Do you feel lucky, time-traveler Punk?
“New York circa 1905. "Unloading at banana docks." 8×10 inch dry plate glass negative, Detroit Publishing Company” [click for full-size original at Shorpy]
Given that the time-traveler hipster is the most viewed page here on Forgetomori, when I saw the time-traveler punk on Anomalist I just had to blog about it. Even though I must be first to admit this is not as impressive, as his clothes are quite clearly in context, his allegedly mohawk hairstyle is quite interesting.
And as it happens, I was about to blog about mohawk hairstyles, because like stamped T-shirts they look like something quite modern, when contrary to stamped T-shirts, they are not.
The oldest known record of a Mohawk hairstyle actually predates the Mohawk tribe: it’s been found on the Clonycavan Man, an Iron Age body in Dublin, Ireland. That’s a 2,300 years old quite well-preserved Mohawk hair. I didn’t include a photo here because it’s still not that much to look for, but just follow the above link to Wikipedia.
It would be the fierce image of tribal warriors that would make the Mohawk hairstyle enter modern popular culture, but long before the punk movement. In World War II, the US 101st Airborne Division famous for it’s bravery fighting in Europe, as depicted on “Band of Brothers”, had a sub-unit selected and trained for an almost suicidal mission: the Filthy Thirteen.
To incite fear in the enemies, and as a leader of the group, Jake McNiece, was part Native-American, they cut their hair Mohawk style and even painted their faces. The photo above was published by Stars and Stripes in June 1944, and soldiers later in the Vietnam war would also sport such hairstyle.
A fictional Vietnam veteran, Travis Bickle, would then be immortalized in “Taxi Driver” (1976).
Which brings us back to the time-traveler punk unloading at banana docks. By definition this sort of “time-traveler photos” will be singled out because of the fashion statements the apparently out of place hipsters/punks will be sporting.
However – this speaks a lot about fashion – as in the most famous photo, here too the punk wasn’t actually making any sort of fashion statement. He may have cut his hair that way for any number of reasons, you don’t know if he only shaved one side of his hair.
Yesterday’s worker at the banana docks with a ridiculous haircut my be tomorrow’s David Beckham.
Popularity: 11% [?]
Posted in Fortean | 13 comments13 Comments so far
Leave a reply
Live Comment Preview
Subscribe to the RSS feed
That’s simple : the man is probably a real mohawk from Akwesasne
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akwesasne
From 1900 to early 50 it was common practise to clean shave around the ears, sometime to some extent.
Comics and propaganda from first and second world war show Krauts with similar hairdos.
Yeah, I’m not convinced he’s got a Mohawk haircut either; we can’t see the back. Shaving back and sides was not unusual.
He is Ukrainian, find “kozacs” – Ukrainian warriors, antient army in Eastern Europe
[...] The cellphone lady is just one more time traveller, along with the hipster and the punk. [...]
The explanation for the cellphone lady is a simple one. Being of great modesty as most women of those times were she was aware of the camera filming her and was blocking her face. My grandmother used to do the exact same thing every time she encountered a camera.
Ummm, you forgot about Sonny Rollins circa early 1960′s:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/daddio/4492461751/
[...] El viajero Punk del tiempo forgetomori.com/2010/fortean/do-you-feel-lucky-time-trave… por Professor_Duernuballs hace 7 segundos [...]
why would a time-traveller deliberately want to make themselves stand out like a sore thumb? Surely they would want to do their best to blend into the background rather than sporting hair-styles or clothing that look completely out of place by several decades…
Or maybe it’s a rather thick time-traveller who’s not done their research for the time-period.
[...] Mas datos clic aquí (en inglés) [...]
[...] Mas datos clic aquí (en inglés) [...]
When I was a kid in the late 60′s, I got hit high on my forehead with a thrown rock. They had to put stitches in, and they shaved much of one side of my head so that I could easily clean and take care of the wound. From the right angle looking at myself in the mirror, it looked exactly like a mohawk.
Short back and sides.