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20 Rarely Seen Photos Of America In The 1950’s Show How Different Life Was Before
The 1950’s are often viewed as a golden era in U.S. history, a time of happiness and prosperity, despite the threat of nuclear annihilation, racial segregation and the looming Cold War.
While most photos from the time are in black and white, color photography was still a relative novelty at the time and the film was quite expensive for regular people, the photos below are in glorious color. This means that they are more relatable, and makes the period feel closer to us than ever.
Many of the photos were collected by Denis Fraevich, a New Yorker of Russian descent who loves to bring the era back to life. “The pictures were found at auctions, flea markets and yards, digitized and posted on the Internet,” he told Bored Panda. “Someone's happy life, someone's dreams, important events, holidays and travel, for some reason were thrown into the garbage and became penny goods in a neighborhood sale. Seeing this is incredibly sad, but thanks to enthusiasts who buy and digitize old slides, we can raise the curtain of time and look at that era through the eyes of ordinary Americans.”
It is Denis' hobby to search for these photos, he is fascinated by all things Americana and loves history, abandoned places and as you can see in many of the photos, classic American cars. “I am amazed at how often a car is present in the frame,” he said. “They obviously occupied a much more important position in the life of an American than in our time. Today, it is much less likely that someone would take pictures of their car or television.” Denis works as a Russian-speaking tour guide in NYC and has a fascinating blog, which you can find here. (Translate it from Russian)
Scroll down to check out the pictures below, it might just inspire you to dig out that old leather jacket and the Brylcreem!
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Colored Entrance, Alabama, 1956
Yes, so sick of when people talk about how we need to return to the values of the past......These were the REAL American values of the past.
Load More Replies...Please don't forget that this wasn't that long ago. My father, who is still alive, remembers growing up in Virginia during Jim Crow and living with segregation laws. Remember so history doesn't repeat itself.
How old is he now, Auntie? Probably about my age. I m 60, and I grew up in the USA south. Things were much different then. My grandfather was African American, and I heard stories.... Bless him, if he were still alive, he would be 102. Miss him much.
Load More Replies...I can't stop looking at her dress though, it's gorgeous... and with her skin colour, marvellous effect.
I just read a really good book about this period. "Black like Me" was written by a white journalist that took skin treatments to make his skin black and went to live in Louisiana and Mississippi as a black man to tell the truth of what it was like. It is a true story. I highly recommend.
I read this book too. What an eye opener. Unfortunately things are still the same some how. No use to go to church and badly treat others.
Load More Replies...How much time and energy we have wasted -- how much heartbreak we've caused -- and continue to cause, all these years just because of differences in skin tone and culture.
Very well stated, Wanda. Hate accomplishes nothing. It is pure waste.
Load More Replies...I hate this so much. I never want our nation or any other nation to become this. Yet our current administration is all about this divisiveness. May we never forget and never repeat this hateful part of our history.
And all because some people have more melanin in their skin than others.
Load More Replies...What is the difference between Usa and South Africa? None both countries practice Apartheid, had slaves and both stole land from the the people who were there before the white men.
Many cultures practiced pillaging, slavery and stealing of land. Many tribes in Africa captured people from other tribes and sold or traded them into slavery. Irish were enslaved, Asians were enslaved, Africans were enslaved, the Jewish were enslaved. Its part of human history, not just the USA and South Africa. And it's not just white people who did it.
Load More Replies...It is sad, however, be grateful times are not like that. Or at least hopefully not going backwards.
Yes. Segregation is really not nearly as long ago as people like to pretend.
Load More Replies...I think this is my favorite photo in this series, because although it does embarrass me completely because of the "colored entrance" and how we as US citizens treated people with a darker color, I can't help but look at this woman and think just how damn classy and beautiful she looks! Her look is simply timeless.... That dress. Her shoes... her earrings and her clutch, just gorgeous. She's simple beautiful. And this city-scape, wow, it just brings me back to some long ago memories from my childhood. I grew up in Alabama, so I wonder where this was taken. Birmingham perhaps? Huntsville? No idea, but I LOVE this photo! Regardless of the humiliating entrance sign. I find that sign to be more humiliating than anything.
