35 color photos from the past and the history behind them

Now it's hard to imagine that once it was impossible to just get a smartphone and instantly take a picture, and then process it as your heart desires. And once all the photos were only black and white at all. And although such frames have their own charm, there is something special about being able to see the past in color. Fortunately, thanks to modern technology, artists all over the world are working to breathe life into old pictures.

A woman puts a letter in a mailbox among buildings destroyed by bombing during World War II. London, United Kingdom, 1940

A Navajo man photographed in 1904 dressed as Nayenezgani, a mythical hero from Navajo mythology who, along with his brother Tobadzini, rid the world of Anaye (monsters from Navajo mythology)

Japanese couple takes a selfie, 1920

Louis Armstrong plays the trumpet for his wife Lucille in front of the Great Sphinx of Giza, Egypt, 1961

Robin Williams before he became famous, performs as a mime in Central Park, New York, 1974

Daniel Sorin photographed two mimes performing in New York's Central Park. In 2013, Daniel was looking through his negatives and photos and realized that one of the mimes was Oscar-winning actor Robin Williams.

A 21-year-old Royal Navy stoker nicknamed "Popeye" aboard HMS Rodney in September 1940

Two photos of the Soviet soldier Yevgeny Kobytev, taken with a difference of 4 years. The photo on the left was in June 1941, when he went to war at the age of 30. The photo on the right was taken when he returned from the war in 1945.

Read more here — Photos of a soldier taken before and after the war. What did this man go through?

The actors of "Star Wars", 1977. From left to right: Harrison Ford (Han Solo), David Prose (Darth Vader), Peter Mayhew (Chewbacca), Carrie Fisher (Princess Leia), Kenny Baker (R2-D2) and Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker)

Martin Luther King Jr. and Ralph Abernathy ride on the first bus, where there is no division into seats for whites and blacks. Photo taken in Montgomery, Alabama, in December 1956

The future Queen of Great Britain, 19-year-old Elizabeth II in 1945, when she served as an ambulance driver in the Auxiliary Territorial Service during the Second World War

Native Americans of the Apsaroke tribe riding horses at a tipi in a snowy forest in Montana, 1908

A little Italian gives flowers to an American soldier whose tank stopped on the outskirts of Rome, June 1944

A Navajo man dressed as Tony Neil, the rain god of the Navajo nation, 1904

Hawaiian surfer, Charles Kauha, carries an alaya, a surfboard that was used in Hawaii until the 20th century. Photo taken on Waikiki beach in 1898

The famous photograph of the Spanish Civil War, taken by Juan Guzman on July 21, 1936 during the military uprising in Barcelona. In the photo — 17-year-old Marina Hinesta with a Mauser M1916 rifle.

Chief John Smith, aka the White Wolf, is considered the oldest Native American in history. According to one version, at the time of his death he was 137 years old. Photo circa 1920.

The Mercury train, 1936. Mercury passenger trains ran between Midwestern cities. The train was created in 1936 and lasted until 1959

Artist Claude Monet in his garden in Giverny, France, 1899

Jewish families in Amsterdam forced to leave their homes in May/June 1943 for deportation to concentration camps

Dutch Resistance fighters celebrate the liberation of Breda, Netherlands, by the 1st Polish Armored Division on October 29, 1944

Charlotte and Marjorie Collier, survivors of the wreck of the Titanic in April 1912. Charlotte's husband and Marjorie's father, Harvey Collier, died in the crash. June 1912

81-year-old Nikola Tesla, 1937

British socialite and suffragette Lady Norman on her car in 1916. This scooter was manufactured by the company Autoped on Long Island, from 1915 to 1922

Leon Trotsky, Frida Kahlo and Natalia Sedova in Mexico in 1937

British veteran of the Napoleonic Wars and his wife in the 1860s

Women deliver ice from a truck on September 16, 1918. Previously, this work was performed only by men, but because of the war, it was assigned to women

A boy sits among the ruins after the bombing of London during the Second World War. The photo was taken in January 1945

The Hindenburg airship disaster, May 6, 1937. The airship caught fire while trying to land at Lakehurst Air Base and burned to the ground

The famous photo of the "Migrant Mother" Dorothea Lange, which depicts 32-year-old Florence Owens Thompson in a pea picker camp, where crops died due to frost. Nipomo, California

A French boy runs down the street with a baguette. Shot by French photographer Willy Rony, 1952

The interior of a commercial aircraft in 1936. The plane belonged to Imperial Airways, the first British commercial airline

Norwegian artist Wilhelm Otto Peters works on the painting "In search of worms" in Nesseby, Finnmark, 1884

The 16th President of the United States Abraham Lincoln at the age of 56 on February 5, 1865, one month before his second inauguration and 2 months before his assassination

The tram conductor does not let passengers without a mask during the Spanish flu pandemic. Seattle, Washington, USA, 1918

Train wreck at Montparnasse Station in Paris, France, October 22, 1895. The train knocked out the track stop, broke through the wall of the building and collapsed from a height onto the street. Oddly enough, only one person was killed — a newspaper saleswoman, on whose kiosk the fragments of the wall fell