75 Extremely Rare Historical Pictures That Will Completely And Totally Change Your Perspective On The The Past

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07-04-2025

1. This is what the Statue of Liberty looked like while it was under construction in France:
2. This is the last photograph ever taken of the Titanic:
3. This is a picture of one of the last Tasmanian tigers, an animal that went extinct in 1936:
4. This is George Hackenschmidt, the man credited with inventing the bench press:
5. This is a picture of some of Gandhi's only earthly possessions when he died:
A couple hats, a couple bowls, and some sandals.
6. This is what Gutzon Borglum's original model for Mount Rushmore looked like:
There's still time to remedy this. We need giant coats on our big giant rock presidents.
7. The very first iteration of Ronald McDonald was created by Willard Scott in 1963:
8. Before the invention of RADAR, soldiers used big old Looney Toons- looking contraptions to listen for enemy planes:
9. This is Selma Burke, the woman who designed the portrait of Franklin Roosevelt that's still on the dime to this day:
10. This photo, taken by Louis Botan in 1899, is one of the first photos ever taken underwater:
The very first picture taken underwater was done some years earlier, but that was done by attaching a camera to a pole and lowering it into the water. This is the first taken by a diver also submerged.
11. Held in 1903, this is what the first ever Tour de France looked like:
12. And this is a picture of the first-ever international tennis match at Wimbledon in 1883:
13. This is the scene inside a Chicago bar on Dec. 5, 1933, the day Prohibition was repealed:
14. This is what New York City looked like from space on 9/11/2001:
NASA
Captured from the ISS.
15. This is Albert Woolson, the last surviving Civil War veteran:
16. This is the USS Langley, the first United States aircraft carrier:
17. This is what New York City's Central Park looked like during the Great Depression:
Bettmann
This picture, captured in 1933, showcases a range of "Hoovervilles," makeshift settlements created by the unemployed and named after President Herbert Hoover.
18. The Titanic had a full gym on board, complete with a rowing machine. This is what it looked like:
19. This is a picture of the spectators, including alleged mobsters, covering their faces with hats to avoid recognition during Al Capone's trial in October 1931:
20. This picture, from 1930, shows a plane flying over the old city of Baghdad:
21. This is Stephan Bibrowski, otherwise known as Lionel the Lion-faced Man. Stephan had a condition known as hypertrichosis that caused hair to grow up to eight inches long all over his body including, obviously, his face:
22. This picture, taken in 1925, is the last known photo of a Barbary lion in the wild:
23. This picture, taken in 1838 by Louis Daguerre, is the first-ever photo to have a person in it:
24. And this is the first picture of Earth from the moon, taken in 1966 by Lunar Orbiter 1:
25. And, while we're at it, this picture of a human hand captured in 1895 is the oldest surviving X-ray of the human body:
26.
27. During the Battle of Britain during World War II, cows were painted with bright white paint to stop cars from hitting them during the nightly blackouts:
28. This is Daniel Lambert, a British man who was known as the world's heaviest person in the 18th century:
30. This, from 1896, is what one of Pablo Picasso's first-ever self-portraits looks like:
Alamy Stock Photo
31. And this, from 1972, is what one of Picasso's last self-portraits looks like:
Alamy Stock Photo
32. This is the safety net that was installed under the Golden Gate Bridge during its construction in the 1930s. The net saved 19 people through the duration of the work:
Underwood Archives / Getty Images
The 19 men who were saved by the net became known as the "Halfway to Hell Club."
33. This photo is one of only two photos in existence of the US Supreme Court in session:
Alamy Stock Photo
The court has never allowed cameras. In 1937, photographer Erich Salomon pretended that his arm was broken and put the camera inside a sling he wore into the court and snapped this pic.
34. The Great San Francisco Earthquake of 1906 was the deadliest earthquake in US history, resulting in the deaths of over 3,000 people. In the aftermath of the disaster, you could literally see where the Earth split along the San Andreas Fault:
Underwood Archives / Getty Images
35. This is the Willamette meteorite, the largest meteorite that's ever been found in the United States:
Bettmann / Bettmann Archive
It is the sixth largest in the world and weighs 15.5 tons.
36. This is what the world's largest gold nugget, named the Welcome Stranger nugget, looked like. It was found in Australia in 1869:
/ Alamy Stock Photo
This is actually a model of the nugget. It weighed almost 160 pounds and was sold pretty much immediately for £9,534, which is about £970,000 today.
37. This is Norma Smallwood, the winner of the 1926 Miss America pageant:
George Rinhart / Corbis via Getty Images
Try as he might, old Calvin Coolidge couldn't rig the contest for his wife, Grace.
38. This 17th-century painting by Giovanni Stanchi shows what the inside of a watermelon looked like in the 1600s, before selective breeding:
/ Alamy Stock Photo
Look at that old fruit.
39. This is one of the only pictures of President Andrew Jackson, taken shortly before his death in 1845:
/ Alamy Stock Photo
40. On September 3, 1967, Sweden made a shift from driving on the left side of the road to driving on the right. This is a picture from the first day after the big change:
/ Alamy Stock Photo
Looks like a chill, relaxing day.
41. This picture, taken by Robert Cornelius in 1839, is generally accepted as the first "selfie":
Robert Cornelius / Getty Images
Basically, he probably took the first self-portrait ever. Bob had to sit for 15 minutes to get this picture.
42. Tourists used to be able to freely climb up the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt to sunbathe and have tea parties:
Bettmann / Bettmann Archive
Fortunately, that is not the case anymore.
