October 16, 2026

Life Magazine in 1951

October 16, 2026/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing my look at Life Magazines on Internet Archive….

As I looked at the issues from 1951, advertisements reflected products like Coca-Cola, Mounds candy bars, Bell telephone, airline flights, Life Savers candy, Alice in Wonderland movie, cat food, Avon cosmetics, penicillin by Merck, and Chrismas ads for eggnog and 7Up. There were pictures of construction, the beginning of an avalanche, Yellowstone in winter, the Dalai Lama traveling before he left Tibet to live in India, Korean war, Peary in the Arctic, and A-Bomb tests. They were all part of what the publisher thought was newsworthy in 1951!

Life Magazine 1951-01-01 - Cotton stockpile

Life Magazine 1951-01-08 - Coca-Cola through 65 years (advertisement)

Life Magazine 1951-01-15 - 50 year ago – Spindletop in Beaumont, TX

Life Magazine 1951-01-22 - Cinderella never had it so bad (outside London)

Life Magazine 1951-01-29 - Mounds Coconut (advertisement)

Life Magazine 1951-02-05 - Castle Geyser new Old Faithful at Yellowstone National Park

Life Magazine 1951-02-12 - Career girl, 1965 (Bell Telephone advertisement)

Life Magazine 1951-02-19 - Jungle Gardens in Louisiana (swampland refuge)

Life Magazine 1951-02-26 - Glow of A-bomb explosion

Life Magazine 1951-03-05 - Air pipeline to Korea

Life Magazine 1951-03-12 - Young avalanche in the French Alps

Life Magazine 1951-03-19 - Pumpkin-like house

Life Magazine 1951-03-26 - Dark days in Iran after premier’s murder

Life Magazine 1951-04-02 - Blooms in central California

Life Magazine 1951-04-09 - Grandma flying (TWA advertisement)

Life Magazine 1951-04-16 - Delaware Memorial Bridge construction

Life Magazine 1951-04-23 - Dalai Lama traveling

Life Magazine 1951-04-30 - Modern church design

Life Magazine 1951-05-07 - Refugees in China

Life Magazine 1951-05-14 - Peary’s fellow discoverers at the North Pole

Life Magazine 1951-05-21 - Earliest humans

Life Magazine 1951-05-28 - Paratrooper

Life Magazine 1951-06-04 - Worse main street (in Bellevue, OH)

Life Magazine 1951-06-11 - Children in peril (from narcotics)

Life Magazine 1951-06-18 - Pep-o-mint Life Savers (advertisement)

Life Magazine 1951-06-25 - Martha’s Vineyard from above

Life Magazine 1951-07-02 - US House Statuary Hall

Life Magazine 1951-07-09 - Walt Disney’s Alice in Wonderland (advertisement)

Life Magazine 1951-07-16 - After flood, mud (in Kansas)

Life Magazine 1951-07-23 - North Korean soldier reaction to photographer

Life Magazine 1951-07-30 - Paris on her 2,000 birthday

Life Magazine 1951-08-06 - Insects survive by mimicry

Life Magazine 1951-08-13 - Drought cracks Arizona

Life Magazine 1951-08-20 - Festival of Britain

Life Magazine 1951-08-27 - W.R. Hearst – a quiet end

Life Magazine 1951-09-03 - Puss’n’Boots Cat food (advertisement)

Life Magazine 1951-09-10 - California lights

Life Magazine 1951-09-17 - Children without clutter

Life Magazine 1951-09-24 - Fantastic weapons

Life Magazine 1951-10-01 - Largest helicopter

Life Magazine 1951-10-08 - Pelicans at West Palm Beach

Life Magazine 1951-10-15 - Avon Cosmetics (advertisement)

Life Magazine 1951-10-22 - Plasma storage

Life Magazine 1951-10-22 - The wonder of penicillin (Merck advertisement)

Life Magazine 1951-11-05 - Port of New York

Life Magazine 1951-11-12 - Yale’s 250th autumn

Life Magazine 1951-11-19 - Baltimore’s Friendship airport

Life Magazine 1951-11-26 - The American road

Life Magazine 1951-12-03 - Stream pollution – an Ohio creek

Life Magazine 1951-12-10 - First underground A-bomb blast in Nevada

Life Magazine 1951-12-17 - Borden’s Egg Nog (advertisement)

Life Magazine 1951-12-24 - Christmas (7up Advertisement)

Life Magazine 1951-12-31 - Hillside farms in Japan

September 18, 2026

Life Magazine in 1950

September 18, 2026/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing my look at Life Magazines on Internet Archive….

As I looked at the issues from 1950, the Korean War was becoming more dramatic as the year progressed. The 75% reduction in pneumonia deaths between 1930 and 1950 was a stunning statistic. Advertisements from Life Savers, Howard Johnsons, American Airlines, General Motors, Christmas cards, Coca Cola and American toys captured my attention. Natural events – frozen redwing blackbirds, lots of snow in the Sierras, dust bowl in Texas, albino deer, Mauna Loa erupting, an owl nest, and Dutch Elm Disease - also were in the news. They were all part of what the publishers thought was newsworthy in 1950!

