January 2024
January 21, 2024
Sheaffer Pen accurately predicted the future
In 1963 and 1964, Sheaffer Pen ran an ad campaign in which they made a variety of predictions about future technologies of the 21st century. The company contrasted these technologies, which must have seemed a bit pie-in-the-sky at the time, with the timeless performance of a Sheaffer pen. The surprising thing is that all their predictions have come true: instant mail delivery, checkbooks that balance themselves electronically, portable visual phones, ring tape recorders, camera sunglasses, credit card rings, electronic translators.They don't all exist in the specific form that Sheaffer imagined (credit card rings?), but in each case the equivalent or better exists.
Newsweek - Sep 23, 1963
Posted By: Alex - Sun Jan 21, 2024 -
Comments (4)
Category: Technology, Advertising, 1960s, Yesterday’s Tomorrows
Living With Lesbians
The artist's Wikipedia page.
Posted By: Paul - Sun Jan 21, 2024 -
Comments (1)
Category: Domestic, Sexuality, Vinyl Albums and Other Media Recordings, 1970s
January 20, 2024
Baby the Smoking Blue Jay
We posted a few days ago about a smoking poodle. Now here's a smoking blue jay.
Greenwood Commonwealth (Mississippi) - Dec 8, 1962
image source: NY Journal American archive
Posted By: Alex - Sat Jan 20, 2024 -
Comments (0)
Category: Smoking and Tobacco
The Far-out Costumes of Dancer Nina Payne
Read her story here.Source of advertisement.
Dancer Nina Payne (USA) Nina Payne doing exercises in the Elizabeth Arden beauty parlor, Paris (to prepare for her performance in the Folies-Bergere) - undated, probably 1925
Posted By: Paul - Sat Jan 20, 2024 -
Comments (1)
Category: Eccentrics, Bohemians, Beatniks, Hippies and Slackers, 1920s, Dance, Europe
January 19, 2024
Miss Stacked Job
As far as I can tell, the term "stacked job" (as it was used in 1960s-era computing) was roughly equivalent to what today would be called 'batch processing'. It was a stack of jobs (or programs) to be run by the computer.When the Northern Arizona University Data Processing Club came up with the idea of awarding a young woman the title of "Miss Stacked Job," they admitted, "We didn't know how many, if any, girls would want the title." They ended up with ten contestants. Kathe Kline was the winner.
Posted By: Alex - Fri Jan 19, 2024 -
Comments (0)
Category: Awards, Prizes, Competitions and Contests, Computers, 1960s
How To Speak Hip
The whole playlist for all 13 cuts is here. Track 1 below.Wikipedia entry for the album here.
Posted By: Paul - Fri Jan 19, 2024 -
Comments (2)
Category: Languages, Vinyl Albums and Other Media Recordings, Bohemians, Beatniks, Hippies and Slackers, 1960s, Parody
January 18, 2024
The Judge who wanted to be fully informed
Nov 1976: Roxbury District Court Judge Elwood McKenney, presiding over a cocaine possession case, announced that he would need to try cocaine himself before he made his ruling... in order to be able to make an informed decision. He recessed the trial until he had done so.
Palo Alto Times - Nov 2, 1976
Judge Elwood McKenney
About a month later, McKenney abandoned his decision to try cocaine, saying that all the publicity about it had distorted his intent.
But he then proceeded to rule that the Massachusetts statutes forbidding the possession of cocaine were unconstitutional.
Obviously his ruling must have been dismissed or overturned at some point, otherwise cocaine would now be legal in Massachusetts. But I haven't been able to figure out when that happened.
Boston Globe - Dec 11, 1976
Posted By: Alex - Thu Jan 18, 2024 -
Comments (1)
Category: Drugs, Law, Judges, 1970s
Mystery Gadget 108
This is not an iron lung machine. So then, what's going on?The answer is here.
Or after the jump.
More in extended >>
Posted By: Paul - Thu Jan 18, 2024 -
Comments (4)
Category: Technology, Twentieth Century
January 17, 2024
Worried Mother
Birmingham Post - May 9, 1958
Posted By: Alex - Wed Jan 17, 2024 -
Comments (0)
Category: Parents, 1950s
Pigeon Drones
Read all about the wartime practice of mounting cameras on pigeons.At Wikipedia.
And at Public Domain Review, where there are more pictures.
Posted By: Paul - Wed Jan 17, 2024 -
Comments (0)
Category: Animals, Inventions, Photography and Photographers, War, Twentieth Century
| Get WU Posts by Email | |
|---|---|
| Who We Are |
|---|
| Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction books such as Elephants on Acid. Paul Di Filippo Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1. Chuck Shepherd Chuck is the purveyor of News of the Weird, the syndicated column which for decades has set the gold-standard for reporting on oddities and the bizarre. Our banner was drawn by the legendary underground cartoonist Rick Altergott. Contact Us |
