The Retro Blog

A strangely addictive and entertaining blog called Cake Wrecks has been gaining a lot of notice on the internet. It celebrates cake designers that should perhaps be seeking employment in other fields as well as skillful cakes made to look like things that should have never been set in icing. Here’s a cake I nominate [...]

If the winner of The Cold War was going to be determined by who had the most awesome looking new technology, I think the Ruskies would have been miles ahead of us. You know Sputnik looked sweet, but what about this lesser known project, EPIK. This flying saucer like aircraft was being designed in secret [...]

I must say that “test pilot” has never been an appealing sounding job to me. In the 50’s, though, it seems as though there were plenty of people quite happy to perform the task. Have a look at this gallery of all the exciting and dangerous looking toys these test pilots got to play with. [...]

If you go to film school you will sit through Triumph of the Will at least once. You will have a lengthy debate over whether or not it’s ok to appreciate the film despite the fact that it’s blatant Nazi propaganda. The token class feminist will bemoan the fact that this is the only film [...]

With their bold colors, stern faces, and often unintelligible messages, I’ve always been fond of Soviet Russia propaganda posters. The Crestock Blog has a great writeup featuring some of the best retro Soviet art. This article provides commentary on the design elements of the posters, as well as a little information about why the posters [...]

You’ve heard of Frank Capra, right? Director of the sugary sweet It’s a Wonderful Life? His movies are just so heartwarming and uplifting. Well… we’ll just ignore some of those movies he made for the government. Like this one called “Know Your Enemy: Japan.” The film starts with a disclaimer that this film isn’t about [...]

Propaganda is always a dirty word, but after a certain number of years, propaganda gets kind of entertaining. Let’s look at it from the cartoon front.
This is a racist little Looney Toons film that takes a “funny” look at our enemy in the Pacific. They’re so silly and dumb. Don’t forget short, too. Oh, and [...]

The other night I was watching 60 Minutes when this lovely little segment appeared:

Two thoughts came to my mind:
1. When did 60 Minutes become Jackass with a budget?
2. Why isn’t that ray-gun more awesome looking?
I’ll address only issue two here. This thing looks like a giant black tray with a hole in it stuck on [...]

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 [...]