Anita Ekberg, nude, photo taken by Andre De Dienes in 1955

Image found at LostFoundAndEnvied

I guess a lot of you out there remember MacGyver, that bloody irritating sod who managed to get out of just about any awkward situation with what ever he found laying around. Well, now you can be that irritating sod. MacGyver’s multitool can now be yours – Ted

Image found at lafinlarry

SS Great Eastern was an iron sailing steam ship designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, and built by J. Scott Russell & Co. at Millwall on the River Thames, London. She was by far the largest ship ever built at the time of her 1858 launch, and had the capacity to carry 4,000 passengers from England to Australia without refuelling. Her length of 692 feet (211 m) was only surpassed in 1899 by the 705-foot (215 m) 17,274-gross-ton RMS Oceanic, and her gross tonnage of 18,915 was only surpassed in 1901 by the 701-foot (214 m) 21,035-gross-ton RMS Celtic. With five funnels (later reduced to four), she was one of a very few vessels to ever sport that number, sharing her number of five with the Russian cruiser Askold – though several warships, including HMS Viking, and several French cruisers of the pre-dreadnought era had six.

 
Loading cables

Brunel knew her affectionately as the "Great Babe". He died in 1859 shortly after her ill-fated maiden voyage, during which she was damaged by an explosion. After repairs, she plied for several years as a passenger liner between Britain and North America before being converted to a cable-laying ship and laying the first lasting transatlantic telegraph cable in 1866. Finishing her life as a floating music hall and advertising hoarding (for the famous department store Lewis’s) in Liverpool, she was broken up in 1889.

Text from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A digital recreation of a project published in Popular Mechanics, April 1951

Where room furnishings include facing sofas, a matching pair of narrow sofa tables stand by ready to relieve the dining problem at large family gatherings. Used alone, side by side or placed one at each end of the regular dining table, they provide a quick-change setup that is ideal for cramped living quarters. This project gives you a simple, rugged construction, use pine or fir and then stain.

Plans and description in
jpg & pdf format HERE

A recipe from an ad for Jell-O published 1949. You’ll find it HERE

The post-WWII relaxed haze of happiness gave birth to the most ridiculous inventions. Like this one, we can see what it it does, but can anyone see the use. A vehicle that is half automobile and half airplane and ends up being useless as both. It can’t fly and it is a death trap of a car.

I can just see professor T Edward Moodie sitting there, punch drunk, at his trusty drawing board sketching away and, eureka, let’s build something like that. Any sane person would have dropped the idea in the sobering light of morning. But not professor Moodie. Oh no – Ted

The poor man’s Marilyn Monroe, Manie Van Doren, strut her stuff in Topper,1964

Images found at billmagazines.xxx

Paco de Lucía, one of the world’s greatest guitarists left us yesterday. May he rest in peace. And should there be a heaven, I really hope they like flamenco music up there.

Title: Artist: Recording: Recorded: Released: Genre:

Almoraima Paco de Lucía  Almoraima 1976 1976  Flamenco

My then girlfriend and later wife (now x-wife) Marianne bought me this record as a gift when she was on a study trip to Spain in 1979 and it has been among my most treasured vinyls ever since – Ted

1923 Ford Model T

Ford’s output passed a million in twelve months for the first time in 1922, the year that this Model T touring car was built; in the following year, the two million mark was reached. In fact, this car has most of the characteristics of the 1923 Model T -lower body lines and raked windshield-but lacks the deeper radiator with a fairing at the bottom of the shell of the true 1923 model, announced in August 1922.

1922 OM (Officine Meccaniche)

 
The first car to bear the name OM was produced in 1918, and it was a reliable if plain car. The Officine Meccaniche, a huge engineering conglomerate, had absorbed the old Ziist company in 1918, and for a while continued with the pre-war S305 model mildly brought up to date. It was, seemingly, an Austrian with the odd name of Barratouche who designed the first ‘new’ OM, the 1327cc 465, developed into the 1496cc 469 in 1922. This model was in production until 1929.

1922 Phanomobil

A truly curious survival is this Phanomobil, built by a company of cycle makers from Zittau in Germany from 1907 to 1927 in virtually unchanged form. Early models had an air-cooled, vee-twin engine driving the front wheel by chain; from 1912, a transverse four-cylinder engine of 1548cc was used. Relatively popular in its native land because of its economy, the Phanomobil did not travel well; nevertheless, some, like this 1922 example, were used as light delivery trucks in England.

1923 Humber Chummy

A fine example of the very rare Humber Chummy, as restored by Humber apprentices. This 1923 car is powered by a 985cc, overhead-inlet, side-exhaust engine, which produced a respectable 20bhp at 3000rpm; fuel consumption was only 35 mpg, however.

