PODCAST

Photo of the Day Podcast

Brenda Elthon

A little history. look.substack.com

history

All Episodes

2:47

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/08/07

The old children’s nursery rhyme conjures up happy, hopeful sentiments.And, across recent American history, merchants and others have used the term ‘starlight’ to bring in customers.Take a look at these pictures.1869 advertisement for “Starlight Bess” tobacco.The luxurious Starlight Car of the Colorado Midland Railroad Company, the first rail line across the Colorado continental divide, shown in 1890. The line connected Colorado Springs, Leadville, Glenwood Springs and Grand Junction. Get full

1:45

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/08/06

The 19th century philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson had this to say about bathtime:"People who wash much have a high mind about it, and talk down to those who wash little.”Hmmm… he has a point.Below, some old pictures on the topic.The North Beach Bath House, Santa Monica, California, 1900.Tears at bathtime in this immigrant’s tenement home, 1905. Get full access to Photo of the Day at look.substack.com/subscribe

1:35

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/08/05

These old pictures were taken on Memorial Day, 1925, in Manhattan’s “Sixty Years After” parade.There, two hundred Civil War veterans marched for a mile up Riverside Drive alongside other veterans, military hardware and bands.The youngest were in their late seventies.Some wore their old uniforms.Some carried torn scraps of old battle flags.Some walked with the help of flag-waving grandchildren. Get full access to Photo of the Day at look.substack.com/subscribe

2:15

Photo of the Day.

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/08/04

Some pictures stick with with you.These are the ones from last week which have stuck with me.Martin Luther’ room in Wartburg Castle, where he translated the New Testament into German in the 1520s.The National Mall in Washington, D.C., in this Mathew Brady photo dated 1865, but believed to have been taken two years earlier. It’s a sea of trees with the Smithsonian Castle in the center and the Capitol Building in the distance.A bison hunting party in Denver, 1873. Note the size of the bullets on these

2:58

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/08/02

The American First Army has crossed the Selune River in its drive south, out of Normandy towards Paris, and has entered the Brittany region of northern France.Almost seventy thousand Germans have been taken prisoner in France since D-Day eight weeks ago.In intense fighting near Percy, Negro truck drivers joined their white American counterparts, wielding long-bladed pocket knives.“Their very appearance scared the daylights out of the Krauts,” said a colonel. “Now, when they see [a Negro], they run

1:49

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/08/01

Martin Luther’s room in Germany’s Wartburg Castle, where, in 1521, he translated the New Testament into German, shown here in 1900.General Grant leans over to examine a map held by General Meade at this “Council of War” held in Massaponax Church, Virginia, on May 21, 1864.Lincoln’s funeral procession passes Grace Church, in lower Manhattan, April 25, 1865.Fifth Avenue Easter Parade, c. 1912. Get full access to Photo of the Day at look.substack.com/subscribe

2:35

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/31

It isn’t much to look at: short, stubby, and somewhat difficult to grow.But this little tree is a survivor.When glaciers covered most of the continent during the last Ice Age, a few of these trees survived in sheltered micro-habitats along the continent’s southeast coast.In 1765, King George III’s Royal Botanist and his son discovered them growing along the banks of the Altamaha River in Georgia.These men had traveled extensively throughout the Colonies documenting native plant life and they had

2:32

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/30

These young men are patent clerks.They were photographed in 1924 on the third floor of the Patent Office Building on F Street in Washington, D.C., in a room often called “the model room.”The Patent Office Building was then almost one hundred years old; and it had been the place where much of the American story had unfolded.Initially, the building housed inventors’ patent applications and scale models of their inventions, which were displayed for the public in glass-fronted cabinets. Get full access

2:23

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/29

A ‘take-no-prisoners’ bison hunting party in Denver, 1873. Note the size of the bullets on these guys’ belts and the bison head on the far right.The Republican Party of Jefferson County, Washington, 1888. Three more decades before women get the vote, so, of course, it’s all men.Wisconsin yachting party on Lake Winnebago, 1892.Somber wedding party of Austrian immigrants in Ely, Minnesota, 1911. Note the guy with the cigar seated on the far left. And then there’s the bride’s far-apart shoes.Little

