"All set to go places and do things!"  From 1938.

From the San Diego Air & Space Museum Archives.  (The enlargement of the mysterious "face" is our own.)

The third figure from the right has two heads that don't see eye to eye.  The postcard was originally scanned by UpNorth Memories.  (For those intrigued by Janus-faced figures, our Oracle of the Two-Fold Gods is finally in print again, and the first 57 pages are viewable here.  [Note that the preview may take a few moments to load.])

"For when the frost comes, all will be safe till Spring" (R. H. Budd, The Complete Practical Farmer, 1835).  Photo courtesy of the Costică Acsinte Archive.

"Braemar Badminton Club opening tea, Edmonton, 1953."

Photo by Leslie Jones, date uncertain.

From 1970.

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

"Pres. Coolidge & family in Swampscot," as scanned by the Boston Public Library.

The Sneeuwstormbeschermer (face protection from snowstorms), Montreal, Canada, 1939.

"Hyman Gordon, 15, Boston, Mass., demonstrates his 'chemical man' he built out of bits of rubber, glass, cigar boxes and other odds and ends.  When the figure is stuck with a pin he reacts after the manner of a mortal.  He eats and digests food.  The tubes here indicate the lungs, heart, bladder, intestines, etc." (Milwaukee Sentinal, Jan, 11, 1936).  Photo by Leslie Jones.

The Chemical Man is obviously not to be confused with the Chemical Chicken (also photographed by Leslie Jones, date uncertain), nor (while we're at it) with Scrappo (the mechanical scrap metal creation made by the Marion County salvage committee, Salem, Oregon, 1942).  

The radio hat of 1931.

"I am who I am, but there are always two sides to every face.  For me, one is a myth, the other a legend" (Clair McIntyre, Shadowy Stillness).  Photo as scanned by the Costică Acsinte Archive.

Here's the radio pram of 1921.

"Many think that Egypt is upside down [because the Nile flows from south to north]" (Marci Haines, Ancient Egypt).  And it's true.  Our photographic proof is courtesy of the San Diego Air & Space Museum Archives.

Piano for the bedridden, 1935.

Three members of the 72nd Squadron in Hawaii, 1928, courtesy of the San Diego Air & Space Museum Archives.

Photo courtesy of the Stanford Historical Archive.

Aviator Amelia Earhart has been suspected of being a spy, a lesbian, and even a fish, but we can now reveal that she was a mannequin sculpted by Dorothy Fox.  Our photographic evidence is courtesy of the San Diego Air & Space Museum Archives.

"The sky is an umbrella to the earth" (Sri Venkateswara University's Oriental Journal, 1981).  Photo courtesy of the San Diego Air & Space Museum Archives.