The Retro Blog

These days, my tv is generally deemed “vintage” just because it’s three dimensional and has a tube in it. Forget plasmas and LCDs, I want something with some panache. My favorite retro television brand is Philco, makers of the Predicta. Its rotating tube and stylish curves make the modern flat black boxes all the less [...]

1950’s food seems pretty nauseating by today’s standards. Whenever I open a retro cookbook I find that every recipe seems to have mayonnaise, gelatin, hot dogs, hard boiled eggs, or a stomach-churning combination of the above. What they lack in basic dietary needs is more than made up for by presentation. Mid century food seems [...]

I’m always seeing cheap old suitcases at thrift stores and estate sales, and they’re hard to pass up. I mostly use them for stylish storage, but I’ve found some more creative ideas I’d like to try. They’re great for transforming into cat beds, tables, and ottomans. Now I can feel ok when I grab yet [...]

You probably suspected that Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis had crude senses of humor and filthy mouths. Now here’s your proof. In this video, Martin and Lewis are recording voice over for the trailer for the film The Caddy. Needless to say, it quickly descends into shouting and dick jokes. 

I didn’t make it home in time to catch the Oscars this year, but here’s a nice little look back at the posters for the best picture winners of the past. The mid century ones are quite stylish, my favorites being Lost Weekend, All About Eve, An American in Paris, and Marty. [via neatorama]

In 1966, supermodel Twiggy was the darling of the London fashion scene. Frequently blamed for that whole making women think they need to weigh 90 pounds to be pretty thing, Twiggy was best known for being skinny, having big eyelashes, and being the symbol for mod fashion. Twiggy knew how to stare at the camera [...]

When I was four, I had a baby doll called Toby (named after the baby in Labyrinth). Now, I remember loving Toby and carrying him around and rocking him and thinking that I would love him until I was old enough to have a real baby and name him Toby. Not once did I ever [...]

This brilliant 1953 Tex Avery cartoon parodies industrial films about TV’s of the future. While it mostly has fun with outlandish predictions about where television is headed, eerily, some of its predictions aren’t that far off. [via boing boing gadgets]

The Retro Blog is going away for work this weekend, so you get extra posts tonight to compensate for lack of posts in the next few days. So ingest slowly!

tv-signoffs.com has a vast collection of clips from back when TV stations actually stopped airing. Makes me wonder what insomniacs used to do before infomercials. Anyway, the audio clips from the 50’s are especially fun because a lot of them have jingles, and the announcers all seem very proud of the fact that their stations [...]

The 1950’s was a time when people started to be a slightly less overt in ostracizing people different from themselves. I’m basing this solely on the fact that Coney Island closed down it’s famous freak show during this time. There’s a new post at mental floss about the Coney Island sideshow. It has some biographical [...]

I can think of no city symbol more awesome than the Seattle Space Needle. It’s not the tallest structure. It doesn’t even really do anything. Except be awesome. You can just picture a bunch of grown men in a meeting gleefully shouting,
“Yeah, yeah, it’s gonna look like a huge flying saucer!”
“And it’ll spin around!”
“Can we [...]

Here’s a short video of a man going on a quick jetpack ride over Tomorrowland at Disneyland. Why don’t we all have jetpacks in the 21st century? I guess there’s the whole thing about them being extremely inefficient. And judging by the pained faces of the kids in the video covering their ears hard enough [...]

After that Pez post, I think I’ll balance the blog out with some useful information about the dangers of tooth decay. It’s doled out by frantically animated clay teeth having a hoe-down. The Retro Blog doesn’t put a lot of emphasis on the 70’s, so this video’s special. Enjoy Munchers: A Fable Tale

Oh Pez. You’re sort of delicious. I guess. Let’s face the facts, Pez would never have made it if they hadn’t come up with the wonderful dispenser gimmick. Since 1955, the Austrian company has been selling their little candies by putting them in the slit throats of various animals, cartoons, and pop culture figures, and [...]

In my grade school days it was required for every student to bring a valentine for every other student in the class. I can recall purchasing boxes of Tiny Toons valentines and carefully selecting which card would go to which person, personally ensuring that no cards I deemed “too suggestive” would go to any boys [...]

Oh Disney… You used to be so damn interesting. Nowadays all you hear about are the various corporate blunders and slumps at the box office. Let’s ignore all that and have a look at the good old days. Not only did Disney help our soldiers out in WWII, but they helped young ladies fight an [...]

Mid century military posters seem to have two common themes: loose women and loose talk. Here’s a gallery of World War II posters about the latter. Uncle Sam and some big bold text advise soldiers to keep their damn mouths shut. For some reason the U.S. government seemed to strongly associate floating hands with staying [...]

You can always count on 1950’s housewives in advertisements to get excited about almost anything. This is especially evident in this flickr pool called “I Love My Electric Appliance!!” These broads go into a tizzy because they have ten color options for their refrigerator door handle. If you were able to quantify the amount of [...]

&Check out this sweet commercial for Pie Face, a game whose title describes it all. Yes, this is a game where you steal whipped cream from the fridge, apply it to a sponge, and wait for a machine to smash it into your face.
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To me, Pleo looks like a sad modern attempt to make [...]

Polaroid recently announced that it is going to end all production of instant film. Although this isn’t as devastating to me as two years ago when Kodak slit the throat of Kodachrome (how I love thee, super 8), but there’s still something sad about losing a unique method of creating images. Pre digital, there was [...]

Flickr user jl.incrowd has made three great photosets:
1940’s Paperback Mysteries
Paperback Mysteries, etc., - - the 1950’s and ’60’s
Nostalgia for the Scholastic Book Club, circa ’60’s & ’70’s
[via boingboing]

While most people are abuzz with rumors about the upcoming Batman film, there are some of us who still prefer our dark knight with Adam West and more than a touch of camp. I can’t really picture Christian Bale saying “let’s go, Robin. We’ve set another youth on the road to a brighter tomorrow,” which [...]

So Super Tuesday’s over and you might get a short break from all the annoying political commercials, but here’s one last ad for your enjoyment. It might just trick you into thinking there was a time when politics were a little less malicious and a little more delicious. (This catchy number puts me in a [...]

I’ve been keeping an eye on these electric bikes from Schwinn for a while. The battery gives you an extra push when you get tired. I think I’d be inclined to ride a bike more often if I weren’t so intimidated by San Francisco’s landscape. It’s certainly not the worst looking bike, and it [...]

This is an odd little 16mm film designed to help the film technicians of 1966 calibrate color. The colors themselves are wonderfully saturated, but the content is a bit…odd. Nobody seems particularly happy to be in this film. In fact I’m pretty sure none of them have any idea why they need to be there [...]

Eatliver.com has an excellent collection of disturbing ads from the past. If you’ve ever wanted to see Ronald Reagan hawking cigarettes, this is the place for you. There’s also a great variety of ads for questionable medical practices, VD prevention, and, of course, creepy kids.

Daddy-O’s is one of those online stores I visit frequently but have no intention of buying anything. It’s just that I don’t wear dresses often. And by often I mean ever. Regardless, a lot of their dresses are simply divine and the Bettie Page look alike model doesn’t hurt either. The cute stuff’s typically in [...]

Quack has a designer table concept inspired by our favorite era. There’s so much to love about it: atomic legs, flying saucer top, snacks! [via mocoloco]