1:44

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/28

Some pictures stick with you.Here are the ones from last week, which we posted here on Substack or on our Bluesky page or on our YouTube Channel, which have stuck with me:A new stove in 1910.Building a lock on the Panama Canal, c. 1913.Mom makes biscuits in the kitchen during the Depression. Get full access to Photo of the Day at look.substack.com/subscribe

3:15

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/26

With a break in soggy weather, US forces launched a combined air and ground attack along a wide line between St. Lo and Periers in the western section of the Normandy battle front.But the Secretary of War, having completed a tour of the front lines, warned that ‘the end of the war in Europe is not now apparent to the men doing the fighting,’ adding, ‘Germany and Japan will not surrender until it is made clear to them that they are about to be smashed.’ Get full access to Photo of the Day at

1:34

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/24

Even in the worst of times, people find ways to make themselves happy.Often, they draw closer to their people.Or, sometimes, it comes with the recognition of small miracles in their own backyard.Few would say the late 1930s and early 1940s were happy times.Yet, in one of history’s darkest eras, there were joyful moments.Here are some of them. Get full access to Photo of the Day at look.substack.com/subscribe

2:27

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/23

Half of the Black people who came to America in chains arrived in Charleston’s harbor.They came in groups of several hundred after weeks-long voyages in the bowels of cramped ships.They disembarked at a slave facility offshore on Sullivan’s Island.There, they were checked for disease and then transferred to the mainland for auctioning at Charleston’s slave markets.White Charlestonians sometimes came to watch and enjoy wine and refreshments offered by the auction houses. Get full access to Photo of

3:44

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/22

Do you think you’ve got troubles?You’re not the only one.Take a look:So, it’s 1910 and we have two guys between the cars of a freight train trying to hit each other with tire irons.We can assume they’re on the lam, but what are they fighting about? Get full access to Photo of the Day at look.substack.com/subscribe

3:19

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/21

Some pictures stick with you.Here are the ones from last week, which we posted here on Substack or on our Bluesky page or on our YouTube Channel, which have stuck with me:This bull shot dead in Central Park after escaping from the vehicle hauling him to the slaughterhouse.Sometimes in life there are no good options. Get full access to Photo of the Day at look.substack.com/subscribe

2:44

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/19

The Soviet army is in retreat as German forces, spearheaded by mechanized columns, press their offensive east towards Moscow and Leningrad.The Germans have held Smolensk, 230 miles west of Moscow, for four days, and have repulsed fierce Red Army counter-attacks.There are large numbers of casualties on both sides.The German air force struck the city of Hull, on England’s northeast coast, yesterday, inflicting heavy damage in residential areas. Get full access to Photo of the Day at

3:28

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/17

They are one of life’s best things.Here are a few dog stories from history.Queen Victoria owned eighty-eight Border Collies during her long life. Her favorite was Sharp, who came into the royal household in 1866, after the death of her husband, Prince Albert.At the end of her life, it was a Pomeranian named Turi who comforted her. It is said Victoria died with her eldest grandchild, the future German Kaiser Wilhelm II, and Turi, at her bedside. Get full access to Photo of the Day at

2:29

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/16

It is July 16, 1858.Abraham Lincoln is in Bloomington, Illinois, sitting in an audience which has gathered to hear Senator Stephen A. Douglas speak.Douglas, a Democrat, is running for reelection and Lincoln has emerged as his main challenger.The long-simmering issue of slavery has been shoved to the front burner with the Supreme Court’s recent decision in the Dred Scott case.‘Black people are not citizens,’ the Court had said, ‘and the federal government has no power to prohibit slavery in US

2:42

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/15

Even as the stock market surged in the 1920s, with stock prices more than quadrupling in value, an economic depression was beginning to take hold on American farms.They had prospered during the 1910s.Europe’s devastation from World War I towards the end of the decade, had brought a surge in export demands for farm products.So, farmers had borrowed money to buy new equipment and additional farmland to boost production.But when Europe recovered from World War I, the international demand for farm

1:58

Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day Podcast ·

2025/07/14

Some pictures stick with you.Here are the ones from last week, which we posted here on Substack or on our Bluesky page or on our YouTube Channel, which have stuck with me:American soldiers compete in a footrace in France in 1918.Civil Conservation Corps guys haul a log along a mountain path in the mid-1930s.This young woman works in the cotton fields during the Depression while wearing a pretty dress and earrings. Get full access to Photo of the Day at look.substack.com/subscribe

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Photo of the Day Podcast

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