American colour pictures from 1939-1943.

[ElFenix]

Surprising quality. Some of those look like they are taken yesterday (i.e. 2010 quality *AND* 2010 content)

one of kodachrome's greatest strengths was its archival durability. it's calculated that the yellow will start to perceptibly fade after 180 years.

 

[TheVrolok]

Those are phenomenal. I might see if I can try to get some prints made up and framed.

 

[CPA]

It's amazing how many kids went without shoes back then. Either they didn't have them or just never wore them.

 

[Homerboy]

beyond cool pics. It's especially cool that most are of very rural areas in everday "adventures" of which you just never really see anything like these pics. Great find denni.

 

[mmntech]

Some of the towns, would be neat to see what those buildings/areas look today.

 

[AyashiKaibutsu]

Makes you realize how much better people are going to have it 60 years from now... The bastards!

 

[Sheik Yerbouti]

Very cool pics. Thank you!

 

[mb]

Wow sweet pictures!

BTW, #13 & 16. TridenT. lulz

 

[Mossimo142]

The girl on the right in #16 looks like Napoleon Dynamite. Lol.

 

[Wyndru]

Amazing photos, thanks!

 

[Rudee]

Young women back then did not age well at all compared to women today. A woman in her 20's looks like she's in her late 30's.

 

[GuitarDaddy]

Life was hard in rural American at this time. Thanks for the link to those special pics!

I've got to print some of those off and show them to my dad who was born in 1925. He was 14-18 when these pictures were taken, I'm sure it will bring back memories for him, he grew up in rural settings just like these.

Most of us really can't understand how much the country boomed in the post WWII period. My dad has lots of family pictures taken around the time I was born in 1957 and the difference between those and these pictures taken just 15-18 years prior is astonishing. The way people dressed, the look of buildings and architecture, everthing looks much more prosperous by the late 50's.

If you were wealthy enough to pony up the wildly extravagant price of $225 for a brand new top of the line Martin D-45 guitar in 40 or 41 and hung on to it you would have a collectors prize worth $125,000 today

 

[sohcrates]

Everyone is very...dirty

When did NASA invent the shower?

 

[mcurphy]

american pickers would have major cubbies for the oil signs above the stage.

lol, I thought the same thing when I looked at that picture. Those guys love their oil signs and oil cans.

 

[coldmeat]

If you were wealthy enough to pony up the wildly extravagant price of $225 for a brand new top of the line Martin D-45 guitar in 40 or 41 and hung on to it you would have a collectors prize worth $125,000 today

That's it? $125,000 for 70 years?

 

[dennilfloss]

Some of the towns, would be neat to see what those buildings/areas look today.

Someone at Ars Technica checked this.😎

Plate 57: Dillon, Montana, 1942:

Same corner, Google Street View:

Link

They've uglified the building, but it's still there, as well as the buildings attached to the left, and the ones down the street to the right.

 

[TehMac]

It's just utterly mindblowing how big of an impact two generations of the human race can make on the world. The singularity is near.

lol don't kid yourself