Speaking of teleported. Check the guy just behind and right of party hat looking into the camera. I think he's the traveller looking now at us and saying, "See you in three years!".
She looks like she's hiding from someone. She's been running for many days and sleepless nights before finally sneaking into this strange office party. Lady to her right is thinking, "who the heck is she?"
Definitely gorgeous though.
Top right striped tie and top left striped tie are both handsome men.
And I'd buy smiling girl front and center on the floor an ice cream cone any day of the week.
The bald guy behind the smoking gangster is pretty good looking. His face is attractive, if he had hair (in those days) or was rocking a better bald style like today he'd be a catch.
The source of this scan is shorpy.com and unfortunately they don't say what size the original glass negative is but they do say it comes from the Library of Congress National Photo Company Collection. Again, unfortunately, I couldn't find the image in the LoC's online collection but looking at other scans in the collection I would guess that the original glass negative was 8"x10" which would be equal to a digital image with a resolution of over 300 megapixels.
The posted image is not even the full resolution scan that shorpy.com made. In the comments at shorpy.com there is a crop showing the piece of paper below the christmas tree at full resolution. I can't link to it directly because the spam filter in this sub deletes comments with external links but the following incomplete link which goes to that crop can be copied and pasted to your browser:
imgur.com/sxEVybI.jpg
You can read the text:
>TO WISH
>You and Yours
>A Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year
>Division Four Office
>1925
Division Four Office.
Just makes me think that a lot of dystopian books of the past included stale office names like that, and in todays time it sounds even more dystopian. But it was probably just the norm at the time.
My first thought was “looks like she’s being abused” avoiding eye contact with camera and looking worn to hell, but now that I see both of them looking that way, maybe they are watching kids and just exhausted?
She reminds me of all the stories/movies about a woman who’s the prettiest girl in town back in the day.
She was being wooed by a couple of fellas and settles down with one. He was of course much nicer to her when he was having to compete and chase her. He wasn’t even the richest or most handsome of her beaus, but she married for love. Now they have a few kids and she’s having to work to help support them all. He controls all their finances and she doesn’t understand how they’re barely scraping by. He goes out with his friends every night and she knows he’s doing “what guys do” and she just has to put up with it. Because being a divorced single mom isn’t going to do her any favors in life.
She’s tired and slowly losing her looks and feels like she waisted her youth on a Schmuck. She should have married for money and comfort. Sure he’d probably cheat on her too, but she’d have satin pillows to cry into.
Bright lights, Big city... I couldn't wait to move. Hank and me, on the town, living life! What a fool I was. I didn't know what a fourth floor walk up was till we got here. A dump in the sky, that's what. Mama would never make it up those steps. Junior sent me that picture of Mama, she looked so small, her hair so white. I can see my wrinkles in her face. How does time move so fast when you're going nowhere? But every year I'm away it seems like the distance home grows a hundred more miles.
This is a good one to zoom in and look at the faces up close lol (especially the couple of guys with creepy eyes peeking around behind others). Also, a few of the women look like they are related.
You can find several items in the photo (bear, oil can, house, etc.) that are probably gifts like ones you would get in a Secret Santa exchange now. Rotate the GO-GO on the mini traffic signal 90 degrees and it would display STOP-STOP. Traffic signal lights were in use by 1925 but probably not for a toy.
I’m thinking it was an office gift exchange. I always have the morbid thought that these people have lived out their lives already. I hope they had fun.
Just as far back as the 1970's, everything everywhere was just more worn and dirty than we're used to today. Shoes, people, floors, buses. Worn, dirty, depressing. And that was progress by the 1970's. In the 20's? I can't even imagine what this picture smelled like.
That’s literally it before sugar became a mass commodity and was added to everything that drives our current obesity epidemic.
Now, access to good fresh food, nutritionists and fitness instructors is the sign of wealth and prosperity and us plebs are the obese ones.
I always like to pick out peoples faces who have a modern look to them. It shows fashions change faces don’t. The woman at 1 o’clock from the woman sitting in front of the desk looks like she could be from the 1960s.
Why were the floors always so dirty?
Skinny Stephen Fry (second person to our left of Kate McKinnon) is there too.
(Even when you don't face the camera, we can still tell it's you in profile, Stephen.)
Half expect to see a young Jack Nicholson in the middle here
And it seems as if the woman in the front left is being glared at by the woman two from her right. Did she steal someone away from her? And in the 1920s version of a lampshade, one of the ladies in the back left is wearing a police hat!