Ethel Waters (October 31, 1896 – September 1, 1977) was an African-American blues, jazz and gospel vocalist and actress. She frequently performed jazz, big band, and pop music, on the Broadway stage and in concerts, although she began her career in the 1920s singing blues.

Her best-known recordings include "Dinah," "Stormy Weather," "Taking a Chance on Love," "Heat Wave," "Supper Time," "Am I Blue?" and "Cabin in the Sky," as well as her version of the spiritual "His Eye Is on the Sparrow." Waters was the second African American, after Hattie McDaniel, to be nominated for an Academy Award. She is also the first African American woman to be nominated for an Emmy Award, in 1962.

Career
After her start in Baltimore, Waters toured on the black vaudeville circuit. As she described it later, "I used to work from nine until unconscious." Despite her early success, she fell on hard times and joined a carnival, traveling in freight cars along the carnival circuit and eventually reaching Chicago. Waters enjoyed her time with the carnival and recalled, "the roustabouts and the concessionaires were the kind of people I’d grown up with, rough, tough, full of larceny towards strangers, but sentimental and loyal to their friends and co-workers." She did not last long with them, though, and soon headed south to Atlanta, where she worked in the same club with Bessie Smith. Smith demanded that Waters not compete in singing blues opposite her. Waters conceded and sang ballads and popular songs. Around 1919, Waters moved to Harlem and there became a celebrity performer in the Harlem Renaissance during the 1920s.

Waters obtained her first Harlem job at Edmond’s Cellar, a club that had a black patronage. She specialized in popular ballads and became an actress in a blackface comedy called Hello 1919. Jazz historian Rosetta Reitz points out that by the time Waters returned to Harlem in 1921, women blues singers were among the most powerful entertainers in the country. In 1921, Waters became the fifth black woman to make a record, on the tiny Cardinal Records label. She later joined Black Swan Records, where Fletcher Henderson was her accompanist. Waters later commented that Henderson tended to perform in a more classical style than she would prefer, often lacking "the damn-it-to-hell bass."

She recorded with Black Swan from 1921 through 1923. In early 1924, Paramount bought the Black Swan label, and she stayed with Paramount through that year. Waters first recorded for Columbia Records in 1925, achieving a hit with her voicing of "Dinah", which was voted a Grammy Hall of Fame Award in 1998. Soon after, she started working with Pearl Wright, and together they toured in the South. In 1924, Waters played at the Plantation Club on Broadway. She also toured with the Black Swan Dance Masters. With Earl Dancer, she joined what was called the "white time" Keith Vaudeville Circuit, a traditional white-audience based vaudeville circuit combined with screenings of silent movies. They received rave reviews in Chicago and earned the unheard of salary of US$1,250 in 1928. In 1929, Waters and Pearl Wright arranged the unreleased Harry Akst song "Am I Blue?," which then appeared in the movie On with the Show and became a hit and her signature tune.

Although she was considered a blues singer during the pre-1925 period, Waters belonged to the vaudeville style of Mamie Smith, Viola McCoy, and Lucille Hegamin. While with Columbia, she introduced many popular standards including "Dinah," "Heebie Jeebies," "Sweet Georgia Brown," "Someday, Sweetheart," "Am I Blue?" and "(What Did I Do To Be So) Black and Blue" on the popular series, while she continued to sing blues (like "West End Blues," "Organ Grinder Blues," etc.) on Columbia’s 14000 race series. During the 1920s, Waters performed and was recorded with the ensembles of Will Marion Cook and Lovie Austin. As her career continued, she evolved toward being a blues and Broadway singer, performing with artists such as Duke Ellington. She remained with Columbia through 1931. She then signed with Brunswick in 1932 and remained until 1933 when she went back to Columbia. She signed with Decca in late 1934 for only two sessions, as well as a single session in early 1938. She recorded for the specialty label "Liberty Music Shops" in 1935 and again in 1940. Between 1938 and 1939, she recorded for Bluebird.

In 1933, Waters made a satirical all-black film entitled Rufus Jones for President, which featured then-child performer Sammy Davis Jr. as Rufus Jones. She went on to star at the Cotton Club, where, according to her autobiography, she "sang ‘Stormy Weather’ from the depths of the private hell in which I was being crushed and suffocated." She had a featured role in the wildly successful Irving Berlin Broadway musical revue As Thousands Cheer in 1933, where she was the first black woman in an otherwise white show. She had three gigs at this point; in addition to the show, she starred in a national radio program and continued to work in nightclubs. She was the highest paid performer on Broadway at that time. MGM hired Lena Horne as the ingenue in the all-Black musical Cabin in the Sky, and Waters starred as Petunia in 1942, reprising her stage role of 1940. The film, directed by Vincente Minnelli, was a success.