This is so bizarre when you try to work out the reasoning behind it. The belief, even at government level, that you were somehow, even impecably dressed like these two, were still not suitable to be physically close to white people. It's disgusting, horrible, unfair, cruel, etc, and impossible to understand. The mindsets people are raised with are hard to break.
at least there is a place for them to enter, in Canada an "Indian" was only allowed off the rez for a specific timeframe with a permit from the indian agent
Look again. The people in the photo are not Indians.
Load More Replies...Since I’m albino, would I be allowed in colored places and whites only?
Nop unfortunately :-( because theses bastard knews albinos were black but imagine I’m mixed light skin black if I have a 1/4 child with a white woman and my kids is white so my kids could be alowed in white area but not me , looks how this is ridiculous
Load More Replies...Photographed by Gordon Parks in Mobile, Alabama 1956. He was mainly a photojournalist but dabbled in fashion photography too. I have a set of his work on Flickr if any one is interested - https://www.flickr.com/photos/53035820@N02/sets/72157625111136669/
What strikes me isthe pride in their appearance. People had pride in themselves, no matter the circumstances
From England, 2022, looking at the USA and this poignant image, it seems amazing that that great nation lost its way so thoroughly and so long ago, largely thanks to its political and commercial misleaders. Henry David Thoreau's disappointment still sounds relevant!
This was an example of "jim crow laws ? sad ! A pretty mom and her daughter
This was not in where I lived. I know it was in the Southern states.
Despite the obvious racism here, it is still notable that both mother and child dressed up to go "downtown" as was the norm of the day.
Whats heartbreaking and sad if there is a Bigot in the White House who want to bring it back,
lol, love it. Back then, everyone wanted to move to the US. Now, f* it, not a chance, don;t want to be murdered by these "poor people"
Rly sad how u said it u must have a rly poor life to get all this frustration , u don’t know how it’s rly direspectfull for people who lived in this area and how hard it was , ur just a racist jerk f**k yourself judgment day is coming soon ur old probably in ur 70s hope u died fast and soon we don’t want u in this world anymore die pls die fast mother f****r ur racist b***h 🤮🤢🤮🤮🤮🤮
Load More Replies...They lady and child look so elegant. I remember having to dress up to go uptown with my dad. "Put on your Sunday clothes if you're going with me."
I remember accompanying My Sister's first Husband; he was a jerk, when he was driving a Truck to Florida delivering apples and picking up bananas for delivery to New York City. Stopping for lunch in Georgia, Truckers drove all night then and twelve to fourteen hour days were standard. Walking into the restaurant as a young teen ager from Canada I was amazed there were separate drinking fountains and rest rooms and "coloured".That is all the sign read "coloured" everyone understood. Fifteen years later when driving to Charlotte North Carolina as a twenty-eight year old for a training course as employee of an the international company I stopped at a restroom facility for all People. The only separation being gender. I was a tie-wearing suit jacket male driving a current year company car walking down the sidewalk when an older man raking leaves responded to my good-day greeting. His tennis shoes had holes for his small toes. He said with pride; "I am an American".
Are u still amazed for the coloured espace ? u understand it’s was racist right
Load More Replies...Beautiful mother and daughter, perhaps dressed up for Saturday outing !
Similar anti-white situation in Australia with aboriginal services that exclude whites - legal services, community transport, sports teams. If white organisations excluded aboriginals there would be hell to pay, but the opposite if fine, apparently! Now that is heartbreaking and sad! :(
I remember in the 50's my uncle had a bar in springdale arkansas-across the street was a bar that had music and dancing and I said daddy could we go over ther e they look more fun (we where visiting from california-he said NO that is for the black people
Oh so sad 😭 I’m sure ur a kind and sweet lady Im sure u have the love of god in u and u know it was racist I’m praying we all meet together in heaven 🥹😊
Load More Replies...I only wish that the ones now who are saying we should go back to the 50's had to live it from the other side for a while.
I remember there being a colored people only drinking fountain in the Hudson's store in Detroit in the mid 50s when I was a young child.
