The Snowmobile as Envisioned in 1924

Armstead Snow Motors from Seeking Michigan on Vimeo.

This is an Accidental Mysteries re-post from 2009.

WHEN I FIRST WATCHED THIS VIDEO, from an old 16mm film made in 1924, I was stunned. For the last 100 years, American ingenuity and know-how has been a leader in the industrial world. From backyard tinkerers to garage inventors to larger productions—there’s nothing like the freedom of the entrepreneurial spirit to spur a new idea. My father once told me the story of the trouble American tanks had during WWII in the hedgerows of France. The tanks could not negotiate the thick, thousand year old hedges until a ordinary soldier—a farm-boy from back home—suggested welding to the front of the tank steel prongs—which was able to virtually rip their way through the underbrush. Problem solved… a simple solution to a serious situation.

Then I found this old film a week ago. What an ingenious idea to a crippling problem before the small, fast and streamlined snowmobiles of today. The concept is a little bit like Buck Rogers, a futuristic design below a Ford tractor.

And then I wondered why the concept never went any further? Perhaps the idea lacked backers. Perhaps there were design problems this “PR film” did not display, or perhaps the concept vehicle sat stagnant until the 1929 stock market crash doomed its production.

To my knowledge, the U.S. military did not have any kind of snowmobile vehicles during the fierce winters in Belgium and Germany in WWII in the early 1940s. I do recall seeing pictures of trucks and jeeps being stuck in and dug out of snowdrifts, troops walking alongside. While it’s not such a peaceful thought, think of this baby multiplied by 200 with a couple of machine guns mounted on the front—leading a frontal assault during the Battle of the Bulge. Wild! Or, think of it being used to move supplies or injured troops to and from the front lines. It seems to me that the military would have funded this concept in a heartbeat.

So, where did this (seemingly) great industrial design go? I don’t know.

This old silent film is about 10 minutes long, but I guarantee you’ll watch every bit of it—in awe.

The Hidden Mother

PHOTOGRAPHY BUFFS may already know about the “hidden mother” in early photographs, but some of my readers may not. So—this is for them. Shown above are two recently auctioned tintypes, both of which are excellent examples of this 19th century phenomenon. You see, most infants during that time were photographed with their mothers holding them. The intended picture was ultimately headed for a frame or mat, so the child would sit in the mothers lap for the photo. When the picture was taken, the mother simply was cropped out to serve as the backdrop.

In the top right photo, I have shown a suggested cropping, with the mother cropped out. Without a mat, the photos are decidedly creepy—but that's the way it was (under the mat), over 100 years ago. “Hidden Mother” tintypes are highly sought after by collectors.

This is an Accidental Mysteries re-post from December 2008.

Soviet Era Space Race Graphics

ONE OF THE EARLIEST MEMORIES in my life was in the late fall of 1957. I was 6 years old and I remember my father taking me out into the “country” as he called it—to get a view of Sputnik, the first man-made satellite to orbit the earth. There, we pulled over into a field, away from the city lights, and stared at the night sky. It was late, and I remember being elated as my father pointed to a moving “star” traveling slowly across the dark night sky. Since that night, I was a fan of all the space flights, both Russian and American. I saved every newspaper (still have them), and followed the first astronauts like Alan Shepard and John Glenn.

These graphics are as fresh today as they were 50 years ago.

Enjoy this earlier post readers. And thanks for feeding the goldfish.