She began to work with Fletcher Henderson again in the late 1940s. She was nominated for a Best Supporting Actress Academy Award in 1949 for the film Pinky, under the direction of Elia Kazan, after original director, John Ford, quit, due to his disagreements with Waters. According to producer Daryl Zanuck, Ford "hated that old…woman (Waters)." Ford, Karzan stated, "Didn’t know how to reach Ethel Waters." Kazan later referred to Water’s "Truly odd combination of old-time religiosity and free-flowing hatred.". In 1950, she won the New York Drama Critics Circle Award for her performance opposite Julie Harris in the play The Member of the Wedding. Waters and Harris repeated their roles in the 1952 film version of Member of the Wedding” In 1950, Waters starred in the television series Beulah, but quit after complaining that the scripts’ portrayal of blacks was "degrading." She later guest starred in 1957 and 1959 on NBC’s The Ford Show, Starring Tennessee Ernie Ford. In the 1957 episode, she sang "Cabin in the Sky."

Despite these successes, her brilliant career was fading. She lost tens of thousands in jewelry and cash in a robbery, and had difficulties with the IRS. Her health suffered, and she worked only sporadically in following years. In 1950-51 she wrote the autobiography His Eye is on the Sparrow with Charles Samuels, in which she wrote candidly about her life. She explains why her age has often been misstated: her mother had had to sign a paper claiming Waters was four years older than she was, and that she was born in 1896. His Eye is on the Sparrow was adapted for a stage production in which she was portrayed by Ernestine Jackson. In her second autobiography, To Me, It’s Wonderful, Waters states that she was born in 1900. Rosetta Reitz called Waters "a natural … [Her] songs are enriching, nourishing. You will want to play them over and over again, idling in their warmth and swing. Though many of them are more than 50 years old, the music and the feeling are still there."

Title: Artist: Recording: Recorded: Released: Genre:

Harlem on my mind Ethel Waters  The Chronological Ethel Waters 1933 -1938 1933 1999 blues/Jazz

Title: Artist: Recording: Recorded: Released: Genre:

Trade Mark Ethel Waters The Chronological Ethel Waters 1933 -1938 1938 1999 blues/Jazz

Title: Artist: Recording: Recorded: Released: Genre:

Jeepers Creepers Ethel Waters  The Chronological Ethel Waters 1933 -1938 1938 1999 blues/Jazz

Title: Artist: Recording: Recorded: Released: Genre:

St Louis Blues Ethel Waters  The Chronological Ethel Waters 1946-1947 1947 1999 blues/Jazz

Text from Wikipedia

Alfred Leslie Buell (1910–1996) was an American painter of pin-up art. He was born in Hiawatha, Kansas in 1910, and grew up in Cushing, Oklahoma. He attended some classes at the Art Institute of Chicago, which, in concert with a trip to New York City, decided him on a career in art.

In 1935, Buell and his wife moved to Chicago, Illinois, where he joined the Stevens/Hall/Biondi Studio. By 1940, he had opened his own studio. During this period, he did a number of pin-ups for the Gerlach-Barklow calendar company. Buell also did work for several other calendar companies in the early 1940s.

During World War II, Buell was rejected by the draft, so he spent the war painting a variety of popular and patriotic pin-ups for Brown & Bigelow. After the war was over, he began contributing to Esquire’s Gallery of Glamour.

Buell returned to Brown & Bigelow in the late 1950s. He continued to paint glamour and pin-ups until about 1965, when he retired from commercial art. He remained active until he was injured in an accident in 1993, after which he remained in a nursing home until his death in 1996.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia – Scetches found at Pinupmania

… if you listen to too much accordion music.

Image found at I’ve had dreams like that

All posts material: “Sauce” and “Gentleman’s Relish” by Ronnie Barker – Hodder & Stoughton in 1977

The Actor’s Seasons
By Arthur Goddard

 
With a crutch in his hand, and his hat on one side,
His purse full of cash, and his heart full of pride,
Fitz-Clarence de Belleville struts gaily along,
Cheerily humming a snatch of a song,
For fickle Dame Fortune has smiled with a will,
And De Belleville, at last, has his name in the bill.

Society welcomes De Belleville’s new "school",
A sort of a hybrid ‘twixt Irving and Toole,
Votes his Hamlet "intense", and his Lear "too, too",
His Paul Pry the finest the stage ever knew;
And well may the tide of their favour run strong,
For he’s "posted" in letters a yard or two long.