Life Magazine 1950-01-02 - Acceleration of Science

Life Magazine 1950-01-09 - Einstein

Life Magazine 1950-01-16 - Frozen Redwing blackbirds in Oklahoma

Life Magazine 1950-01-23 - Children on Will Rogers statue

Life Magazine 1950-01-30 - Natural childbirth

Life Magazine 1950-02-06 - A winter battle in snowy Sierra

Life Magazine 1950-02-13 - Pneumonia death toll dropped 75% in 20 years

Life Magazine 1950-02-20 - Disney’s Cinderella

Life Magazine 1950-02-27 - Atomic explosion (cover)

Life Magazine 1950-03-06 - St. Louis Museum shows art of the Mississippi River’s great past

Life Magazine 1950-03-13 - Fireworks in Port-au-Prince for the inauguration of the bicentennial exposition

Life Magazine 1950-03-20 - Familiar house and garden bugs

Life Magazine 1950-03-27 - Peppermint stick life savers (advertisement)

Life Magazine 1950-04-03 - Owl nest

Life Magazine 1950-04-10 - Dust Bowl Look in Texas

Life Magazine 1950-04-17 - Hopper paints the city in stark lonely moments

Life Magazine 1950-04-24 - 3 albino deer in Wisconsin

Life Magazine 1950-05-01 - Coca Cola advertisement

Life Magazine 1950-05-08 - American Airlines advertisement

Life Magazine 1950-05-15 - Edward Steichen (when he was 71) photography

Life Magazine 1950-05-22 - Sand sailing

Life Magazine 1950-05-29 - Olmec stone face

Life Magazine 1950-06-05 - Poison ivy

Life Magazine 1950-06-12 - Spring’s rain splashes away the soil

Life Magazine 1950-06-19 - Mauna Loa splits its seams

Life Magazine 1950-06-26 - Amish school children

Life Magazine 1950-07-03 - Building of the Eiffel Tower

Life Magazine 1950-07-10 - Korea – bracing climate and depressing proverbs

Life Magazine 1950-07-17 - Howard Johnson’s advertisement

Life Magazine 1950-07-24 - Marine muscle heads to Korea

Life Magazine 1950-07-31 - Yanks hit a beach in Korea

Life Magazine 1950-08-07 - Wounded GIs flown from Korean front

Life Magazine 1950-08-14 - Greatest meteor crater? (north of Quebec)

Life Magazine 1950-08-21 - General motors advertisement

Life Magazine 1950-08-28 - Present plants will handle 4 to 1 expansion (military aircraft)

Life Magazine 1950-09-04 - In Korea the supplies stack up and roll on to fighting front

Life Magazine 1950-09-11 - Life savers advertisement

Life Magazine 1950-09-18 - The Korean air war in color

Life Magazine 1950-09-25 - New chemical may halt ravages of Dutch Elm Disease

Life Magazine 1950-10-02 - Small size separates

Life Magazine 1950-10-09 - Historic church burns

Life Magazine 1950-10-16 - US is building new schools but is facing a serious shortage

Life Magazine 1950-10-23 - Photograph to raise funds for a non-profit

Life Magazine 1950-10-30 - October in the Southwest

Life Magazine 1950-11-06 - Churchill Christmas cards from Hallmark

Life Magazine 1950-11-13 - Thanksgiving (insurance advertisement)

Life Magazine 1950-11-20 - Arthur Siegel photographs

Life Magazine 1950-11-27 - Give American toys (advertisement)

Life Magazine 1950-12-04 - Christmas cards and wrapping paper (advertisement)

Life Magazine 1950-12-11 - Eva Peron

Life Magazine 1950-12-18 - Great retreat in Korea

Life Magazine 1950-12-25 - Christmas in Korea

December 06, 2024

eBotanical Prints – November 2024

December 06, 2024/ Gwen Morrison

Twenty more books were added to my botanical print eBook collection in November - available for browsing on Internet Archive, New York Public Library Digital Collections, or Botanicus. They cover a range of botanical topics: medicinal plants, botanical link in literature (Milton), particular taxonomic groups, and fruit as well as plants of places (Italy, Russia, and Korea (7 volumes!)). Three volumes (1 by Cornut and 2 by Presl) were about North American plants from preserved plants collected by others – the authors never visit the New World. Overall - the 20 books were published over almost 300 years (1635-1933).

My list of eBotanical Prints books past the 3,000 volumes milestone in November – now totaling 3,003 botanical eBooks I’ve browsed over the years. The whole list can be accessed here. Click on any sample image below to get an enlarged version…and the title hyperlink in the list below the image mosaic to view the entire volume.

Enjoy the November 2024 eBotanical Prints!

Picturesque botanical plates * Thornton, Robert John * sample image * 1807

American medical botany * Bigelow, Jacob (artist) * sample image * 1820

Sorimachi 409 * Spencer collection * sample image * 1746

The Flowers of Milton * Giraud, Jane Elizabeth (Lithographer) * sample image * 1846

Pomona Italiana * Gallesio, Giorgia (illustrator); Capurro, Niccolo (pubisher) * sample image * 1839

Iac. Cornvti ... Canadensivm planatarvm, aliarumque nondum editarum historia. * Cornut, Jacques Philippe * sample image * 1635

Eidodendron: views of the general character and appearance of trees foreign and indigenous connected with picturesque scenery * Burgess, Henry William (artist); Hullmandel, Charles Joseph (printer) * sample image * 1827

Flora Rossica * Pallas, Peter Simon * sample image * 1788

Reliquiae Haenkeanae V1 * Presl, Karel Borivoj; Haenke, Thaddaus * sample image * 1833

Reliquiae Haenkeanae V2 * Presl, Karel Borivoj; Haenke, Thaddaus * sample image * 1835

Hymenophyllaceae :eine botanische Abhandlung * Presl, Karel Borivoj * sample image * 1843

Tentamen Pteridographiae * Presl, Karel Borivoj * sample image * 1836

The Hardy Catalpa * Record, Samuel James * sample image * 1906

Flora Sylvatica Koreana Pt 11 Caprifoliaceae * Nakai, Takenoshin * sample image * 1921

Flora Sylvatica Koreana Pt 16 Araliaceae and Cornaceae * Nakai, Takenoshin * sample image * 1927

Flora Sylvatica Koreana Pt 17 Elæagnaceæ, Alangiaceæ, Daphnaceæ, Flacourtiaceæ et Ternstrœmiaceæ * Nakai, Takenoshin * sample image * 1928

Flora Sylvatica Koreana Pt 18 Piperaceæ, Chloranthaceæ et Salicaceæ * Nakai, Takenoshin * sample image * 1930

Flora Sylvatica Koreana Pt 19 Ulmaceæ et Moraceæ * Nakai, Takenoshin * sample image * 1932

Flora Sylvatica Koreana Pt 20 Bambusaceæ, Myricaceæ, Juglandaceæ, Magnoliaceæ * Nakai, Takenoshin * sample image * 1933

Flora Sylvatica Koreana pt. 21 Aristolochiaceæ, Lardizabalaceæ, Berberidaceæ, Pittosporaceæ, Malvaceæ, Empetraceæ, Urticaceæ * Nakai, Takenoshin * sample image * 1933

May 24, 2024

Korean Art History eBooks

May 24, 2024/ Gwen Morrison

Internet Archive had 14 of the 15 volumes of the Chōsen koseki zufu – published beginning in 1915 in Japanese and full of illustrations of Korean antiquities. It was the result of the Japanese work to systemically organize and investigate cultural assets and sites throughout the Korean Peninsula after they annexed the country in 1910.

Most of what I know about Korea is in the context of the Korean War of the 1950s and, more recently, the products from South Korea that are exported to the U.S. These books enlarged my understanding of the deep history of the country via the pictures (although I probably would have gotten even more from the books if I could read Japanese!). I have selected a sample image from each volume…but there are many more in the books…well worth the time to browse.

Volume I. Sites of excavations, pottery, bronzes, inscription on stone, ancient metallic mirrors, etc. Chōsen koseki zufu V1

Volume II. Continuation of first volume, frescoes and other details of paintings from the tombs. Chōsen koseki zufu V2

Volume III. Photographs and plans of sites excavated details of sculpture, beads, smaller bronzes etc. Chōsen koseki zufu V3

Volume IV. Antiquities of the Silla period in Korea. Chōsen koseki zufu V4

Volume V. Continuation of Volume IV (not on Internet Archive)

Volume VI. Antiquities of Koryo period. Chōsen koseki zufu V6

Volume VII. Continuation of Volume VI. Chōsen koseki zufu V7

Volume VIII. Pottery. Chōsen koseki zufu V8

Volume IX. Metallic mirrors, bronzes, jewelry, household utensils. Chōsen koseki zufu V9

Volume X. Temple architecture, including some details of decoration. Chōsen koseki zufu V10

Volume XI. Continuation of preceding volume, sculpture. 1951. Chōsen koseki zufu V11

Volume XII. Temple architecture. Chōsen koseki zufu V12

Volume XIII. Temple architecture. 1933. Chōsen koseki zufu V13

Volume XIV. Painting. 1934. Chōsen koseki zufu V14

Volume XV. Pottery. 1935 Chōsen koseki zufu V15

December 22, 2023

Books and Bulletins from The Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities

December 22, 2023/ Gwen Morrison

This week’s collection of books from Internet Archive are from The Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities in Stockholm. The first two are books published in the 1960s. The rest are bulletins from 1929 to 2003. So many things to browse! I primarily looked at the images but some of the articles caught my attention as well. These volumes are a mix of history and art….from a part of the world I have never visited…but enjoy from afar. Enjoy the sample images from each volume!

Sung Ming: Treasures from the Holger Lauritzen Collection

Korean Ceramics