One Very, Very, Very Safe Example of What a Baby's Car Seat Used to Look Like, 1950s

This picture preserves a moment few cameras ever caught — one very, very, very safe example of what a baby's car seat used to look like in the 1950s and 60s. It was taken in the 1950s, and like the best archival images it needs almost no explanation — the frame tells its own story.

The 1950s brought a wave of postwar prosperity, especially in North America. Suburbs, television sets, big chrome-trimmed cars, and rock and roll defined the decade, and a booming picture-magazine industry sent photographers to document all of it.

What makes everyday photographs like this one compelling is the details at the edges: the clothes, the signs, the tools, the postures. They preserve texture that history books flatten out.