43. This is what the inside of the White House looked like when it was being reconstructed in the late 1940s:
Abbie Rowe / National Park Service
44. During World War II, Walt Disney developed a Mickey Mouse gas mask, designed to help children get comfortable and relaxed while wearing the mask:
Alamy Stock Photo
45. Here's a totally not frightening closeup:
Alamy Stock Photo
46. This right here is a photo from President Abraham Lincoln's first inauguration in 1861:
Education Images / Contributor
Can you spot Honest Abe?
47. Here's one from his second inauguration in 1865:
Universal History Archive / Universal Images Group via Getty Images
48. This is Herman the Cat, a cat who was given the title of expert mouser aboard a US Coast Guard ship during World War II:
Sherman Grinberg Library
Herman, in addition to other cats aboard ships, was there to catch pests. It was a thing.
49. This is the iconic log cabin where Abraham Lincoln was born in 1809:
Mpi / Getty Images
This would sell for $19 million in Lake Tahoe today.
50. John Quincy Adams was the first US president ever photographed. Here he is in 1840, more than a decade after his presidency:
Henry Guttmann Collection / Getty Images
51. This is the world's first skyscraper, the 10-story Home Insurance Building, which was located in Chicago:
Bettmann / Bettmann Archive
The absolutely gargantuan skyscraper was built in 1885 and torn down in 1931.
52. This is Ahmet Ali Çelikten, a man who is generally considered to be one of the first Black pilots — and perhaps the very first:
Aclosund Historic / Alamy Stock Photo
He first flew for the Ottoman Empire in World War I. His contemporaries included Eugene Bullard, the first Black military pilot from the United States.
53. Fiat once had a car factory with a working test track on the roof:
/ Alamy Stock Photo
The building and the track are still there; you just can't perform the incredibly safe act of driving cars on a roof anymore. Bummer.
54. This is the oldest picture of the White House ever taken:
Alamy Stock Photo
It was taken in 1846.
55. This is what the face of the Statue of Liberty looked like before it was installed onto the monument:
NPS Photo / Alamy Stock Photo
56. This is what economy class on a commercial plane looked like in the 1960s:
- / AFP via Getty Images
57. This is Charlotte and Marjorie Collyer, a mother and daughter who survived the wreck of the Titanic in 1912:
ThePhotoMender.com / Alamy Stock Photo
Charlotte's husband and Marjorie's dad Harvey Collyer died in the wreck. Also lost in the tragedy was the family's life savings of £5,000 cash.
58. In 1903, Edward Llewellen (left) made history by breaking the world record and catching the biggest sea bass ever caught off the coast of Catalina Island:
Niday Picture Library / Alamy Stock Photo
It weighed 425 pounds.
59. In 1969, Niagara Falls was "drained" in order to remove a large number of boulders that had accumulated at the foot of the falls:
colaimages / Alamy Stock Photo
Apparently, two bodies were found at the bottom of the drained waterfall.
60. This is what the view of downtown Manhattan looked like from the Empire State Building the year it opened in 1931...
Everett Collection Inc / Alamy Stock Photo
And this is what that same view looks like today:
IndustryAndTravel / Alamy Stock Photo
I spy a couple more buildings.
61. This is what one college student's dorm room looked like in the 1910s:
Hum Images / Alamy Stock Photo
Some absolutely scandalous wall decorations.
62. This right here is a once state-of-the-art piece of armor that used to be worn by golf course workers sent out to retrieve range balls:
Library Of Congress / Corbis/VCG via Getty Images
63. For its 50th anniversary, over 300,000 people walked across the Golden Gate Bridge:
Ed Perlstein / Redferns
Here's another angle of the very packed celebration:
San Francisco Chronicle / Hearst Newspapers via Getty Images
64. This is what Times Square looked like in 1921:
Edwin Levick / Getty Images
65. Speaking of other things that didn't catch on, this was a proposed firefighting suit designed to drench the wearer in water:
Smith Archive / Alamy Stock Photo
66. This is Emma Lilian Todd, the first woman to design an airplane:
Science History Images / Alamy Stock Photo
That is some contraption.
67. This is a picture of the opening of the very first New York City subway back in 1904:
Photoquest / Getty Images
68. This is William Hutchings, one of the last surviving American Revolutionary War veterans:
FAY 2018 / Alamy Stock Photo
He was 100 in this picture.
69. This is how many barrels of wine the French army supplied for its troops for the Battle of Gallipoli during World War I:
Historical / Corbis via Getty Images
70. After World War I, sculptor Anna Coleman Ladd led a team that crafted realistic masks to restore the faces of injured soldiers:
Science History Images / Alamy Stock Photo
71. This is Louisa Ann Swain, the first American woman to ever vote in a general election:
Alamy Stock Photo
The vote happened in 1870, five decades before the 19th Amendment granted voting rights to all American women.
72. This is the check for $7.2 million, issued Aug. 1, 1868, that the US sent to Russia for the purchase of Alaska:
Three Lions / Getty Images
73. This picture, from the 1980 Moscow Olympics, shows a number of performers making a human torch:
NCAA Photos / NCAA Photos via Getty Images
74. This is the Brewster armor suit, one of the first fully functional suits of body armor designed for World War I combat:
u/baronvonbroccoli / Via reddit.com
75. And, finally, this is Jack the baboon, a South African baboon who worked as a signalman at a railway station in the 1800s. During his almost decade of railway work, Jack never made a single mistake:
Getty
He was paid "20 cents a day and half a bottle of beer weekly." RIP, Jack.