Remember slide projectors? I sure do. My grandparents had one, and they used to routinely wheel it out on a rickety card table and re-visit fading slides from family vacations from the 1950’s, or even some from my grandfather’s days in WWII (I remember one of him in his fatigues – like an extra out of “M.A.S.H.” -- standing outside of a bar somewhere called, if memory serves, “the Bucket O’ Blood”). There was always a sense of occasion when their ol’ Carousel was dusted off and brought out (as memorably lionized in that early episode of “Mad Men”). It took time to set up, but in those days before the ubiquity of immediate gratification, it always seemed worth it. Nowadays, people carry volumes upon volumes of photos with them in their phones at all times, ready to share’em at a moment’s notice. No assembly required.
In any case, I stumbled upon this clip of old slides of New York City and thought they were worth sharing here. While, no, you won’t get that satisfying clicking sound when you go from image to image, there is indeed some gold buried herein.
These were taken in 1969. Nixon was in the White House, “Vietnamization” was in full swing, “Easy Rider” and “Midnight Cowboy” were in movie theaters, The Beatles had released Abbey Road, the Stones had released Let It Bleed, Bowie’d released Space Oddity, and more adventurous types might have found the first Stooges album, Monster Movie by Can and the third Velvet Underground album in their local record shops. I was all of two years old, at the time, and living on East 90th Street, just off Lexington Avenue.
Not sure if it’s the aging film or just that colors in general in New York City at the time just seemed so flat and drab. Incidentally, you’re better off ignoring the captions, as too often, they’re just entirely wrong (for example, around the nine minute mark, they wrongly identify East 86th Street as East 8th Street). Regardless, it’s an interesting trip back through time.
Somebody get the lights and sit back.
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