The Baby Cage

I could never use this, but it does make for an interesting post!

In the 1930s, London nannies lacking space for their young ones resorted to the baby cage. It’s exactly what it sounds like: a wire contraption, patented in the U.S. in 1922, that lets you claim that space outside your city window for your infant. Risky? Maybe, but so convenient.

It seems that this historical oddity is one that constantly comes in and out of the media and causes incredible public shock and outrage every time. It is amazing how attitudes change, so that something invented in the 1920s to do nothing but good now leaves us struggling to believe it ever happened.

In 1923 Emma Read patented the Portable Baby Cage. It was designed to solve the problem of large high rises in urban areas which left families with no open spaces to allow their young children to play. It was agreed that babies needed fresh air to maintain their health, so the baby cage was a simple and safe way to leave babies outside to enjoy the air. In the patent it is explained that:

“It is well known that a great many difficulties rise in raising and properly housing babies and small children in crowded cities, that is to say from the health viewpoint. “With these facts in view, it is the purpose of this invention to provide an article of manufacture for babies and young children, to be suspended upon the exterior of a building adjacent an open window, wherein the baby or young child may be placed.”

The cage could be suspended outside an open window of a flat, allowing the baby to sleep or play fully in the open air with wire mesh protecting it from falling. The baby cage was used in London during the 1930s, when in particular they were distributed to members of the Chelsea Baby Club ‘who have no gardens and live at the top of high buildings’, as documented by Getty.

The idea didn’t really catch on for many obvious reasons. Firstly the wire mesh looks awful and must have reminded mothers constantly that they were really locking their baby in a cage: and I’m sure the name didn’t help either. Secondly they look incredibly dangerous, with babies potentially suspended 200 feet from the ground.

Let me know what you think of this wacky invention!

Storefronts

Fairbanks-Alaska It was made in between ca. 1900 and 1916.

For some reason I just think that these days would have been so much better.  I know there were other trials and tribulations, but think how slow and peaceful the average day would have been.  if you look at the simplicity of the advertising, it is wonderful.  Surely we do not need blasting rap music, dancing girls and nonsense humor in order to be intrigued, do we? When did it come about that we need advertising at the gas pump, it is idiocy.  Our parents and grandparents had the right of it!

Not all of the hustle and bustle of today, people actually knew their neighbors, actually knew their family.  You could probably go into any of these stores at anytime and know everyone in it!  To me, that would just be an awesome thing.  I wish there were a way for us to get back to these times!

Schneider Electric Store. Interior. It was created between 1905 and 1945

Raleigh Haberdasher show window, Washington, D.C. It was made in 1925.

Window display featuring Pond’s Extract products in O’Donnell’s drugstore, probably in Washington, D.C. It was taken in between 1909 and 1932.

Washington Auto Exchange. It was made between 1905 and 1945

People of Deadwood celebrating completion of a stretch of railroad. It was made in 1888

James Store, 12th Street, Washington DC. It was taken between 1905 and 1945

Atlanta, Georgia. View on Marietta Street. It was made in 1864 by Barnard, George N., 1819-1902

Mullany’s Saloon. It was created in 1913

North side of Chestnut Street, between Second Street and Third Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was taken in 1842

Old Doughnet Shop. It was created between 1905 and 1945

Ox teams on Main St.,Sturgis, Dakota Territory. It was taken in 1887

Bringing back brass

Classy Brass

Brought to you by the Etsy Vintage Elte

This is the smallest sampling of brass beauties in the Eveteam favorites!  Stop by and see what else there is, or click the images to go directly to the individual stores!

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probably the first “Waffle House”

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obsessed

For as long as I can remember I have been obsessed with boxes.  It does not matter what kind, what they are made out of, or what size they are.  Basically if it can hold stuff and has a lid (preferable), then I love it!  I have boxes from all over the world and I have boxes that have traveled the world.  There is no end in sight to my obsession, well if “they” ever quit making boxes, then I guess I can stop! The collection I have now is of perfect specimens for display, storage or organization!

I cannot keep them all so here you go: