I just wanted to share some great old prop photographs I’ve come across on the Life photo archive hosted on Google. Remember, it’s also a great place to find primary photographic research since the invention of photography.
Look at the amazing craftsmanship it took to create these miniature human figures.
Propman A. D. Kuehl holds a breakaway club, constructed of balsa wood, with toothpicks holding it together.
Propman R. B. Berscheid cleans one of the many guns in his props storage. Propmen dressed much snappier back then.
This one doesn’t have much information cutting blocks of material. My guess is that it’s rubber to make fake rocks. Urethane foam was not commercially available until the mid 1950s.
This looks like an interesting play. Seriously though, check out the trick knives on the right used for stabbing effects.
That prop box is exactly like the ones we still use at the Public Theatre, as well as ones I’ve seen at most of the other theatres I’ve worked.
Propman Dan Harrison spins artificial spider webs, a process I wish I knew a lot more about.
It must have taken a lot of wood to build that giant row boat filled with massive puppet-men.
And finally, here is a picture of me carrying two real rocks. Wait, it’s actually a picture of a propman carrying two rubber prop rocks. Props rock!
Yay, jokes! Wait a minute… you just used the same joke over and over…