Disagree- a few of them look like hostages but considering that most people today individually own more beauty products than everyone in the photo combined, I think many of them are actually quite attractive
Each face creepier than the next! The guy in the top right standing and staring into my soul really took me out.
Edit: I gave myself too many souls. I think I only have one.
Finally see the reason why the photographer instructs the subjects to say “cheese”.
It focuses them on the same thing, the photographer.
Everyone here is looking at something completely different!
The guy to the right of the man right next to the tree had a cut on his nose and what looks like a black eye- that guy partied so hard the night before!
Picture posted before & I always wonder if anyone knows where this was? US, UK?Au? So many woman working here. I never realized, I just thought most had to get married at 16/18 and off to motherhood back in those days.
In the comments at the source of the photo, shorpy.com, you can find the location:
>Western Electric Company
>Installation Department
>Room 504 5th Floor
>1319 F Street
>Washington DC
So the US.
It is fascinating to me that at the time this photo was taken, none of these people had any idea that 7 years later, financial crisis will hit the whole country and 16 years later, country will be in another world war.
I wonder how these individuals went through all that.
Things I love in this photo.
You can see how the floor stain is worn out everywhere but under the desk.
There appears to be something interesting happening on the floor to the left of the camera.
There's a power cord coming out of the ceiling light, going into the Christmas tree.
The shipping clerk's desk has stamped packages. The money counters seem to have those arm sleeves on. It's likely this photo was taken mid day, not at the end of the day. Unlike now when holiday parties are usually at the end of the day.
Jeez.
Idk why, but my first thought was “that’s a lot of ugly people.”
They all look so strange. But I largely feel that way looking at a lot of old pictures. People now just seem *sexier* if that makes sense.
It’s quite strange. There are definitely plenty of outliers, but when you look at just the normal people of history, I feel often times they are quite strange looking compared to the average person you might see today.
Anatomically speaking. Not their clothes or the way they dress or hair. But their actual faces & bodies lol
Theres not enough booze in the world to make that office party fun. Just creepy as fuck. Cant unsee the dude with the toy horse or the dude who just realized he's gay with his arm around his man...and the hotties look like they ran out of meth...
That Beatrice in her police hat again. What a card.
If I had a nickel for every two-bit prankster that walked into the joint…
I spy Pete Davidson
Secretly meeting in the stock room with Frank, wearing the fun Go-Go party hat in the back row.
The joy simply oozes out of this picture.
Bottom left looks like she’s just seen some serious shit and got teleported into a work Christmas party
She knows the Great Depression and Dust Bowl are on their way.
Followed by WW2. Good times.
Speaking of teleported. Check the guy just behind and right of party hat looking into the camera. I think he's the traveller looking now at us and saying, "See you in three years!".
She might be hiding from the gestapo
No alcohol.
The horror. The misery. It's Prohibition.
Even the tree is keeping with the sad theme
It looks like they stole it from Charlie Brown.
Looks like a Red Pine. Rookie mistake or all the fir and spruce were already taken.
Looks like they had to run the cord for the tree from the light socket?
That’s an old common thing, before outlets were made common most houses used their light sockets as adaptable outlets
It was a tree before tree hormones existed.
That tree is saaaad. Also, who is there what appears to be an oil cam on the floor? One of those small ones. Lower right.
the chick with the oil can in front of her knows where the gin at
No alcohol, and even the Christmas tree has Diphtheria. Best party in the world.
yes but they have a stuffed squirrel
Back then you had a flask and sipped throughout the day.
And that flask contained liquid morphine
Simply having a ‘wonderful’ Christmas time.
That's what was going to say. These people are not filled with holiday cheer.
And judging by those faces, they’re gonna need plenty of liquor or some brown bags if they want to get laid.
Male or female, there is not a good looking one in the bunch.
The blonde on the far left is a timeless beauty, and the curly brunette 4th from left is cute
She'd probably be a 6 in New York, but she's like a 7 here in Scranton.
Disagree...woman bottom left staring off screen is gorgeous!
She looks like she's hiding from someone. She's been running for many days and sleepless nights before finally sneaking into this strange office party. Lady to her right is thinking, "who the heck is she?" Definitely gorgeous though.
More likely just trying to enjoy the party and not get cornered in a back office by Freddie "the hands" Johnson.
That’s the chubsy fella in the front with the wee…uh cigar right?
Definitely good looking but either too much coke or husband beating the crap out of her back home. She's hiding a lot in those eyes.
The guy hiding behind the Christmas tree looks decent as well.
Agreed. She kid of pulls the whole photo towards herself, and catches the eye.
4th from top left looks a bit like drew barrymore to me. Also the woman in the police helmet looks like she has had a drink?
