Historical images - Images that made history

  • Want to keep track of this thread?
    Accounts can bookmark posts, watch threads for updates, and jump back to where you stopped reading.
    Create account
Big Boz said:
I always thought that having a conjoined twin must be absolute hell. I mean, you are stuck with this person for the rest of your life. No privacy, no time apart, nothing. For your entire life, you have somebody right next to you at all times and who has seen everything you've ever done. I don't care how well you get along with somebody, that has got to be horrible.
Click to expand...
Their autobiography points that out. Houdini trained them to live independently from one another. In a sense. They had different personalities, opinions, sleep schedules, relationships, even bodily functions.

When they would be annoyed with each other, they would just not talk to each other. Even after a show.
 
Big Boz said:
I always thought that having a conjoined twin must be absolute hell. I mean, you are stuck with this person for the rest of your life. No privacy, no time apart, nothing. For your entire life, you have somebody right next to you at all times and who has seen everything you've ever done. I don't care how well you get along with somebody, that has got to be horrible.
Click to expand...
Could be worse they coulda been like the Hensels:
Can't find the one of them as kids. They are kindergarten teachers now.
 
Big Boz said:
I always thought that having a conjoined twin must be absolute hell. I mean, you are stuck with this person for the rest of your life. No privacy, no time apart, nothing. For your entire life, you have somebody right next to you at all times and who has seen everything you've ever done. I don't care how well you get along with somebody, that has got to be horrible.
Click to expand...
As someone with siblings who didn't always get along, that thought has crossed my mind a lot when thinking of conjoined twins. But I suppose you get used to it after however many years or decades.

Edit: I was wondering about the women who shared a body, but couldn't remember the name. It's so fascinating to think about, though I'm glad I don't have to worry about it.

I'm sure someone more qualified can answer, but are Siamese twins always the same sex? I figure maybe it's just cases of identical twins but I was curious.

There's definitely some interesting ethical ponderings when it comes to the income some of these people made in the shows. The nature of freak shows is fairly exploitative in nature, but some also seemed to make a lot of money. Would the circus take part of that cut?
 
1618089427426.png


Women and the Iranian Revolution.
 
GenociderSyo said:
My interest in disability started with learning about old sideshow and circus freaks as a child figured I'd share some historical
images of them:

View attachment 2069978
Ella Harper - Congential Gena Recurvatum (Born 1870 - Sideshow 1886)
She was making in the sideshow $200 a week, the equivelant today of $320,000 a year or $5,000 week.

View attachment 2069998
Myrtle Corbin - Dipygus/Parasistic Twin (Born 1868 - Sideshow 1880s)
She was making $520 a week.

View attachment 2070063
Chang and Eng Born 1811 Change had 10 children Eng had 11.
They were joined by a ligament between their sternums that connected their livers. Today this would be easily seperatable condition.

View attachment 2070080
Ruth Berry (born circa 1910, sideshow 1930-1965)
She was born with phocomelia (shortened limbs) in all four limbs as well as syndactylly (fusion of digits)

View attachment 2070127
Fanny Mills, born 1859
Had Milroy Disease which effects lymphatic system in the lower body.

View attachment 2070164
Charles Porter Born 1900, Sideshow 1930s
Had Fibrodysplasia Ossificans Progressiva where the muscles progressively calcify and form a 2nd skeleton.

View attachment 2070184
George Williams Born 1859
Had parastremmatic dysplasia, a severe form of dwarfism that twists and deforms the limbs.

View attachment 2070206
Joseph Merrick Born 1862, Died 1890. His is a sad case to read and there are quite a few books/documentaries on him.
Belief is he had Proteus Syndrome. There are questions about if his death was accidental or suicide. His head due to his disorder was heavy enough that if he layed down normally it would kill him due to asphyxia. He was found to be laying in such a way.

View attachment 2070241
Robert Wadlow Born 1918 Died 1940.
Gigantism. He died due to an infection by faulty leg brace causing a blister on his ankle.

View attachment 2070259
Robert Earl Hughes Born 1926
Weighed between 1041 and 1069 lbs.

View attachment 2070309
Dolly Dutton Born 1852
In 1882, Dolly was brought to a mental institution for "domestic troubles." This ususally was done by a husband to punish for disobeying, for a break, for being in menopause. It should be noted she lost a child at a year old and it may have been post partum and grief.

