Think The World We Live In Today Is Weird? These 40 Vintage Photos Prove It Used To Be Even Weirder…
Home Humanity Think The World We Live In Today Is Weird? These 40 Vintage Photos Prove It Used To Be Even Weirder…
There is no denying we live in a weird world. It seems as we grow older, things get worse and worse. But sometimes all it takes is a look into the past to see that things actually used to be even weirder than you could have imagined…it might just make you feel better about today’s world.
A police officer judges an ankle competition in London. [1930]

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A professional “rat catcher” showing off his kill. [1904]

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Rat catchers would scour the sewers of Europe and receive money for each rat they killed.
Women painting their legs to make it appear that they were wearing stockings [1942]

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During wartime, nylon for stockings was scarce and women had to get creative to look fancy.
The day Sweden switched which side of the road they drive on. [1967]

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Members of the Seattle Tubing Society relax on a warm afternoon [1953]

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A maintenance crew loads 5 megabytes of memory into a Pan am Aircraft. [1956]

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That’s about enough space to store one HD image.
A man testing a prototype football helmet. [1912]

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Batman on elephant. [1967]

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Nazis singing outside of Jewish art shops to encourage Germans to boycott the shops. [1933]

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“People Scooper” for cars. [1920s]

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A “Punt Gun” which was used to hunt waterfowl – it was banned for being too effective. [1800s]

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A brewery in England delivering kegs of beer on Spitfires to troops fighting in Normandy [June 1944]

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War orphaned Vietnamese babies are flown to LAX. [April 12, 1975]

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Alfred Hitchcock serving tea to the MGM Lion. [1957]

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Exercise machine designed to “roll the fat” out of legs [1936]

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Salvador Dali walking his pet anteater. [1969]

Women box on a rooftop. [1938]

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Women in “wooden bathing suits” designed to make you more boyant [1929]

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Portable sauna

A Berlin boy selling lemonade with a portable lemonade dispenser. [1931]

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United States Border Patrol try to drag a fugitive across the US border in order to keep him from escaping to Mexico. [1920]

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An overhead view of New York showing that everyone wore a hat. [1939]

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Japanese women cover their faces in shame in a Tokyo courtroom.

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The Dynasphere was a monowheel electric vehicle which could go up to 25 miles per hour. [1932]

Russian soldiers feed polar bears from their tank. [1950]

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A German soldier firing a gun from the back of his horse. [1939]

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A woman waits for the hoops of her crinoline to be completed by a London dress shop. [1860]

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Pedal skates. [1910]

Kids playing with stacks of German money. [1922]

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Due to inflation after WWI, monetary notes in German were so inflated they became practically useless.
Portable TV Concept [1967]

Parisians navigate flood waters by walking across rows of chairs. [1924]

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A woman wearing a cape designed to block harmful UV rays [1946]

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Before there was sunscreen, people used to great lengths to protect themselves from the sun.
World War I “Sound Finders” used to detect which direction enemy planes were approaching from. [c. 1914 - 1918]

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A nurse applying UV light to babies [1927]

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In the past, vitamin D was delivered via tanning to babies until it was replaced by the safer supplements we use today.
Belgian troops stand with their dog drawn cannons on their way to the Western Front. [1914]

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Participants of a “Miss Lovely Eyes” contest held in Florida. [1930]

An advertisement for an anti-malaria drug. [1941]

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An “icebox” facial beauty treatment. [1966]

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A masked Mickey Mouse Club meeting. [1930s]

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Actors recording an episode of the “Gang Busters” crime radio show. [1934]

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Source: Distractify
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