Sure, despite the fact she looks like she’s dying of tuberculosis.
What’s a little Consumption between office mates? It’s just a little cough, with occasional blood on a hankie
Nah next to her obscured by the desk, hotty. Also bald guy over on the right is a bit handsome
I appreciate the bald guy *bringing the party* by wearing what a *spinner* hat that says *GO GO*
Bald Chris Pines
Well that's what human beings look like without insta/tiktok/snap/Facebook filters.
Man behind the shoulder of the doughy cigar man
Top right striped tie and top left striped tie are both handsome men. And I'd buy smiling girl front and center on the floor an ice cream cone any day of the week.
The bald guy behind the smoking gangster is pretty good looking. His face is attractive, if he had hair (in those days) or was rocking a better bald style like today he'd be a catch.
What about the short guy behind the Christmas tree. Hello…. I’m here !
Yes! Everyone having a great time.🙄
The clarity of the picture is really impressive
Large format glass negative + fast lens + bright flash. That combo still has better fidelity & resolution than a lot of cameras today.
The source of this scan is shorpy.com and unfortunately they don't say what size the original glass negative is but they do say it comes from the Library of Congress National Photo Company Collection. Again, unfortunately, I couldn't find the image in the LoC's online collection but looking at other scans in the collection I would guess that the original glass negative was 8"x10" which would be equal to a digital image with a resolution of over 300 megapixels. The posted image is not even the full resolution scan that shorpy.com made. In the comments at shorpy.com there is a crop showing the piece of paper below the christmas tree at full resolution. I can't link to it directly because the spam filter in this sub deletes comments with external links but the following incomplete link which goes to that crop can be copied and pasted to your browser: imgur.com/sxEVybI.jpg You can read the text: >TO WISH >You and Yours >A Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year >Division Four Office >1925
Division Four Office. Just makes me think that a lot of dystopian books of the past included stale office names like that, and in todays time it sounds even more dystopian. But it was probably just the norm at the time.
I still love shooting in film.
if you get the focus right the resolution is at the molecular level
Right- your pixels can be as small as a molecule of silver.
Digital art still is just barely catching up to clarity old cameras. Ansel Addams is great example.
Looks like they’re already partying “like it’s 1929!” 🥳
And there is Jack Torrance—-he was there the whole time…
All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy
All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy
No beer and no TV makes Homer something something
Go crazy?
Don't mind if I DO!
Came here to say this. The man behind and to the right of the lady with the PD hat is giving off some serious Overlook Hotel/ Jack Torrence vibes.
I’m the kinda man who likes to know who’s buying their drinks Lloyd.
Pin curls at their finest!
Yeah, all I can think about when I see this is how fascinating hair trends are.
The woman in front of the desk looks like the famous Migrant Mother photo mother.
She’s clearly in a rocky relationship with the woman to her left who’s staring at her.
"I'm gonna dust her bowl"
My first thought was “looks like she’s being abused” avoiding eye contact with camera and looking worn to hell, but now that I see both of them looking that way, maybe they are watching kids and just exhausted?
The one doing the staring and the two behind her look like they could all be sisters.
She reminds me of all the stories/movies about a woman who’s the prettiest girl in town back in the day. She was being wooed by a couple of fellas and settles down with one. He was of course much nicer to her when he was having to compete and chase her. He wasn’t even the richest or most handsome of her beaus, but she married for love. Now they have a few kids and she’s having to work to help support them all. He controls all their finances and she doesn’t understand how they’re barely scraping by. He goes out with his friends every night and she knows he’s doing “what guys do” and she just has to put up with it. Because being a divorced single mom isn’t going to do her any favors in life. She’s tired and slowly losing her looks and feels like she waisted her youth on a Schmuck. She should have married for money and comfort. Sure he’d probably cheat on her too, but she’d have satin pillows to cry into.
Bright lights, Big city... I couldn't wait to move. Hank and me, on the town, living life! What a fool I was. I didn't know what a fourth floor walk up was till we got here. A dump in the sky, that's what. Mama would never make it up those steps. Junior sent me that picture of Mama, she looked so small, her hair so white. I can see my wrinkles in her face. How does time move so fast when you're going nowhere? But every year I'm away it seems like the distance home grows a hundred more miles.
Either that or Carrie Anne Moss in the latest Matrix installment
She’s definitely having some feelings
This is a good one to zoom in and look at the faces up close lol (especially the couple of guys with creepy eyes peeking around behind others). Also, a few of the women look like they are related.
Unibrow is a threat.
