![Atop Empire State- in construction; Chrysler Bldg & [Daily] News in middle foreground. (1931)](http://www.retronaut.co/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Atop-Empire-State-in-construction-Chrysler-Bldg-Daily-News-in-middle-foreground.-1931--199x123.jpg "Balancing on the Empire State, 1920s")
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Source: Gene Gable
“A Ride of Death”, 1940s
If you like this, check out:
"Photograph of a time-traveler", 1940
Colour photographs of America, 1939-1943
Cars of the Future, 1948
Soviet Accident Prevention Posters
Pre-Communist Russia Postcards
Playground Equipment Catalogue, 1962
Manga Fire Safety Posters, 1979
Bicycle Pageant, 1948
NASA Photography Manual, 1984
Sexology, 1960s
Vintage Beer Cans
Technical Cutaways, 1940s, by Frank Soltesz
Colour Photographs of American Store Fronts, 1940s
Colour photographs of Picasso painting in light, 1949
Colour Photographs of Billboards, Nashville, 1940s
LeBaron Chrysler Newport Phaeton concept car, 1940
Dizzy Dali Dinner, 1941
Television Taboos, 1949
Barbie World of Fashion, 1984/85
Hopeful Starlets, Los Angeles, 1946
Willys Jeep Ads, 1945
What is disturbing is that very few of these accidents are the fault of the cyclist. Who decided it was OK to tailgate cyclists?
Interesting for any country where bycicle riding is US developed, US manual’s of anything you might imagine.
Can we get this reprinted for the dumbasses I see still doing all of this today?
Yes, especially those Lance Armstrong wannabes that are always clogging up the roads. I make a point of forcing them to the shoulder whenever I can and this would remind them what will happen if they don’t move. Bicycles don’t pay licencing fees or road taxes and they have no right to be on the road. What are they training for that’s so important that they can get in everyone else’s way?
we ALL pay for the roads whether we drive, ride, walk, or stay at home. troll.
@Joel: I run over any cyclist I can find.
What a morbid publication. In the real world, injuries greatly outnumber deaths.
From this publication it would seem the motor vehicle has the right-of-way in all situations and its ‘open season’ on the ‘careless’ cyclists that do not respect this rule.
Reads like car industry propaganda designed to scare people off of bicycles. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.
Shame the result was the virtual elimination of people on bicycles in the US aside from recreation on protected paths. These same scenarios could just as easily have been used to control and limit automobile speeds and usage. Almost every one of those drivers should have lost their license at a bare minimum and in many cases been sent to prison.
Wow, usually you have to watch read or watch a piece of 1930′s anti-marijuana propaganda to get this kind of hysteria, over-reaction and exaggeration of the consequences (according to this pamphlet, bicycle mishaps that *don’t* result in instant death or crippling for life are quite rare). It’s really hard not to come away from this with the strong impression that for some unfathomable reason someone was trying to terrify kids into never, ever getting on a bicycle to begin with. Was some crazy Fundamentalist preacher back then shouting that they were “tools of the Devil” or something?
On a completely unrelated note, who in real life has *ever* referred to that vehicle as a “street transportation bus”?
As a learning tool,these discriptions can make a young person more aware of their surroundings.
A common sense lesson.
@William Yes, every one of these fictional drivers should have faced consequences. It is an outrage that this government issued pamphlet on bicycling didn’t address the punishments these cartoon drivers received. IF ANY.
“Safety” films and propaganda in those days was all about scare tactics. This safety film is about a safety monitor that dies and goes to heaven:
http://historicfilms.com/search/?searchType=all&q=bicycle+safety+heaven#p1t3687i0o1318
Well I am afraid of riding bicycles these days, but those days I rode one every day and never saw this pamphlet. Looks like the early 40′s.
As someone who has crashed very recently, this pamphlet is just utterly horrible to look at, or even fathom that some sadistic illustrator would make what looks like a huge morbid joke out of a very serious situation.
As the automobile grabbed more and more urban space, roads that used to be safe for pedestrians and children suddenly became dangerous. This is the propaganda that successfully changed our attitude to the space around us, and made us believe that is was OK for a large part of our urban area to be a no-go zone.
reminds me of the The Gashlycrumb Tinies
http://takalak.narod.ru/gorey/
Brutal. Cycling is really very safe but I still run into too many cyclist that don’t cycle safely. Bum deal.
http://hillsandheadwinds.blogspot.com/2012/02/his-name-is-trouble.html
The girls where just injured. The boys where killed.
Moral: Don’t pumping hard. And certainly don’t pumping head-on.
Girls shouldn’t try to keep up with boys lest they get injured.
I’m embarassed to admit that this book was distributed to all students in my class in the 1st or 2nd grade (circa 1965-66). I remember it scared the piss outta me, but I still bashed up kneecaps and elbows many times while piloting my Schwinn Stingray.
aaaah yes, doesnt everything lead to skull fractures and eventually death.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SXTca22RKM
What do you get when you cross the Tour de France with the Hunger Games?
Well, thank goodness Big Brother has the good sense to mandate styrofoam helmets for everyone now. Everyone is safe! No more cracked skulls! And cars are much less pointy. X-D