Then & Now Stories

Then & Now Stories Old photographs meet modern truth. From forgotten towns to fallen empires, we place the past beside the present and let you see what time really did.

In 1932, at the Bradford Country Club in Pennsylvania, George Blaisdell watched a friend struggle to light a cigarette w...
05/09/2026

In 1932, at the Bradford Country Club in Pennsylvania, George Blaisdell watched a friend struggle to light a cigarette with a dent-prone Austrian lighter that required both hands. Blaisdell noticed its windproof chimney design worked well but decided it needed reinventing. He built a rectangular case with a hinged lid, allowing one-handed use, and named it "Zippo" because he liked the sound of the word "zipper." The first lighters sold for $1.95 in 1933, backed by a lifetime guarantee: "It works or we fix it free." During World War II, Zippo halted civilian sales to supply millions of American soldiers, cementing its reputation. Today, the company has sold more than 500 million lighters, and the design remains unchanged since 1950.

William Boeing, a timber merchant, became fascinated with airplanes after seeing one at a Seattle exposition in 1909. He...
05/09/2026

William Boeing, a timber merchant, became fascinated with airplanes after seeing one at a Seattle exposition in 1909. He bought a lesson from a flight instructor, then decided to build his own aircraft. In 1910, he purchased an old boat-building shipyard on Seattle's Duwamish River, nicknamed the Red Barn, and converted it into his first airplane factory. On July 15, 1916, Boeing incorporated the Pacific Aero Products Company, and his single-engine seaplane, the B&W, made its first flight that June. A Navy contract for 50 training planes during World War I gave the company its first momentum. Renamed Boeing in 1961, the company grew into the world's aerospace manufacturer. Today, the Red Barn still stands, preserved at Seattle's Museum of Flight.

George Washington acquired Mount Vernon in 1754, expanding it over the decades into a working plantation on the banks of...
05/09/2026

George Washington acquired Mount Vernon in 1754, expanding it over the decades into a working plantation on the banks of the Potomac River. After his death in 1799, the estate passed through generations of his family, but insufficient income left it crumbling; by the 1850s, the mansion's piazza was propped up by makeshift wooden posts. Unable to maintain it, owner John Augustine Washington III tried to sell it to the government, but was refused. In 1853, South Carolina's Ann Pamela Cunningham founded the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association, the nation's first historic preservation organization, and in 1858 the group purchased the estate for $200,000, rescuing it from ruin. Today, the nonprofit still operates Mount Vernon, welcoming over a million visitors each year.

In 1869, engineer John Roebling was surveying the site for his East River bridge when a docking ferry crushed his foot; ...
05/09/2026

In 1869, engineer John Roebling was surveying the site for his East River bridge when a docking ferry crushed his foot; he died of tetanus weeks later, leaving the project to his son, Washington Roebling. Construction on the Brooklyn Bridge began in 1870 using underwater chambers called caissons, where workers developed a mysterious condition later identified as decompression sickness, or "the bends." Washington became permanently disabled by it in 1872, forcing him to direct the work from his apartment window using field glasses, while his wife, Emily Warren Roebling, carried his instructions to the site and managed operations for a decade. When the bridge opened in 1883, Emily was the first to cross. Today, it remains an iconic achievement of American engineering.

In 1959, Seattle hotel executive Edward Carlson traveled to Stuttgart, Germany, where a broadcast tower with a restauran...
05/09/2026

In 1959, Seattle hotel executive Edward Carlson traveled to Stuttgart, Germany, where a broadcast tower with a restaurant inspired him, and he doodled an idea for a similar structure on a napkin in a café. His sketch went through transformations, at points resembling a flying saucer, a tethered balloon, and a cocktail shaker, before engineers settled on a final design just over a year before the 1962 World's Fair opened. Built for $6.5 million as the fair's centerpiece, the tower stood 605 feet tall and was considered a risky investment given its cost. It became a sensation with fairgoers instead. Today, the Space Needle remains Seattle's landmark, drawing over a million visitors a year to its rotating restaurant and observation decks.