View attachment 2070273
Grady Stiles Born 1937
He killed his daughters fiance in 1978. Went to trial admited he killed the man and was convicted of third degree murder. He was not sentenced due to them stating no jails could deal with his disability. They ordered him under house arrest and 15 years probation. He was later murdered and there is controversy over if it was ordered by his wife and son.
The original episode of Killer Carnies featured his family talking about him. Also beleive there is an episode of american monster/evil lives here about him as well.
Click to expand...

As a kid stuff like this terrified me, as an adult I think it's fascinating. I like you that named all of the diseases, that could make for some interesting reading later on. Also, I'm a little surprised no one pointed this out but apparently - the fat guy is just a fat guy? No disease was mentioned
 
Chan Fan said:
As a kid stuff like this terrified me, as an adult I think it's fascinating. I like you that named all of the diseases, that could make for some interesting reading later on. Also, I'm a little surprised no one pointed this out but apparently - the fat guy is just a fat guy? No disease was mentioned
Click to expand...
It was said he had a malfunctioning pituatary gland due to comlications of whooping cough and easily treatable condition today. They beleive this explains his extremely mobilility for his size.

He died though at 32 due to measles. He waited to seek out a doctor until it was too late and it had already lead to his kidneys failing. His weight made it impossible to get him to a hospital though its beleived even that would not have saved him at that point.

I've been tempted to make a thread to give info on certain diseases/disorders since we seem to run into a lot of them on the site, but was not sure if there was interest or where to put it.
 
Big Boz said:
I always thought that having a conjoined twin must be absolute hell. I mean, you are stuck with this person for the rest of your life. No privacy, no time apart, nothing. For your entire life, you have somebody right next to you at all times and who has seen everything you've ever done. I don't care how well you get along with somebody, that has got to be horrible.
Click to expand...
Except, you've lived as an independent person, remember, conjoined twins have no experience or concept of not sharing a body...

A person rendered suddenly blind or deaf through trauma or disease is going to take it harder than a person born blind since, to them, their baseline of "normal" means not seeing.

Some people who are born with correctible blindness/deafness actually suffer depression AFTER the "cure" because having to deal with a new sense they've never encountered before is overwhelming and taxing. Some have even regretted it because now their jobs or simple house tasks are actually harder to do with things like sound and color assaulting their mind and breaking their concentration.

To conjoined twins, their experience of the world is that they've always been attached to another for as long as they can remember, to them, even though they know they are exceptional, they have no concept outside of though experiments of what it really means to be a "normal" person. They don't "get" used to it, it's all they've ever known.
 
Last edited:
Coffee Druid said:
I'm sure someone more qualified can answer, but are Siamese twins always the same sex? I figure maybe it's just cases of identical twins but I was curious.
Click to expand...
Conjoined twins are formed the same way identical twins are: Mom releases one egg, that month. Dad fertilized it and the two initial cells starts multiplying at an exponential rate. Sometimes, the embryo cleanly divides itself in two before it touches down somewhere, which how you get identical twins.

Siamese twins are form when the mass of cells tries to separate, but they're still stuck together.
 
1618094877376.png

Then you have good ol' parasistic conjoined twin:
1618095005086.png

The twin could open and close its eyes and react to pain since they share portions of the brain.
 
1618097397489.png


(Original Caption) Rochester, New York; Siamese Twins Hear Of Arrival Of Another Pair-- The famous Hilton Siamese twins, who are now in Rochester, New York, are shown reading of the birth of the Picciotto Siamese twin girls at Staten Island, New York. The Hilton girls, Violet, dark hair, and Daisy, now 34, are joined at the base of the spine. They are both married. They wrote advising the parents not to let doctors operate to separate the Picciotto twins---but fate intervened. The Staten Island babies died today, shortly after the parents had consented to an operation which was to have been made in ten or fifteen days.

I prefer the pygopagus like the Hilton sisters.
 
'1934 photo staged by A.L. Schafer, mocking the Hays movie censorship Code by violating as many of its rules as possible in a single image'
1618419675163.png
 
Fullscreen capture 12212015 121523 AM.jpg


Cheshire Regiment - Somme trench 1916

This image has always given me the feels. That one soldier keeping a lookout while the others try to get a bit of rest. Imagine living like that in those horrible trenches.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom