Old-Timey Car Wreck Photos Are The Gift That Keeps On Giving

One of my favorite hobbies is digging through old archival photos of cars; you can learn a lot about folks based on the kinds of things they deemed important enough to photograph — and as I've learned, the people of the past loved to take photos of ridiculous car crashes. Our ancestors truly are just like us.

Today, I've found some of the finest examples of automotive (crash) photography from the days of yore and put it all in this post for you. Like the header photo to this post. The gentleman behind the wheel crashed his car trying to go up a mountain. When that didn't work, he settled for the next best thing: Gathering up his buddies and snapping a photo. And there are plenty more where that came from.

Image descriptions for older photos are pretty vague, and in this case, the good folks at Getty have included little information other than "road accident in Normandy." Did this goggled gentleman actually careen into the gal in the wheelbarrow? Was this staged? Who knows — but it's certainly worth a good chuckle.

This image's description is, "pretense of a car crash (France)." It's not a real accident, but I do love the idea that dudes got their hands on one of the first motor cars and decided to stage a photoshoot that hinges on them running each other over.

It took humans quite a while to get the hang of this whole "driving" thing. Honestly, I'd even go so far as to argue that we still have no idea what we're doing, collectively. Neither did the driver who managed to get his car wedged between a street light and a tram.

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Good to know that no one has ever been able to drive in damp conditions.

This is a car that crashed into a sewer. Whoops!

You can definitely tell the protective barrier on that bridge was designed for things that were not as fast or heavy as a motor vehicle.

This crash was so good that photographer A. Hampton grabbed shots from two different angles!

. A. Hampton/Topical Press Agency/Getty Images

If you no longer go for a gap...

But it's also one of the funniest things I've ever seen. Ol' Françoise Sagan crashed her car, and the cops tried to put together a recreation of it — and then, for some reason, she went ahead and posed by the wreckage. The cigarette in her hand makes it all the better.

The intoxicated driver of this car decided he'd just go ahead and park it in the pool. He wasn't injured — just stupid.

When your Uber driver insists on dropping you off at your door, but you live in the basement.

Here, we see the very scientific testing of some new crash barriers at Brands Hatch.

Ah, he almost had it!

I pulled this slide caption right from the title of the image because it made me hoot.

Remember when suspension was made out of three twigs and some chewing gum?

When a car crashes in town, it only makes sense to gather up your buddies and pose for a photo.

The original Kool-Aid Man entrance.