In 1631, Mughal emperor Shah Jahan lost his beloved wife, Mumtaz Mahal, during the birth of their fourteenth child. Grie...
05/09/2026

In 1631, Mughal emperor Shah Jahan lost his beloved wife, Mumtaz Mahal, during the birth of their fourteenth child. Grief-stricken, he refused to hold court festivities for years and vowed to build her the most beautiful tomb ever built. Construction began in 1632 on the banks of the Yamuna River in Agra, employing an estimated 20,000 artisans, masons, and craftsmen brought in from across the empire and beyond. Using white marble inlaid with precious stones, the mausoleum took roughly two decades to complete. Shah Jahan later spent his final years imprisoned by his own son in a fort overlooking the monument he built. Today, the Taj Mahal draws millions of visitors as one of the Seven Wonders of the World.

The Great Wall of China was never built as a single project but grew over more than two thousand years, beginning with s...
05/09/2026

The Great Wall of China was never built as a single project but grew over more than two thousand years, beginning with separate defensive walls raised by rival kingdoms as early as the 7th century BC. After unifying China in 221 BC, Emperor Qin Shi Huang connected these fragments into one barrier against northern invaders, a brutal effort that cost so many lives it earned the grim nickname "the longest cemetery on Earth." Dynasty after dynasty rebuilt and extended it, but the towering brick-and-stone sections tourists walk today were constructed during the Ming Dynasty, between 1368 and 1644. Stretching 13,000 miles across mountains and deserts, it was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1987 and remains China's most visited monument.

When Gustave Eiffel unveiled his 300-meter iron tower for the 1889 World's Fair, celebrating the centennial of the Frenc...
05/09/2026

When Gustave Eiffel unveiled his 300-meter iron tower for the 1889 World's Fair, celebrating the centennial of the French Revolution, Parisian artists and writers were furious. A group of prominent intellectuals signed a public petition denouncing it as a "monstrous" and "useless" eyesore looming over the city. Built in just over two years using 18,000 iron pieces and 2.5 million rivets, the tower was only intended to stand for twenty years before demolition. It survived because engineers realized its height made it perfect for radio transmission experiments. That scientific value saved it from the scrapyard entirely. Today, the once-mocked structure welcomes roughly seven million visitors every year and stands as the single most recognized symbol of France anywhere on Earth.

For centuries, Yellowstone's geysers, canyons, and hot springs were known only to Native American tribes and a handful o...
05/09/2026

For centuries, Yellowstone's geysers, canyons, and hot springs were known only to Native American tribes and a handful of trappers whose tales of steaming earth were dismissed as exaggeration. That changed in 1871, when government geologist Ferdinand Hayden led an expedition with photographer William Jackson and painter Thomas Moran, whose stunning images finally proved the wonders were real. Congress acted quickly, and on March 1, 1872, President Ulysses S. Grant signed Yellowstone into existence as the world's first national park, protecting over two million acres from settlement and exploitation. The idea sparked a global conservation movement that continues today. Now, Yellowstone welcomes millions of visitors who come to see Old Faithful and the same wild beauty once thought impossible to protect.

On April 15, 1912, the "unsinkable" RMS Titanic sank in the North Atlantic after striking an iceberg, killing more than ...
05/09/2026

On April 15, 1912, the "unsinkable" RMS Titanic sank in the North Atlantic after striking an iceberg, killing more than 1,500 of its 2,200 passengers and crew. For over seventy years, the wreck's exact location remained one of history's mysteries, despite countless failed search attempts. On September 1, 1985, oceanographer Robert Ballard and a joint American-French expedition finally located the ship nearly 12,500 feet beneath the surface, using a submersible camera sled called Argo. Ballard refused to remove artifacts, calling the site a grave that deserved respect. Since then, over 5,500 items have been recovered by salvage companies. Today, the wreck continues to deteriorate as iron-eating bacteria slowly consume it, making each expedition the last glimpse of the ship intact.

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