But, somehow, Dame Fortune – an innate coquette –
All at once poor Fitz-Clarence resolves to forget;
Like a star in high heaven, or spent rocket-stick,
He falls out of favour remarkably quick:
And the name on the bill-board less legibly shines,
He is found in small print, ‘midst the spirits and wines.

This may mean bread and cheese, but his fame-dreams have vanished
To that Limbo where so many visions are banished:
He still, with avuncular aid, can contrive
To keep his old gin-sodden body alive;
But for him ’tis the winter of sore discontent –
On a bloater he dines, and is chased for his rent!

text from the ad:
How soon is too soon?

Not soon enough. Laboratories tests over the last few years have proven that babies who start drinking soda during the early formative period have much higher chance of gaining acceptance and “fitting in” during those awkward pre-teen and teen years. So, do yourself a favour. Do your child a favour. Start them on a strict regimen of soda and other sugary carbonated beverages right now. For a lifetime of guaranteed happiness – Ad for The Soda Pop Board of America

Playing on mum’s insecurity and fright at the thought of their kids not going to fit in must have seemed an easy way to get the kids hooked on soda and sugar for a lifetime to any heartless mad man. But honestly, the crap about laboratory tests was pushing it a bit to far even back then – Ted

Erika Kornelia Szeles, a 15 Year Old Hungarian Resistance member who fought against the Soviets during the 1956 revolution. She was a student at the Dobos C. Jozsef Catering School in Pest, and later an apprentice cook at Hotel Bike at Teriz Kvrut 43, Budapest.

Erika joined the uprising with an older friend after Soviet forces invaded Hungary, and served as a nurse, treating wounded resistance fighters during the last days of the uprising.

During a resistance operation, Erika was mortally wounded in a street fight with Soviet soldiers on November 8th 1956 and died on the spot.

The picture was taken by Danish photographer and photojournalist, Vagn Hansen.

Erika was burried on November 14th 1956 at Kerepesi Churchyard in Budapest. The grave number is 21/1/24, and the gravestone still exists today.

Image and text found at lafinlarry

… traveling in style and comfort I don’t know what is – Ted

Decoliner and accessories:
The wild custom Blastolene build called “The Decoliner” is basically what Flash Gorden’s Airstream motor home would look like. This 26 ft aluminum beauty features a flying bridge, complete with driving station and room for 5 passengers on the roof! This was designed and conceived as the ultimate promotional vehicle. The specific layout of the RV’s interior can be tailored to your particular needs. If you’d like something like this custom built for you, please fill out out Contact Us form for Randy Grubb with some comments and we’ll see what we can do for you!

See the building process here

Paris has long been the world’s number one style centre, dictating female fashion in all civilized parts of the globe. There is a very good reason for this – the mademoiselles de Paris are a sexy, high fashion lot to begin with. It is only natural that they should be clothed with the most imaginative and tasteful flair for style in the world.

Read the whole article and see
the naughty pictures here

Warning: Nudity do occur in this article. If you are under age or live in a country where watching images of nude women for some reason  are against the law  I take no responsibility if you click the link above. In other words you’re flying solo from here on – Ted

Some more interesting information received by message from Shannon Moeser, once known as Gloria Dawn who modelled herself in the early sixties:
If this was published in a 60s French Frills magazine, there is a good chance that the photos were taken by Elmer Batters, and the model, of course, would have been living in Los Angeles. I appeared in French Frills, Vol 3 (1963).

Hollywood should definitely go for bottom left. I particularly like the way he holds his arms. I can’t decide whether he looks like his rocking a baby to sleep, is about to give her the kiss of life or strangle her.

Bottom right is not bad either. She looks dead or fainted. Put the two together and you got a man strangling a woman, and regretting it and kissing the body in desperation. – Ted

Image found at lafinlarry

The bathing machine was a device, popular in the 18th and 19th centuries, to allow people to change out of their usual clothes, possibly change into swimwear and then wade in the ocean at beaches. Bathing machines were roofed and walled wooden carts rolled into the sea. Some had solid wooden walls; others had canvas walls over a wooden frame.
The bathing machine was part of etiquette for sea-bathing more rigorously enforced upon women than men but to be observed by both sexes among those who wished to be proper.
Especially in Britain, men and women were usually segregated, so nobody of the opposite sex might catch sight of them in their bathing suits, which (although modest by modern standards) were not considered proper clothing in which to be seen.

Text from Wikipedia 

Machines might not be exactly what these contraptions of modesty were. But shit, it would have been dig to have one to day. Imagine rolling that thing down on the beach to day, enter it and have it rolled out into the sea so you could indulge in a little seawater bathing in peace and tranquillity – Ted