Things That Never Happened When I Began Teaching School Years Ago

1)  "Ms. Shafer, can I just take a picture of the assignment instructions?  I don't want to write all that down."
2) Instead of carrying a compact mirror or using the restroom mirror, girls pull out their phones and use the selfie function on the camera to check their make up.

Because Football Has Never Really Been About Being Sensitive Towards Other People's Feelings

From my mother's photo album comes this not-particularly-racially-sensitive photo of University of Utah cheerleaders at a game in 1941.

(Click on photo to enlarge.)
Who am I, Sir?  A Utah man am I!  A Utah man, Sir, I will be 'til I die!

Fortunately, things are a little less blatant now.

Utah: The Greatest Snow On Earth

I understand that it was the Norwegians who invented skiing, but it was Utah's snow that popularized the sport in the mid-1900s.
My parents started skiing when people hiked up mountain sides and then skied down. They also recall when tow-ropes were a huge improvement.
Skis were long and skinny back then, and ski clothing looked a bit different than it does now.
Here, my uncle and his wife show off their new ski pants, parka, and skis:

And here's what Alta ski resort looked like in 1947.

I'd hate to drive up a snowy canyon on those awful post-war tires!
And let's just say that that track of snow where people had been hiking up the hill to skit down wouldn't be there today.

(I pulled this shot off a yahoo search.)

Tanning Lotion -- circa 1950

The Shafer Museum.
That's what my sister-in-law calls it.
My family saves stuff.  Need a vintage polyester body suit with hotpant legs and a wrap-around paisley skirt?  Got one.  Need a plastic bobby hat from England?  There's one in the costume closet, on the shelf right above the 1980s square dance dresses and next to the paintball mask.

So, want to see suntan lotion from about 1950?  Here you go:

(Remember to click on the pics to enlarge them.)

Yes, this was a best-selling brand.

(This ad was pulled off the internet; it's not mine.)

Notice how it's 47% alcohol?  Yeah, that'd be great for your skin.  Not.  But at least the "antiseptic" advertising was genuine!
Also, why would anyone in their right minds try to associate a good tan with Scotland?  No one tans naturally in Scotland.  They either go to Spain or to a tanning booth.
And a plaid label and sunburn-pink fluid?  Uh, those are sort of painful images to use with tanning lotion.
And with our modern knowledge, this stuff looks like melanoma waiting to happen.  Skin cancer in a bottle!  Get some now!
No wonder Hartley once wrote, "The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there."

Oh-So-Very-English Story Starter

Every once in a while, I pull a random picture out of iPhoto and use it as a story starter.  Here's one for today:

This shows a picnic meal of a scone with clotted cream and jam, accompanied by ginger beer.  (That's non-alcoholic, if you're curious.)  It just doesn't get any more stereotypically English than this snack -- unless it's tea and biscuits (cookies, that is) with the Queen.
The real story here is that I walked from Cambridge to Granchester one hot and sticky summer day in 2007, accompanied by a die-hard, born-again American Baptist fellow whose name I can no longer recall.  My enjoyment of the outing was rather diminished by the humidity and by his refusal to discuss anything other than his own narrow outlook on life.
However, the photo is a great set up for fiction.
What would you do with it?  Who's picnicking in the park?  Why?  When?
Feel free to share your ideas or link to your own post if you write something about this.
Have fun.