Earlier this month, we got some color snaps of Shackleton’s 1915 Antarctic trip. Pretty nifty. But they’re not quite as captivating as what the Smithsonian put out this week: Full color photos of a San Francisco freshly wrecked by the 1906 earthquake.
Click here to see more. Is it me, or is it a little jarring to see that a city, 100 years ago, really did have bright colors and sunshine, and not just the sad, Dickensian, child-labor-filled grays that fill black-and-white photos? Take away the old-timey billboard, and my brain has no trouble thinking these images are from no older than a smoggy, barren 1965.
… or Detroit circa yesterday.
it’s not just you. It’s weird. That looks like the 1950’s or early 1960s with the buildings and the film stock.
These are great, thank you for posting. Finally something worthy of my time on Blogtown!
Yes, may we please aspire to be Wubbles-
worthy?