June 1, 1918. The Italian racecar driver Ralph DePalma and mechanic in the Packard that won the Harkness Handicap at Sheepshead Bay Speedway in Brooklyn. 5x7 glass negative, George Grantham Bain Collection. View full size.

Circa 1919. "Treasury, Internal Revenue Department; methods of smuggling opium." National Photo Company Collection glass negative. View full size.

Washington. April 25, 1925. "Mrs. H.A. Colman, Mrs. C.E. Holmes, Mrs. C.M. Busch." National Photo Company Collection glass negative. View full size.

This is a Kodachrome of my bedroom in Pacifica, California, in November 1966. I was 10 years old, and apparently an unnaturally neat child. That's my stupid dog Blackie on the bed -- Blackie eventually bit a neighbor kid and "got sent to the farm" - I was in college before I figured out that my parents had him put to sleep. They were also like beatniks, so the whole house was covered in that awful seagrass rug stuff that left waffle marks on my feet. My prize possession, one share of McDonnell Aircraft stock, is framed over my desk. That desk, which is now my wife's computer desk, had an elaborate drawing of a Gemini instrument panel on the underside, and I spent hours lying under it, on the overturned Cost Plus chair, pretending I was in orbit. That's a model of a B-57 B-58 bomber on top of the Zenith TV, which had a broken on-off switch and required me to crawl under it and plug it in when I wanted to watch anything. There are a lot of Roy Gallant books on astronomy and space travel on the shelf, and the window looked out on the driveway. I really miss that camel-hair comforter on the bed. View full size.

Washington, D.C., circa 1920. "Harry Wardman property, 1340 G Street." National Photo Company Collection glass negative. View full size.

St. Louis, May 1910. N. Broadway and De Soto. "Boy with the bag, nicknamed Turk, said he was going to Texas soon. The investigator found him recently with $1.75 he had just won at craps." Photo by Lewis Wickes Hine. View full size.

New York, June 1952. Eartha Kitt, the self-styled "sex kitten" who made "Santa Baby" a staple of the holiday airwaves in a career that spanned half a century, died today at the age of 81. Photo by Gordon Parks, Life archive. View full size.