As a Canadian, it is so hard to fathom that this actually existed..
As a Canadian? Why as a Canadian? Just curious. I mean many of the same issues existed in Canada as well.
Load More Replies...This supposed to be a Christian country where the predominant religion teaches that all are the same in the eyes of God. So sad.
She looks amazing in that dress (yes I know what the point of this article is, just wanted to make a positive observation)
My Mom told me recently about how when I was a little kid we were in a diner somewhere in the south (we used to do a lot of random traveling) and a family pulled up into the parking lot and the father came in. He had to come in ahead of his family and ask if they would be allowed to come in and eat because they were black. Mom said she felt so heartbroken to sit and watch that mother and two kids sit in the car waiting for Dad to come back out to say yes or no and potentially have to go on to the next place to find out if it was OK. They DID get to come in but even just the every day things that other people took for granted...it is the kind of thing that has formed the deepest of scars in the soul. Where does that anger come from? From every cut of that knife.
Came here to see this photo (or one similar). Without it, your claim of Life in the 50's would be disingenuous
It's hard to understand how many people keep thinking that this was going on in one country...racism was and is prevalent all over the world. It's as if people are thinking it was confined to the U.S. in the 1950's.
Load More Replies...In 1956 the people of Alabama were served by Governor Jim Folsum, US Senators John Sparkman and J. Lister Hill, US Congressmen Frank Boykin, Carl Elliot, George Huddleston Jr., Robert E. Jones Jr., Albert Raines, and Kenneth Roberts. All Democrats.
S A M please look up the Gordon Parks foundation. He was a famous photographer and this was one of a series of well known photographs.
Load More Replies...Ladylike In NYC, 1958
My Very Cool Grandpa In The 1950s Holding A Fish, Smoking A Cigarette, With A Book Tucked Into His Pants And Cigarette Pack In His Sleeve
A Drink, A Cigar And Not Giving A Good Goddamn, 1950s
My Grandma Had Such A Gorgeous Smile. 1950's
An Officer With Hot Foot Teddy, The Real-Life Inspiration For Smokey The Bear, 1950
Daytona Beach,1957
James Dean At A California Gas Station With His Silver Porsche 550 Spyder, Named "Little Bastard," Just Hours Before His Fatal Crash. September 30, 1955
Store Front, Mobile, Alabama, 1956
Girl And Her Grandmother Window-Shopping In Mobile, Alabama, 1956
Anne St. Marie, New York City, 1959
Alabama, 1956
The Streets Of San Francisco. 1957
Girl Portrait. Shady Grove, Alabama, 1956
At The Party, 1956
Showgirls Playing Chess Backstage At The Latin Quarter Nightclub - New York, NY (1958)
Outside Looking In, Mobile, Alabama, 1956
This is the s**t we mustn't forget, especially in this day when people want to keep telling us we need to get back to some imaginary "good old days".
A Slightly Surrealistic Photo Of My Grandma And Some Dude Somewhere In Florida, 1957
South Side Snack. 1953, Chicago
Child In A Car Seat
My mom loved the 1950's in New York City. She got to see the original West Side Story on Broadway and had coffee with the beatniks in Greenwich Village who read poetry out loud to jazz. The city was clean and people looked forward to the future and anyone with a college degree had their pick of jobs. Women went shopping with their best clothes on which often included a mink coat or fox fur wrap. The ladies would have lunch at Schrafft's which also served alcohol. In the early 50's they didn't have to go grocery or errand shopping, all the markets (meat market, flower market, etc.) delivered everything to their maid Virginia through the back kitchen entrance. Were things not as good for minorities? No they were not. Mom was raised by an adored black maid named Virginia who was not permitted by the family to go to her wedding. She always felt bad about that and never understood why things were that way. Later, mom got arrested in the 1960's fighting for integration.
Ahhhh, the 1950"s. Where people looked the other way when they saw children be abused and domestic violence the norm because wives and children were considered "property"
Load More Replies...A golden era for white males. I'm am VERY glad I don't have to have lived in it.
very ignorant comment. plenty of poor white families all across America at that time, and before. yes, segregation was outrageous, no doubt about it.
