Thanks to my friend Paul, I came across this set of photographs from the early 40’s. They’re in color! These images show us a time when there was no internet, no television, no X-box or Wii, and definitely no cell phones. And yet, these people manage to get along just fine.

You can see a completely different country in these photos. It is interesting to me to realize that there are people alive today that remember these times the same way I remember the 70’s and 80’s. Memories of the church picnic, when Mrs. Smith wore that crazy hat; that one Christmas when Johnny got the erector set; the one time we all had to get up on stage at school and sing those songs in front of our parents and everybody; that day dad drove us all into town and took us to the drug store to get an orange soda for each of us, these are the types of memories that America just does not produce in the minds of it’s citizens anymore.

Look at the photos here but do more than look. Try to realize that what you’re seeing is a window into the past, a visual time capsule, a quantum device capable of time travel. Look at these and know that you’re seeing something that is lost forever.

Captured: America in Color from 1939-1943 – Plog Photo Blog.