Malcolm X holding an M2, looking cool as hell
Bad trigger discipline though
This one really affected me. It’s one of the first images from the surface of Mars. I was quite young, and it clicked in me that other planets actually exists and are out there in space.
Deepwater Horizon sinking in the Gulf of Mexico on April 22, 2010.
It caused an equivalent oil spill of 4.9 million barrels and exposed the surrounding wildlife to toxic materials, covering thousands of animals in oil. The cleanup efforts took years.
A prime example of humans messing up this planet for their own gains.
The terror of war.
Nobody wins in war, and I hate how angry this photo makes me feel.
The first photo of a black hole is the most historically significant “first photo of x” that happened in my life time and that I actually understood its historical significance when it came out. So I’d say that’s probably my favourite.
Not a photo.
It’s the output of an AI model trained on simulations of black holes being asked to fill in the gaps from sparse observations.
I have many good ones, but i think my favourite is this one:
It’s from the famous victory parade in Moscow in 24.06.1945, Japan and USSR were not at war yet, so in a truly masterful trolling stroke, Japan was invited to parade to celebrate defeat of their own allies. On the photo you can see Japanese army colonel and a navy officer (hat visible partially) congratulate marshal Zhukov while French, British and American officers are waiting in line.
As of why, it never fail to make me smile.
This is Emir Seyyid Mir Mohammed Alim Khan, the last Emir of Bukhara.
The emirate existed from 1785
This is a pre-WW1 colored photograph (1911) by Prokudin-Gorsky
Great choice. I love his pictures, they look so good, it’s as if he had traveled back in time with a digital camera.
It is hard to pick one, but this photo has always stuck with me. That is a picture from the Dust Bowl during the Great Depression.
The series of pictures apparently inspired Peter Gabriel for the song “don’t give up”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Boy_Standing_by_the_Crematory
This one. The cost of any war summarized in one picture.
First moon landing. It shows what we are capable of
Free Huey is a great one:
Maybe that time a dove landed on Fidel’s shoulder during a speech right after the victory of the Cuban revolution.
President Taft riding a water buffalo. Always gives me a chuckle.
All photos are historical photos. That’s a lot to choose from.
Only photos that made history are historical
If they made history, then they are historic, not historical. Well, they’re historical too, to be fair.
These are great. Is there a good place to get hi res print ready files for some of these and other historical noteworthy photos for personal use? Or at least sources that aren’t charging 300 dollars for something that is or should be public domain.
I like this one here because it’s the unedited version. As I’m sure you know, you can see the soldier in the bottom right has two watches. It shows how the soviets covered up the looting that their troops did when they reached Berlin.
Another cool historic photo is all those samurai sitting in the sphinx
I ain’t defending nazis! Just pointing out how the Soviet Union edited this photo to make themselves look better
It wasn’t even a watch but the wrist compass, they were issued to junior officers and senior NCO’s in Red Army, and the soldier in photo was senior NCO.
It shows how the soviets covered up the looting that their troops did when they reached Berlin.
I suppose if the Nazis didn’t want their capital looted they shouldn’t have tried to exterminate poor former peasants.
It’s a fascinating photo outside of the main subject. The destroyed city, all the people below, and the crowd of people gathered around the T-34-85 tank at the bottom left. So much to look at!
