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Vintage: Scotland’s Landscapes (19th Century)

Vintage: Scotland’s Landscapes (19th Century)

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The whole of Scotland was covered by ice sheets during the Pleistocene ice ages and the landscape is much affected by glaciation. From a geological perspective, the country has three main sub-divisions. The Highlands and Islands lie to the north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, which runs from Arran to Stonehaven. This part of Scotland largely comprises ancient…
Vintage: Tight Corset (Victorian era)

Vintage: Tight Corset (Victorian era)

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The corset has been attributed to Catherine de’ Medici, wife of King Henry II of France. She enforced a ban on thick waists at court attendance during the 1550s. For nearly 350 years, women’s primary means of support was the corset, with laces and stays made of whalebone or metal. Other researchers have found evidence of the use of corsets…
Vintage: The Bishop’s Wife (1947)

Vintage: The Bishop’s Wife (1947)

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The Bishop’s Wife is a Samuel Goldwyn romantic comedy feature film from 1947, starring Cary Grant, Loretta Young, and David Niven in a story about an angel who helps a bishop with his problems. The film was adapted by Leonardo Bercovici and Robert E. Sherwood from the 1928 novel of the same name by Robert Nathan, and was directed by…
Vintage: A Christmas Carol (1938)

Vintage: A Christmas Carol (1938)

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A Christmas Carol is a 1938 American film adaptation of Charles Dickens’s 1843 novella of the same name, starring Reginald Owen as Ebenezer Scrooge, an elderly miser who learns the error of his ways on Christmas Eve after visitations by three spirits. On Christmas Eve in 19th-century London, Fred is sliding on ice on a sidewalk. He meets Peter and…
Vintage: It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)

Vintage: It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)

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It’s a Wonderful Life is a 1946 American Christmas fantasy comedy-drama film produced and directed by Frank Capra, based on the short story and booklet The Greatest Gift, which Philip Van Doren Stern wrote in 1939 and published privately in 1945. On Christmas Eve 1945, in Bedford Falls, New York, George Bailey contemplates suicide. Prayers for him reach Heaven, where…
Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Monaco (1890s)

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Monaco (1890s)

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Designated as a protectorate of the Kingdom of Sardinia in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna after Napoleon’s defeat, Monaco’s sovereignty was confirmed by the Franco-Monegasque Treaty of 1861. France accepted the existence of the Principality of Monaco, but annexed 95% of its former territory (the areas of Menton and Roquebrune). Monaco’s military defense since then has been the responsibility…
Vintage: Clémentine Delait – French bearded lady

Vintage: Clémentine Delait – French bearded lady

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Clémentine Delait (1865 – 1939) was a French bearded lady who kept a café. Delait and her husband kept a café in Thaon-les-Vosges, in Lorraine, France. According to later accounts, Clémentine Delait visited a carnival, saw a bearded woman with some stubble and boasted that she could grow a better beard herself. Her husband bet 500 francs to back her.…
Vintage: Christmas Shopping in the past

Vintage: Christmas Shopping in the past

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“Christmas creep” refers to a merchandising phenomenon in which merchants and retailers exploit the commercialized status of Christmas by moving up the start of the holiday shopping season. The term was first used in the mid-1980s, and is associated with a desire of merchants to take advantage of particularly heavy Christmas-related shopping well before Black Friday in the United States…
Vintage: Portraits of Mary Pickford – Silent Movie Star

Vintage: Portraits of Mary Pickford – Silent Movie Star

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Mary Pickford (1892 – 1979) was known in her prime as “America’s Sweetheart” and the “girl with the curls”. She was one of the Canadian pioneers in early Hollywood and a significant figure in the development of film acting. Pickford was one of the earliest stars to be billed under her own name, and was one of the most popular…
Vintage: Christmas Trees in the past

Vintage: Christmas Trees in the past

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The relevance of ancient pre-Christian customs to the 16th-century German initiation of the Christmas tree custom is disputed. Resistance to the custom was often because of its supposed Lutheran origins. Other sources have offered a connection between the first documented Christmas trees in Alsace around 1600 and pre-Christian traditions. For example, according to the Encyclopædia Britannica, “The use of evergreen…
Vintage: Mug-shots of Prisoners (1900s)

Vintage: Mug-shots of Prisoners (1900s)

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“Some years ago I discovered a cache of glass negative mug shots taken in the early 20th century; each negative was inscribed with the man’s name and alleged crime. In order to research the life of each man pictured in the 500 negatives, I spent the next three years traveling back and forth from New York to the small Northern…
Vintage: Portraits of American Ladies by Mathew Brady (1863)

Vintage: Portraits of American Ladies by Mathew Brady (1863)

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During the Civil War, Mathew Brady and his associates traveled throughout the eastern part of the country, capturing the effects of the War through photographs of people, towns, and battlefields. Additionally, Brady kept studios in Washington, DC and New York City, where many influential politicians and war heroes sat for portraits. Brady photographed many subjects in the time of the…
Vintage: Santa Claus in the past

Vintage: Santa Claus in the past

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In 1821, the book A New-year’s present, to the little ones from five to twelve was published in New York. It contained Old Santeclaus with Much Delight, an anonymous poem describing Santeclaus on a reindeer sleigh, bringing presents to children. Some modern ideas of Santa Claus seemingly became canon after the anonymous publication of the poem “A Visit From St.…
Vintage: Street Scenes of the Munster Region, Ireland (late XIX Century)

Vintage: Street Scenes of the Munster Region, Ireland (late XIX Century)

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Munster is one of the provinces of Ireland situated in the south of Ireland. In early Ireland, the Kingdom of Munster was one of the kingdoms of Gaelic Ireland ruled by a “king of over-kings”. Following the Norman invasion of Ireland, the ancient kingdoms were shired into counties for administrative and judicial purposes. In later centuries, local government legislation has…
Vintage: The Balkans (1900s)

Vintage: The Balkans (1900s)

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From the album of a prussian revenue man who was stationed in Sofia (about 1900-1918). The photographs could have been taken in any other Balkan countries, because he undertook many journeys. via Wolfgang Wiggers
Vintage: Lumberjacks of North America (1900s)

Vintage: Lumberjacks of North America (1900s)

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The term lumberjack is of Canadian derivation. The first attested use of the word comes from an 1831 letter to the Cobourg Star and General Advertiser in the following passage: “my misfortunes have been brought upon me chiefly by an incorrigible, though perhaps useful, race of mortals called LUMBERJACKS, whom, however, I would name the Cossack’s of Upper Canada, who,…
Vintage: Russian Beauties in Traditional Costumes (19th Century)

Vintage: Russian Beauties in Traditional Costumes (19th Century)

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These photos were taken in the end of 19th century and now are kept in the collection of the Russian Museum of Ethnography. The women in the photos are wearing traditional costumes of different regions of Russia. And though you can see many regional differences in the outfits there are two similar basic elements – sarafan and kokoshnik. Sarafan is…
Vintage: Street Views of Sweden (1900s)

Vintage: Street Views of Sweden (1900s)

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Despite the slow rate of industrialisation into the 19th century, many important changes were taking place in the agrarian economy due to constant innovations and a rapid population growth. These innovations included government-sponsored programmes of enclosure, aggressive exploitation of agricultural lands, and the introduction of new crops such as the potato. Because the Swedish peasantry had never been enserfed as…