Load More Replies...Honestly, these photos creep me out. For me, these pictures emphasize society's morbid need for perfection. Fake smiles. Brightly painted, but underdeveloped, technology. Ignorance and contributions to mass discrimination. I'd never want to live in the 1950's.
And you don't think our technology will seem undereveloped in the 2090's? I was a kid in the 50's and it was just fine. The smiles weren't fake -- people in these photos look like they actually did. Why do you think people have changed so much?
Load More Replies...Golden era LOL! Except women and anyone other than a white male. The only decent thing to come out of the 50's was Brown V Board of Education of Topeka.
Beautiful and interesting pictures. I love the fashions of the time.
Awesome photos! It's really a trip back to the past!! One quick question though....are these photos colorized?
No, they're color photos. Typically slides. Color film had been common since the late 30's. More common in amateur photography since it was hard to process, expensive to make large prints, and very expensive to reproduce in print.
Load More Replies...Give us more of such pictorial depiction of different cities across the world. Especially of the South and South East Asia, India, China, the Pacific Rim nations. Worth watching.
Very evocative. I was a kid back then (born 1954) and the clothes and cars bring back fond memories. It really was a good time. Not perfect, no time ever is, but it's an accurate depiction of how people lived at a time when working people were earning middle class incomes for the first time in history. No drug plague, homelessness, mass incarceration. I'm taken by how well everyone is dressed -- it brings back memories, I remember having a coat just like one of the kids -- that changed with the youth rebellion of the 60's and never went back. Otherwise, besides the look of the cars and clothes, it's interesting to look at the buildings and realize one would be very comfortable walking around in that world today, indeed, if you look at some of the streets, they might as well be in 2018 -- not just the old but the modernist architecture.
that's when we used to live in America.its been dead for along time.now we live in the rotting stinking empire,which is collapsing just as all empires do.
We (society in 2018) need more pictures like these from the history of ”black” America. As a ”white” person this is something really lacking in both my education and education in general. These images of that unfortunately separate history of America are affirming of the resilliance and warmth of their lives even though they represent a social injustice we can never repay.
My education had plenty of pictures and even movies about this topic and stop speaking for us white people. Its okay to be white.
Load More Replies...hat's when we used to live in America.its been dead for along time.now we live in the rotting stinking empire,which is collapsing just as all empires do.
Everything was classy and beautiful and pastel. But then you see the segregation. OMG. I think a lot of White people in that time where so brainwashed they thought it was normal. But I hope many understood the madness of it all and wanted change, but couldn't do much about it.
The segregation was in the deep south. When I was growing up it horrified us as much as it horrifies people today. Southerners, of course, thought it was normal. And people *did* do something about it, it was already changing (e.g., Truman had integrated the armed forces and school segregation was ruled unconstitutional) and in a few years Martin Luther King would be marching. In 1965, LBJ signed the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts, and the formal apparatus of Jim Crow was dismantled.
Load More Replies...Make America Great Again people don't realize that back in the day America was only great if you were a white person, especially a white man. Or maybe they do realize that and they just don't care about anyone but themselves. That being said, there are some beautiful photos here.
I'm not sure what "people" you're addressing here. We all fully understand the horrible stuff back then.
Load More Replies...The US led the world in standard of living back then. Most of all I remember it as a time of very little crime and more neighborly than today.
It was just hidden. Domestic violence and child abuse were rampant. Clergy were raping children. No one reported it. Don't scratch below that shiny surface - especially if you aren't a white Christian man.
Load More Replies...My mom loved the 1950's in New York City. She got to see the original West Side Story on Broadway and had coffee with the beatniks in Greenwich Village who read poetry out loud to jazz. The city was clean and people looked forward to the future and anyone with a college degree had their pick of jobs. Women went shopping with their best clothes on which often included a mink coat or fox fur wrap. The ladies would have lunch at Schrafft's which also served alcohol. In the early 50's they didn't have to go grocery or errand shopping, all the markets (meat market, flower market, etc.) delivered everything to their maid Virginia through the back kitchen entrance. Were things not as good for minorities? No they were not. Mom was raised by an adored black maid named Virginia who was not permitted by the family to go to her wedding. She always felt bad about that and never understood why things were that way. Later, mom got arrested in the 1960's fighting for integration.
