PreviousDays✦THE WIKI
26 MOMENTS · ONE LIVING ARCHIVE

History.
All at once.

Every picture opens a door.
Wander through the years, then step into a story.

FOLLOW YOUR CURIOSITYSee cars & transport in the image atlas ↗
THE IMAGE ATLAS

Oldest to newest. Follow the years; watch the world change.

A JOURNEY THROUGH TIME1522 — 2018
A weathered sixteenth-century sailing ship approaches a low estuary shoreline.1500–17991500–1799Victoria returns to Sanlúcar after the first circumnavigationPublished Dutch sailors look across open sea toward distant mountains from the deck of a seventeenth-century sailing ship.1500–1799Abel Tasman’s first recorded sighting of New Zealand on 13 December 1642Published A decorated eighteenth-century balloon carries two people above Parisian rooftops.1500–1799The first untethered human balloon flight over Paris, 1783Published An aeronaut descends in a wicker basket beneath a silk parachute above autumnal Paris.1500–1799André-Jacques Garnerin’s parachute descent over ParisPublished A small steam locomotive passes harbour cargo and dock workers, with sailing ships in the background at Durban.The 19th centuryThe 19th centuryOpening of the Point–Durban steam railway in 1860Published Nineteenth-century steamships proceed through a narrow canal between sandy Egyptian banks.The 19th centuryThe Suez Canal opens to international shipping in 1869Published A small steam passenger train crosses a stone-faced embankment in Tokyo Bay beside fishing boats and low shoreline buildings.The 19th centuryOpening of Japan’s Shimbashi–Yokohama railway in 1872Published A woman in Victorian travelling clothes stands beside a three-wheeled motor car while two teenage boys inspect its engine.The 19th centuryBertha Benz’s long-distance drive and pharmacy fuel stopPublished A Victorian woman carrying a small leather satchel beside a steamship gangway.The 19th centuryNellie Bly begins her around-the-world journey in 1889Published An early airship with a small suspended pilot station and propeller flies near the Eiffel Tower above Paris.1900–19451900–1945Santos-Dumont’s Eiffel Tower circuit for the Deutsch PrizePublished An imagined first flight of the wood-and-fabric Wright Flyer above the coastal sand.1900–1945The Wright brothers’ first flights: December 17, 1903Published Amelia Earhart and two aircrew stand beside an estuary with a trimotor floatplane moored nearby.1900–1945Amelia Earhart arrives in Wales after her 1928 Atlantic crossingPublished A Guernsey cow and two handlers inside a corrugated-metal aircraft cabin above farmland.1900–1945Elm Farm Ollie’s flight and airborne milking demonstrationPublished Six expedition members aboard a rope-lashed balsa raft leaving a Peruvian harbour.1946–19991946–1999Kon-Tiki leaves Callao with six men and a parrotPublished Two roped mountaineers with metal oxygen cylinders stand on a snowy Himalayan ridge.1946–1999Hillary and Tenzing reach Everest with bottled oxygenPublished A ski-equipped twin-propeller transport aircraft and bundled expedition members stand on the flat Antarctic plateau.1946–1999Que Sera Sera makes the first South Pole aircraft landingPublished Illustration of a dark carved wooden hull being raised between salvage barges in Stockholm harbour.1946–1999Vasa returns to daylight during the final salvage liftPublished An imagined 1964 railway platform with a rounded-nose 0 Series bullet train.1946–1999Japan opens the Shinkansen: October 1, 1964Published A delicate translucent aircraft flies low over the sea with a cyclist visible beneath its long wing.1946–1999Gossamer Albatross crosses the English Channel under human powerPublished A steel suspension bridge carries 1980s cars between wooded islands above the Seto Inland Sea.1946–1999Seto-Ohashi road and rail crossing opens, 10 April 1988Published A blue and pale yellow passenger train travels through a circular railway tunnel beside a closed cross-passage door.1946–1999Channel Tunnel inauguration on 6 May 1994Published Akashi Kaikyo's two suspension towers and hanging roadway span a strait above a small cargo ship.1946–1999Akashi Kaikyo Bridge opens to traffic in JapanPublished A silver and orange long-distance balloon with a pressurised capsule descends toward an Egyptian desert plain.1946–1999Breitling Orbiter 3 lands after circling the worldPublished A white Concorde with its nose lowered stands on a reflective runway in warm late-afternoon light.Since 2000Since 2000Concorde retires from commercial service on 24 October 2003Published An electric passenger train emerging from a low Alpine tunnel portal beneath high mountains.Since 2000Inauguration of Switzerland’s Gotthard Base TunnelPublished Boatbuilders guide a colourful recycled-plastic sailing dhow into shallow water off Lamu.Since 2000Launch of Kenya’s Recycled-Plastic Flipflopi DhowPublished
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