Time Travel discussion

Someone stumbled upon this photo from 1917 in a book. The man is wearing shorts and a t-shirt. So, of course, he's a time traveler. Right? Wrong? You decide.

http://boingboing.net/2012/10/29/time...

What I find hilarious is that he seems to be holding the hand of the startled man on his right! So he is openly gay, wearing a T shirt, and sporting a haircut that makes him look like Bryan Adams. Not very 1917 for sure :)

I dont think its a photoshop job, its too good. Lighting and shadows are perfect. No singed edges. Absolutely not a time traveller either but certainly a boy who is defying the social stigma of its time :)

A really interesting picture just to highlight inviduals who dare to do things a bit different for their time. The man on the left certainly looks bemused at him.

So when are we supposed to have start wearing T shirts on its own? Did they not exist then?

I agree with Tej that it does not appear to be a doctored photo. I would also agree that his appearance is strange. But there are a couple of other men in the photo without hats, so the lack of a hat is not very compelling proof that he is from the future. There are also other men in shorts, but all the men appear to have button-up shirts, so that detail is a bit suspicious. Definitely an intriguing photo.

In the comments to the article, someone mentioned that t-shirts were around then and that they made it into the common lexicon soon after that date (it appeared in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary in the 1920s). This Article says they were worn by U.S. Navy sailors as early as 1913.

Considering that other guys in the picture are also wearing shorts, I'm going to say that he's not a time traveler. Other than Bill and Ted, what time travelers would think that a t-shirt and shorts would be the best thing to wear when time-traveling into the past anyway?

Etymology Online has the term "t-shirt" being first used in surviving written language in 1920: http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?t...

Granted, the existence of the word in spoken language could have been earlier. And this gives no proof as to the first time such an item existed without today's name.

Well researched Amy. 1920 is not that far off from 1917 so one can allow for the term T-shirt to be written before then but not picked up by the etylomolgy sources, then before that, it may have been a spoken word for a while. And then going back even further, t-shirts would have been worn but the term may not have been coined as such, initially.

That Etymology Online is a useful reference site, I'm bookmarking that one.

Oh, he's definitely a fellow traveler.

I recognize him.

Scott, I think you'd get some argument there, from this group, at least.

Are you fishing or just being sly?

Scott wrote: "Most certainly not. Time travel to the past is fiction that violates the laws of physics."

Haha, good one, Scott...wait...oh, you're serious. :(

Kidding aside this thread inspires me to create a new poll which I'll announce on a new thread.

Amy wrote: "Someone stumbled upon this photo from 1917 in a book. The man is wearing shorts and a t-shirt. So, of course, he's a time traveler. Right? Wrong? You decide.

http://boingboing.net/2012/10/29/time..."
I believe it is just a clever photo shop job. My brother could do as good a job.
They've placed the man almost in the lap of someone too. How come the person he's nearly sitting on isn't trying to push him out of the way? It looks like a photo of a guy from the seventies. If you look closely his upper left arm (right in the photo) is standing out too sharply. Wrong lighting for the old grainy photo. Whoever put the book together had a mischievous sense of humour. My opinion anyway.

I like it!