Here's a precursor to David Lynch's "Ricky Board" art piece in which rows of nearly identical objects are given different names.  From Yankee Enchantments by Charles Battell Loomis and illustrated by F. Y. Cory, 1900.  Here's the Ricky Board we made with asterisks in honor of the celebrated poet and novelist Gary Barwin.

Here's a precursor to Wendy Walker's sublime novel The Secret Service, in which spies discover a Tibetan technique to transform themselves into inanimate objects.  From Judy, Or The London Serio-Comic Journal, 1874.

Here's a precursor to the Ken doll.  By Andreas Bloch, date unknown.

Before the "hanky code" of colored bandanas to announce one's inclinations, there was Black and Gold, or the Signal Scarf by W. H. Patten-Saunders, 1865.

Before Butt-head there was merely Be[a]vis, The Story of a Boy by Richard Jefferies, 1891.

Before Prince's "raspberry beret," there was the strawberry handkerchief by Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr, 1908.

Here's a precursor to the living busts in Disneyland's Haunted Mansion -- Miss Ethel Warwick pictured in The Sketch, Feb. 28. 1906.

A precursor to Burgess Meredith as The Penguin in Batman.  From Die Muskete, 1912.

Here's a precursor to a key scene in Terry Gilliam's Brazil, from Un Autre Monde by Grandville.

Here's a precursor to mentioning something online with the single word "this."  From The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, 1892.  You may recall our previous post about "this hat."

Here's a precuror to Jon Lovitz's pathological liar character Tommy Flanagan, from The London Magazine, 1902.  The text reads, "I'm a nonentity, a spectre—that's it, a spectre—and a spectre can't incur financial obligations, you know."

Here's a precursor to the The Fesserlippenchip Chalkwitheringlicktacklefeff Foundation for Unwed Mothers (as seen on MadTv), from Dugdale's Visitation of Yorkshire, [in 1665-66.].

Here's a precursor to the film and manga series Uzumaki.  "You walk round and round and round the post."  From Everybody's Magazine, 1908.

Here's a prediction of mobile homes in the year 2000.

Here's a precursor to the wacky postcard craze of depicting giant fruits and vegetables on trucks and trains.  From Green's Nursery Co.'s 1900 catalog.

Here's a precursor to the ads for Sea Monkeys, from Die Muskete, 1915.

Here's a precursor to "talk to the hand," from aboriginal pottery of the Gulf Coast, featured in the Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1903

Here's a prediction of downloading information in the year 2000.