Blackfoot Chief Two Guns White Calf, Early 1900s

Blackfoot Chief Two Guns White Calf, Early 1900s. Made in the 1900s, it is the kind of image that turns a date in a history book into something you can actually see.

The first years of the twentieth century were an age of confident invention. Powered flight arrived with the Wright brothers in 1903, automobiles were leaving the curiosity stage, and cities were filling with electric light, elevators, and streetcars — all of it documented by a new generation of press photographers.

Most photography of the period chased celebrities and headlines, which makes surviving images of daily routine all the more precious. This is what the world actually looked like when nobody thought it was worth remembering.