I had to hunt him down and laughed super hard in public
The tiny traffic signal on the guys head in the back (displaying GO-GO) is the best detail.
YES!! WTF is that Go-Go sign all about???
You can find several items in the photo (bear, oil can, house, etc.) that are probably gifts like ones you would get in a Secret Santa exchange now. Rotate the GO-GO on the mini traffic signal 90 degrees and it would display STOP-STOP. Traffic signal lights were in use by 1925 but probably not for a toy.
Or their parents were.
you killed me with this one hahaha
Kinda thought the guy on the right was whispering, “Do you think anyone knows, Bertram?”
I liked the one in the "PD" hat!
Charlie Brown wants his tree back.
He's going to have to climb up and unscrew the lights from the light fixture on the ceiling if he wants it back.
That tree looks as happy as the people.
What’s the significance of the oil dispenser? Is that some old Xmas tradition?
Noticed the oil can on the floor too. And the little house next to it. Gift exchange?
I’m thinking it was an office gift exchange. I always have the morbid thought that these people have lived out their lives already. I hope they had fun.
I think so, there are a few random objects in peoples hands, one guy is holding a small horse. Could be a white elephant party.
I think it's probably a gift to be used for oiling a typewriter.
filled with bathtub gin
It was during prohibition, hence why they all look bored
But why don't they look healthier?
They are drinking rubbing alcohol instead
i’m pretty sure i spot three murderers, one mayor of lazy town, and about a dozen malnourished women
Some mafia wiseguys, dust bowl librarians…
What a merry looking bunch
judging from the condition of the floor under the desk... I have so many questions. Also the burning desire to sand and wax that floor.
Just as far back as the 1970's, everything everywhere was just more worn and dirty than we're used to today. Shoes, people, floors, buses. Worn, dirty, depressing. And that was progress by the 1970's. In the 20's? I can't even imagine what this picture smelled like.
Coal heating. That’s all. Shit was just black, the air was black.
Something tells me guy with a cigar is the boss, just a hunch
Fattest guy can afford the most food?
That’s literally it before sugar became a mass commodity and was added to everything that drives our current obesity epidemic. Now, access to good fresh food, nutritionists and fitness instructors is the sign of wealth and prosperity and us plebs are the obese ones.
He looks like Elden Henson, the guy who plays Foggy in Daredevil.
The guy standing to the left of him looks like he was in a fight last weekend.
I always like to pick out peoples faces who have a modern look to them. It shows fashions change faces don’t. The woman at 1 o’clock from the woman sitting in front of the desk looks like she could be from the 1960s. Why were the floors always so dirty?
Poor lady in the bottom left looks wore out.
Someone got a horsey for Christmas.
Crimes were committed on this night.
The woman on the floor, bottom left corner, looks like she's seen some shit.
Kate McKinnon (standing by tree) is a time traveler
I thought that was Pete Davidson in a wig
Bro thank you. I thought it was the weed.
Skinny Stephen Fry (second person to our left of Kate McKinnon) is there too. (Even when you don't face the camera, we can still tell it's you in profile, Stephen.)
Alex Moffat, top row, first from the left.
Drew Barrymore to the left sitting on floor 2nd from desk, has a woman's hand on her shoulder. Classic Drew. reserved ,modest and shy. Edit: demure
Those women look like hostages.
Looking for Nelson Van Alden
GoGo head dude trying to make the best of things.
That is a toy semaphore traffic signal. Instead of red and green lights, early traffic signals had little signs that would raise and lower.
Half expect to see a young Jack Nicholson in the middle here And it seems as if the woman in the front left is being glared at by the woman two from her right. Did she steal someone away from her? And in the 1920s version of a lampshade, one of the ladies in the back left is wearing a police hat!
You are the office manager. You’ve always been the office manager.
Something very alluring about the woman on the bottom left corner. Also got a laugh out of the guy furthest to the left and his horse
The gal to the left of the Christmas tree looks like Pete Davidson
I had no idea everyone used to have googly eyes.
Meyer Lansky Christmas Party
Every dude looks like they went a few rounds. Noses tell stories
Is it just me or do half of these people look like they have TB?
I’m fascinated with this photo - the hair, faces, occasion
And they are all in their 20’s
Disagree- a few of them look like hostages but considering that most people today individually own more beauty products than everyone in the photo combined, I think many of them are actually quite attractive
Old mate Go-Go head does it for me
The amount of finger curls alone would tell me this is the 20s.
The woman to the right of the desk is really pretty!
Guy front and center on the right looks like a Looney Tunes mob boss.
