Mounted on my favorite horse, my … lariat near my hand, and my trusty guns in my belt … I felt I could defy the world. — Nat Love in The Life and Adventures of Nat Love, 1907 Thousands of black cowboys drove cattle up the Chisholm Trail after the Civil War, but only NatContinue reading “Nat Love, America’s Greatest Black Cowboy of the Wild West”
Tag Archives: 1800s
15 Amazing Photos Showing Drug-Addled Men and Women Lying in the Opium Dens in 19th Century America
Reclining on bunk beds while sucking on opium pipes, these haunting photos provide a rare glimpse into life in America’s 19th century opium dens that prompted the country’s first crackdown on drugs. Established by the Chinese and arriving in the US via ships, the first opium dens sprung up in San Francisco’s Chinatown during theContinue reading “15 Amazing Photos Showing Drug-Addled Men and Women Lying in the Opium Dens in 19th Century America”
Fascinating Stories Behind 19 Stunning Portraits Taken by Julia Margaret Cameron in the Late 19th Century
Earliest Portrait Photos Ever Taken Bring Americans From the 1840s to Life After Being Colorized
These amazing photographs were all taken in the 1840s using the daguerreotype which had just been invented. Images show various people from 1840s New York and bring to life how people looked and dressed in that era. They believed to have been taken by legendary early American photographer Matthew Brady, show a selection of 11Continue reading “Earliest Portrait Photos Ever Taken Bring Americans From the 1840s to Life After Being Colorized”
10 Sad and Strange Facts About Victorian Post-Mortem Photography
The invention of the daguerreotype in 1839 made portraiture much more commonplace, as many of those who were unable to afford the commission of a painted portrait could afford to sit for a photography session. This cheaper and quicker method also provided the middle class with a means for memorializing dead loved ones. Post-mortem photographyContinue reading “10 Sad and Strange Facts About Victorian Post-Mortem Photography”
Portraits of Queen Victoria
Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death in 1901. Known as the Victorian era, her reign of 63 years and seven months was longer than any previous British monarch. It was a period ofContinue reading “Portraits of Queen Victoria”
125 Reasons You Could End Up in a Lunatic Asylum in the 19th Century
Reasons for admission into the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum in West Virginia from 1864 to 1889 included laziness, egotism, disappointed love, female disease, mental excitement, cold, snuff, greediness, imaginary female trouble, “gathering in the head,” exposure and quackery, jealousy, religion, asthma, masturbation, and bad habits. Spouses used lunacy laws to rid themselves of their partners andContinue reading “125 Reasons You Could End Up in a Lunatic Asylum in the 19th Century”
20 Vintage Photos Showing How Things Really Were in the “Wild West” of the 1800s
The American frontier, also known as the Old West or the Wild West, includes the geography, history, folklore, and culture in the forward wave of American expansion in mainland North America that began with European colonial settlements in the early 17th century and ended with the admission of the last few western territories as statesContinue reading “20 Vintage Photos Showing How Things Really Were in the “Wild West” of the 1800s”
13 Amazing Photographs of Revolutionary Veterans Who Lived Long Enough to Have Their Pictures Taken
Images of Americans who fought in the Revolution are exceptionally rare because few of the Patriots of 1775-’83 lived until the dawn of practical photography in the early 1840s; far fewer were daguerreotyped; many, probably most, of such daguerreotypes never carried identification; and finally, the ravages of time have claimed the vast majority of portraitsContinue reading “13 Amazing Photographs of Revolutionary Veterans Who Lived Long Enough to Have Their Pictures Taken”
Long Before Inline Skates Were a Thing, There Were Ritter’s Aptly Named Road Skates, ca. 1898
Like inline skates, they were meant to free skating enthusiasts of those pesky iceless roads. As an advertisement reads, “Ritter Road Skates allow anyone to practice the graceful and healthful pastimes of speed and figure skating on any road or other suitable surface.” The skates were sold by the Road Skate Co of Oxford Street,Continue reading “Long Before Inline Skates Were a Thing, There Were Ritter’s Aptly Named Road Skates, ca. 1898”
