David Vetter (known as ’The Boy in The Bubble’ in the sterilized plastic environment that was his home from his birth until his death 12 years later); ca. 1978.
David Phillip Vetter (September 21, 1971 – February 22, 1984) suffered from SCID, severe combined immunodeficiency.
‘The chaplain of Texas Children’s Hospital at the time, Rev. Raymond Lawrence, said of the situation: “The great scandal of the Bubble Boy was that he was conceived for the bubble. The team that did this didn’t think through this very well. They didn’t consider what would happen if they didn’t find an immediate cure. They operated on the assumption that you could live to be 80 years old in a bubble, and that would be unfortunate but okay.” Lawrence said that the original three doctors encouraged David’s parents to conceive David so that they could have a test subject for studies, a charge which is denied by the three involved doctors.’
(Source)
P.T. Barnum and General Tom Thumb; ca. 1850.
Just for those who thought this picture seemed a little off and possibly some of Barnum’s, shall we say, “showmanship”, Tom Thumb is indeed a child in this photo… a 10 year-old child. He stopped growing at about 6 months old and didn’t start growing again until he was in his late teens when he “shot up” (by which I mean never stopped growing for the next 25 years) from about 2’5″ to 3’3″
A kid with an Indian headdress emerges from a coal hole, 1954
Today this kid would be labeled culturally insensitive and charged with terroristic threats.
A coal hole is a hatch in the pavement (sidewalk, in US usage) above an underground coal bunker. They are sometimes found outside houses that existed during the period when coal was widely used for domestic heating from the early 19th century to the middle 20th century.
A woman bids farewell at Paddington Station in 1942 as her child is evacuated during the Blitz.
I love pictures like this. They leave so much to the imagination i.e. What happened to her? What happened to her child? Did they meet again?
A child in a ‘baby cage’ – used to ensure children get enough sunlight and fresh air when living in an apartment building, 1937
Long before the days of product liability….
Newsreel footage of baby cage in action.
Polish child in the ruins of Warsaw.
The devastation of Warsaw is really hard to comprehend, even before/after shots can’t show anything because of how complete the devastation was: there’s no point of reference anywhere, like the surface of the moon. For example, this ghetto area photo is 1950 and was either directly adjacent to the current city center at the palace of culture, or nearby:
Here’s a video showing the destruction. This is a digital reconstruction of the destruction that happened. Powerful stuff…
Lobster Tea Party, August 1938 .
“Anne and her family lived alone on an island. She enjoyed having tea time with her friends the spiny lobster and baby hawk.”
– National Geographic, August 1938
I hope to be remembered for my atrocities! 