And now for something a little different

And still more. These are images of old Renaults from the B&W days. 4CVs and Fregates feature prominently as do the prewar cars from the 1930s. I wonder if they drooled at cars back in the old days..:unsure:

It's refreshing to see the female models that adorn these cars are respectably dressed as one would have expected in the old days.


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Well my side bar doesn't have any of that, all I have is hip replacements, hearing aides and retirement living ads.

PS. Oh and E scooters, go figure.
 
I am not sure those are models posing with the cars. Some cars are battered, all of them registered, people don't seem particularly fancy, the places seem normal places where people go or just side of the road type places.

As for drooling, I am not sure about the post war cars but the before war cars were probably too expensive to even dream of buying. More like status symbols than things with some usefulness attached. In that sense people probably drooled at what they represented as symbols not at what they were, like say we drool today at a car because it is fast or beautiful or has good handling, you know, car attributes.
 
There was no dearth of cars in NSW before the war. My family's menfolk, and a sprinkling of the ladies all had their own cars then. My mother's aunt used her Dodge (her horse substitute) like a cross-country Bushmaster.
 
Don't forget that the 1930s were the depression years and no one smiled. Sure some of the rick folk with old money had an easier time of it but generally no one smiled when posing for photos in the depression years. Google a few 1930s images and see for yourself. Fast forward to 2022 and everyone smiles for the cameras without even thinking about it. Kids all have good teeth and the older folk have had work done and appear to have good teeth too so everyone smiles.

Here's an historic image of a Renault car show in the 1930s and you can almost smell the money but no one is smiling for the camera. Maybe they were all just drooling instead at this 1935 Nervasport.

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There was no dearth of cars in NSW before the war. My family's menfolk, and a sprinkling of the ladies all had their own cars then. My mother's aunt used her Dodge (her horse substitute) like a cross-country Bushmaster.
Australia and perhaps America are not exactly representative of the state of things elsewhere.

There was no shortage of cars anywhere, but I suspect some countries depended a lot more on cars than others and that was probably where they became cheaper quicker so most people could afford them.

I would hazard a guess in the early to mid thirties only a handful of very rich people could buy cars over in Europe. Trades and industries where cars helped the bottom line most likely had them too but for average Joe I am pretty sure cars virtually did not exist. My father was born in 1935 and I know the first cars he has ever seen were German army cars (and tanks) soon followed by their airplanes.
 
Smiling for the camera is a cultural thing. It was impossible for long exposures, and even when faster film became available was regarded by many as appropriate for drunks and idiots. Our prewar wedding photos are likely to be missing smiles. The ones I have are. It isn't about poverty, rather it's about decorum.

Saying cheese is largely a post-war phenomenon - I suspect Kodak advertising..
 
I dug out some family snaps taken in the 1920s - mostly mother's friends - and done before the depression. No smiles, except from a running boy about 18 being chased by a very nice looking young lady. Posed pictures are all straight-faced.
 
But then my grandma was born in 1908 (west coast, USA) and in every photo I’ve seen of her after 1920 she’s striking a movie starlet pose with a gorgeous smile... oh except for the late 1930s handstand on a beach photos, those are far more spontaneous. But that may say more about my grandma than about social norms for the time. 🤣
 
In 1930 Australia had the fifth highest car ownership rate in the world after the USA, UK, Germany and France.
We had 570,000 vehicles for a population of 6.5 million or, 88 vehicles per 1000 people.
The US had 217 vehicles per 1000 people in 1930.

The US ownership rate didn't change much through into the late 40s.
The Australian fleet on the other hand had grown to almost 1 million units by the late 40s.
Our population had also increased to 7.5 million by 1947 so the ownership rate by then was 133 units per 1000 people.


There's a lot of speculation around why people didn't smile for photos.

Certainly way back the long exposure factor would probably have held true.

Dental hygiene comes up, but then bad or no teeth was "normal".
Historically, portrait painting protocols (pre the advent of photography) were that only drunk, lewd, mad, loud etc, people smiled.🙋‍♂️

The theory I like as to why smiling suddenly became fashionable was that it happened to time in with the advent of the amateur photographer in the early 20th century.
Makes sense that someone is more likely to smile at a friend or relative snapping a photo of them doing something "normal", than they would standing stiff as a post in their Sunday best posing for a professional photographer.🤔
 
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The astute observer would have naturally noticed the steel framed/masonry building in the back ground, perhaps designed by Gustave Eiffel..? The bricks were laid by British brickies.

BTW that's a Citroen 45 I reckon.

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