Ahhhh, the 1950"s. Where people looked the other way when they saw children be abused and domestic violence the norm because wives and children were considered "property"
Load More Replies...A golden era for white males. I'm am VERY glad I don't have to have lived in it.
very ignorant comment. plenty of poor white families all across America at that time, and before. yes, segregation was outrageous, no doubt about it.
Load More Replies...Honestly, these photos creep me out. For me, these pictures emphasize society's morbid need for perfection. Fake smiles. Brightly painted, but underdeveloped, technology. Ignorance and contributions to mass discrimination. I'd never want to live in the 1950's.
And you don't think our technology will seem undereveloped in the 2090's? I was a kid in the 50's and it was just fine. The smiles weren't fake -- people in these photos look like they actually did. Why do you think people have changed so much?
Load More Replies...Golden era LOL! Except women and anyone other than a white male. The only decent thing to come out of the 50's was Brown V Board of Education of Topeka.
Beautiful and interesting pictures. I love the fashions of the time.
Awesome photos! It's really a trip back to the past!! One quick question though....are these photos colorized?
No, they're color photos. Typically slides. Color film had been common since the late 30's. More common in amateur photography since it was hard to process, expensive to make large prints, and very expensive to reproduce in print.
Load More Replies...Give us more of such pictorial depiction of different cities across the world. Especially of the South and South East Asia, India, China, the Pacific Rim nations. Worth watching.
Very evocative. I was a kid back then (born 1954) and the clothes and cars bring back fond memories. It really was a good time. Not perfect, no time ever is, but it's an accurate depiction of how people lived at a time when working people were earning middle class incomes for the first time in history. No drug plague, homelessness, mass incarceration. I'm taken by how well everyone is dressed -- it brings back memories, I remember having a coat just like one of the kids -- that changed with the youth rebellion of the 60's and never went back. Otherwise, besides the look of the cars and clothes, it's interesting to look at the buildings and realize one would be very comfortable walking around in that world today, indeed, if you look at some of the streets, they might as well be in 2018 -- not just the old but the modernist architecture.
that's when we used to live in America.its been dead for along time.now we live in the rotting stinking empire,which is collapsing just as all empires do.
We (society in 2018) need more pictures like these from the history of ”black” America. As a ”white” person this is something really lacking in both my education and education in general. These images of that unfortunately separate history of America are affirming of the resilliance and warmth of their lives even though they represent a social injustice we can never repay.
My education had plenty of pictures and even movies about this topic and stop speaking for us white people. Its okay to be white.
Load More Replies...hat's when we used to live in America.its been dead for along time.now we live in the rotting stinking empire,which is collapsing just as all empires do.
Everything was classy and beautiful and pastel. But then you see the segregation. OMG. I think a lot of White people in that time where so brainwashed they thought it was normal. But I hope many understood the madness of it all and wanted change, but couldn't do much about it.
The segregation was in the deep south. When I was growing up it horrified us as much as it horrifies people today. Southerners, of course, thought it was normal. And people *did* do something about it, it was already changing (e.g., Truman had integrated the armed forces and school segregation was ruled unconstitutional) and in a few years Martin Luther King would be marching. In 1965, LBJ signed the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts, and the formal apparatus of Jim Crow was dismantled.
Load More Replies...Make America Great Again people don't realize that back in the day America was only great if you were a white person, especially a white man. Or maybe they do realize that and they just don't care about anyone but themselves. That being said, there are some beautiful photos here.
I'm not sure what "people" you're addressing here. We all fully understand the horrible stuff back then.
Load More Replies...The US led the world in standard of living back then. Most of all I remember it as a time of very little crime and more neighborly than today.
It was just hidden. Domestic violence and child abuse were rampant. Clergy were raping children. No one reported it. Don't scratch below that shiny surface - especially if you aren't a white Christian man.
Load More Replies...