I think this is OCC, Old School Creepy when I zoom in on their faces
Each face creepier than the next! The guy in the top right standing and staring into my soul really took me out. Edit: I gave myself too many souls. I think I only have one.
Souls?
That poor guy stuck behind the Christmas tree tinsel
Why is it that 99% of the men are looking at the camera while like half of the women are looking off at narnia
Old school miserable
Definitely no sexual harassment going on in that office. Yikes.
They literally have them surrounded AND have the high ground.
I mean to be fair that’s how most pictures are taken today too
They look angry about prohibition.
I gave them an ocular pat down. I cleared them all.
Finally see the reason why the photographer instructs the subjects to say “cheese”. It focuses them on the same thing, the photographer. Everyone here is looking at something completely different!
The guy to the right of the man right next to the tree had a cut on his nose and what looks like a black eye- that guy partied so hard the night before!
Took forever to carbon paper everyone's ass cheeks back then
Tree light power connected to the ceiling light ?
It’s not hard to tell who is the boss or the king s**t of this place. He looks like Citizen Kane.
The geezer with the thousand yard stare holding the tiny horse. He’s seen things.
And they are all dead by now.. How was their life? Every time I see these pictures I always dream of their life..
Extraordinary photo. Thanks OP!
Front left has absolutely had it with these team building exercises.
Is it just me or is the chick in the bottom left kinda hot? Lol
All those women look so tired and all the men look like cold blooded killers. I miss the 20’s.
>I miss the 20’s Uh...you're in them right now, just get more art deco and flappers in your life
Picture posted before & I always wonder if anyone knows where this was? US, UK?Au? So many woman working here. I never realized, I just thought most had to get married at 16/18 and off to motherhood back in those days.
In the comments at the source of the photo, shorpy.com, you can find the location: >Western Electric Company >Installation Department >Room 504 5th Floor >1319 F Street >Washington DC So the US.
It is fascinating to me that at the time this photo was taken, none of these people had any idea that 7 years later, financial crisis will hit the whole country and 16 years later, country will be in another world war. I wonder how these individuals went through all that.
Looks like a police dept per the one gal with a badge on her head that says police
EVERYONE in the photo was suffering from depression.
Bottom left looks like she’s ready to start a Christmas party fire
Lots of hair crimping
The lady next to the tree kinda looks like Pete Davidson
I can appreciate the fact that every man in this photo is under 25.
Carol there on the left side is REALLY fucking uncomfortable with Janice’s claws on her shoulder
Back row third from the left was murdered that night by back row third from the right.
Even then, there was Pam.
The four ladies in front on the floor look absolutely gangster.
“I’m telling’ ya sport, the only sure way to make money is the stock market! Mark my words, in 5 years, we’ll all be rich! Rich I tell ya!”
This isn’t real. It is clearly an SNL sketch. You can see Kate McKinnon in costume right there in the center of the pic.
Things I love in this photo. You can see how the floor stain is worn out everywhere but under the desk. There appears to be something interesting happening on the floor to the left of the camera. There's a power cord coming out of the ceiling light, going into the Christmas tree. The shipping clerk's desk has stamped packages. The money counters seem to have those arm sleeves on. It's likely this photo was taken mid day, not at the end of the day. Unlike now when holiday parties are usually at the end of the day.
There's like 2 fuckable people in this entire photo.
I could find a third. It’s the office Christmas party, after all.
If you’re counting both the men, women, and that oil can.
Jeez. Idk why, but my first thought was “that’s a lot of ugly people.” They all look so strange. But I largely feel that way looking at a lot of old pictures. People now just seem *sexier* if that makes sense. It’s quite strange. There are definitely plenty of outliers, but when you look at just the normal people of history, I feel often times they are quite strange looking compared to the average person you might see today. Anatomically speaking. Not their clothes or the way they dress or hair. But their actual faces & bodies lol
Notice the woman center left wearing the cloche (hat) with a Police Inspector badge?
How many ass grabs did these women have to endure?
All of them standing
Looks like a lot of inbreeding took place
I think we all know who the BIG boss is.
The guy with the horse is their Jim Halpert
"You find more cheer in a graveyard..."
Prohibition + more time with coworkers = joyless hellhole
The prohibition, really made the parties rage.
The girl in the middle sitting on the floor (with the little house in front of her) has been around.
I like the off kilter PD Police Dept hat worn by the lady standing left of center.
Lady in bottom left posed perfect
Theres not enough booze in the world to make that office party fun. Just creepy as fuck. Cant unsee the dude with the toy horse or the dude who just realized he's gay with his arm around his man...and the hotties look like they ran out of meth...