The Atlantic has a photo feature that takes a look back 50 years to the events that shaped the world in 1961. It’s one of the types of photo stories that you see a lot at the end of the year, but done in a much more interesting way than normal. Amazing to see the turmoil and change that shaped the lives of millions of people in the coming decades — from Cuba to the quest for equality in America. Also of particular interest to me is the space race and all that surrounded this early time of exploration of the final frontier. See all of the images here.

Photos via The Atlantic / AP.

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“More heady than love, ladies or liquor is the sporting-goods catalog of L. L. Bean, outfitter extraordinary to men who live so they may hunt and fish,” read Life magazine’s encomium to the entrepreneurial outdoorsman in October of 1941. From modest beginnings in 1911, sales at Leon Leonwood Bean’s Freeport mail order business had surpassed the $1 million mark by 1937. Life showcased a number of innovative items from the Bean catalog, beginning with the famous Maine Hunting Shoe, created when Bean had a seamstress sew elk hide leggings onto a pair of old rubbers to keep his feet warm and dry while duck hunting.

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Inside the loo in the famed New York Athletic Club hangs this intriguing bit of engraved marble that, apparently, has been salvaged from The Grand Union Hotel. It reads as follows:

“The Meanest Man
in the United States
occasionally visits this Toilet Room.
He always carries away as a souvenir, either a coat
hook, doorlock, or paper holder and often several of each.
He would take the marble slabs if they were not made fast.
We guarantee this man a warm reception
if we get hold of him.

Ford & Co.
Grand Union Hotel.”

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In 2009 I wrote about V-Mail, the U.S. Postal system’s answer to the hundreds of thousands of letters that were being exchanged between families on the home-front and service men and women all over the world during WWII.

A person who wanted to send a letter by airgraph or V-Mail would obtain the standard, pre-printed form from the local post office or five and dime store on request. The form contained space for a letter of about 100 to 300 words, the address of the serviceman or -woman to whom the letter was to be delivered, the address of the sender, and a circular area for the censor’s stamp of approval. Once the message was written, the form was to be folded and sealed. It then made its way to a processing center where the form was re-opened and fed through a machine that photographed the letters on 16mm film.

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Completed in 1893, the Ames building is considered by many to be Boston’s first skyscraper; though, even at the time of its opening, it was never Boston’s tallest building. That honor belonged to Church of the Covenant. The Ames building also ranks as the second tallest masonry load-bearing wall structure in the world, behind Chicago’s Monadnock Building, and was constructed using sandstone from the Cleveland Quarries Co. that was carted to Boston all the way from Amherst, Ohio. (Sidenote: As a child I swam in the Amherst quarry that produced the sandstone used in the construction of the Ames Building.)

The Ames Building was commissioned, paid for and built to house the headquarters of the Ames Shovel and Tool Co., which was run by the wealthy Oakes Ames. In addition to being an industrialist, Oakes Ames was a Congressman from Massachusetts (and a fairly corrupt one at that) and was largely responsible for overseeing the construction of the Union Pacific railroad. Coincidentally, the town of Ames, Iowa (which is famous for the Republican Straw Poll that took place this past week) is named for Oakes Ames due to his involvement with the railroad.

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This old book from 1916 stood out to me when I first found it because it relates to the custom tailors union from the early 1900s. Another factor in my intrigue was the fact that the tailor that this book belonged to spent a good amount of time in my hometown — a city with a long history in tailored clothing that is now almost completely gone. I was also drawn to this old union booklet because it is a window into the world of American clothing manufacturing labor at the time. Interesting to see this man traveled from Cleveland to the South and then eventually back to Cleveland, working and paying dues along the way. Maybe he moved around to follow the work? I’m not totally sure.

This is the kind of ephemera that I love to find and collect — it is like a window into the past. These days you see the union label (pictured on the middle page below) on all sorts of garments (made domestically and otherwise), but I bet a lot of people don’t realize it was (and still is) real.

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Andrew Higgins as photographed by Charles Steinheimer for LIFE 1942

The federal holiday Memorial Day began in 1865 in Charleston, South Carolina by formerly enslaved Africans to honor the dead soldiers of the Union army. Eventually the holiday was expanded and today Memorial Day honors all Americans that currently serve, have served, and of course, those that gave the ultimate sacrifice for their country.

Being someone who has a keen interest in the WWII conflict (especially enjoying the work of historian Stephen E. Ambrose) I think it fitting on this day to highlight Andrew Higgins, a person of great service to America (and intrigue to me) as the inventor and builder of the Higgins Boat. The landing craft that somewhat famously became synonymous with the industrious man who created it, saw action in every theater in which Americans fought and dramatically altered the outcome of World War II.

Andrew Higgins as photographed by Charles Steinheimer for LIFE 1942

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In April of 1962, nearly 49 years ago this day, author William Faulkner visited the United States Military Academy at West Point at the invitation of Major General W.C. Westmoreland. On the night of April 19 he read excerpts from his forthcoming novel The Reivers before a rapt audience of cadets, faculty, and staff. The following day, clad in a Donegal tweed suit and repp tie, he lunched with the brass and met with cadets in two advanced literature courses and discussed a wide range of subjects including his work, philosophy of life and views on America.

Faulkner was not himself much of a military man, though critics have noted his “lifelong romance” with the military experience beginning with his first novel Soldier’s Pay in 1926; unable to join the U.S. Army due to his short stature, he had enlisted in the British Royal Flying Corps during World War I but never saw action. Nonetheless he exuded something of a military bearing on the stage at West Point with his pipe and British officer’s mustache.

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As a child, Zippo inventor George G. Blaisdell was fond of productmobiles like the Oscar Meyer Wienermobile and Life Savers Pep-O-Mint car. Blaisdell founded the Zippo Manufacturing Company in the town of Bradford, Pennsylvania in 1932, naming the company “Zippo” as a more modern sounding alternative to the word zipper. During WWII the U.S. Government commissioned Zippo’s entire production to be distributed to GIs, which had the benefit of introducing the company and its windproof lighters to hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of Americans, thereby making Zippo a household name. It was this new found popularity that propelled Blaisdell in 1947 to convert a Chrysler Saratoga into the Zippomobile.

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When most Americans think luggage, they picture soft sided wheelie bags made from ballistic nylon. Nothing challenges an American’s preference for soft nylon bags more than a trip through customs at NRT. It happens quickly, only takes one trip to Japan to make a yank jealous of the ubiquitous Rimowa hard-sided cases that are the travel norm in Japan and the symbol of enduring German design.

Founded in 1898, Rimowa transformed itself from classic trunk maker into a modern metal case company that has stood the test of time. In our normal fashion, we reached out to the people at Rimowa and asked to see exactly what hasn’t changed and we were delighted with all of the historical reference material the company sent back. Light and strong have been the order of the day at Rimowa since the beginning, a philosophy that has continued to this day. It started with wood, eventually became aluminum and when technologies were pushed the company introduced a polycarbonate case to the world.

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This weekend the 157th Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race will take place on the Thames, continuing the universities’ storied sporting tradition. Although nowadays the sculls are made of fiberglass and the clothes of Coolmax, in essence the event is largely unchanged since the days of wooden hulls and white flannels. In honor of the occasion, we bring you a look back at a Life magazine photo essay by Mark Kauffman from 1958 on the pleasures of life at Oxford, where “young Britons follow ancient ways of study and enjoyment” in ivy-covered buildings, on bucolic lawns and rambling rivers.

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