, you heard about the cost of living. But you’ve heard of a game called… basketball? Don’t worry, James Naismith, a well-known college teacher and Canadian, hadn’t heard of it until he invented it. He created this fascinating play for his students, influenced by his rich childhood experiments tossing Canadian rocks at stacks of other similarly Canadian rocks as an Alternative to another obscure pastime called football. Or “foot-ball” or whatever it is.
The original rules of basketball are much more complex than their current version, and were as follows: two teams of players must toss the balls into a large wall-mounted bucket. Riveting — please don’t feel guilty if you have to reread it several times. Somebody finally wanted to cut the bottom out of the bucket, and modern basketball was born.
Instructions on Telephone Use, 1951
People didn’t know how to use telephones back in the 1950s. You know, they didn’t grow up making one-sided discussions with non-existent people using a bit of yellow Fisher-Price plastic. Telephones were always new and mainly any package sold contained these basic instructions as a reference for the entire family.
Nowadays, our directions are over a hundred times more complex and nobody even reads them. Although our first reaction may be to turn our retro nose to the retro folk, note that actually, 80% of people who actually live wouldn’t be able to also use a rotary telephone.
Just Divorced, Reno, 1934
Everyone is tired of seeing “Just Married” signs in cars, right? Eh, folks? Not just us, is it? Yeah, marriage was a tough thing in the mid-1930s. You know, it was oddly believed back in the vintage years that when a man and a woman entered a church and brought together a representative of God in the remainder of their lives in an unbreakable sacred marriage, it meant more than 2 years.
Sadly, there is something that even God does not foresee—women win the right to express their discontent. However, ending an unwanted marriage in most nations, if allowed at all, was still very complicated. However, Nevada has never taken care of the Almighty rules much, and gladly gave miserable couples the ability to come down and “renaissance.” Divorce is now fast, however, so Nevada mainly concentrates on other pet peeves of God: betting and prostitution.
Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, 1991
Sadly, it is difficult to tell which year this picture has been taken because nerd fashion has not improved in the last fifty years. But here we can see Apple and Microsoft’s computer industry “titans,” perhaps in somebody’s cellar, debating Giga-circulizers and psychoprocessors.
When this shot was taken, they realized it would be as good as years later.
Futuristic 5MB IBM Hard Drive, 1956
It was used on IBM’s 305 RAMAC machine and weighed over 900kg. It occupied 1,4 square meters and used 50 24-inch discs, accessible with its two arms moving independently.
At the time 5MB of storage contained 5 million accounting data characters. Unlike prior retro-storage activities such as tape storage, data could be retrieved at random from start to finish. Yet this chunky beast cost $35,000 a year and had to be pushed by a forklift.
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