The past is never dead. It’s not even past, went the quote from William Faulkner and for an elite group, that idea takes a very real turn. Retro photos down the years have made waves of net-based speculation, with eagle-eyed fans absolutely sure they’ve spotted people or objects that simply don’t belong. From “smartphones” in the 1920s to creepy celebrity lookalikes in ancient photographs, these images hover uneasily between coincidence, misperception, and something a lot stranger.
While skeptics cite optical illusions, period-correct but strange attire, or outright deception, the interest persists. After all, there’s something too good to resist about the notion that someone could have fallen through the holes of history and found themselves somewhere they didn’t belong. Here are nine of the most interesting and fiercely argued cases that set the internet abuzz.
1. The 1995 Mike Tyson Fight ‘Smartphone’
At Mike Tyson’s comeback fight against Peter McNeeley in Las Vegas, a fan in the stands appeared to be holding a slim, rectangular device full of what looked like camera lenses aimed at the ring. Since smartphones did not exist in 1995, the video quickly created a ‘time traveler’ conspiracy theory on the internet.
But Inside Edition’s Les Trent later identified the object as an early Dycam Logitech camcorder, not a telephone. Yet, many viewers were still skeptical, claiming the shape and texture didn’t resemble the camcorder. Whether it was a misidentified gadget or something otherworldly, the shot is still one of the most frequently played “evidence” clips in time travel history.
2. Greta Thunberg in 1898
A photo of three kids gold panning in the Yukon in the Klondike Gold Rush contains one who resembles global climate change activist Greta Thunberg. The braids, piercing gaze, and facial features are all so similar that writer Jack Strange jokingly said she “tried to turn back 120 years, didn’t work, and now she’s here.”
University of Washington archivists confirmed that the picture is real and not distorted, but eliminated the time travel hypothesis. The child’s identity remains unknown, and the resemblance is likely to be a coincidence. However, the speed with which the photo has spread shows how quickly an unusual comment will ignite global speculation.
3. The 1941 ‘Time Traveling Hipster’
When the British Columbia South Fork Bridge reopened, a crowd of hat-wearing locals gathered together to take a group picture. Standing among them was a man with what seemed to be a modern graphic T-shirt, casual sweater, and sunglasses, a handheld camera in his hand. The photo, which is now known as the ‘time traveling hipster,’ became an internet sensation.
Experts since then have said that the camera and the clothing were both present in the 1940s, yet far from mainstream. Whether he was just a man who was ahead of his time for fashion or something else entirely, his casual look is firmly in contrast with the formal fashion of the time.
4. The Charlie Chaplin ‘Cell Phone’ of 1928
In bonus material on a DVD of Chaplin’s The Circus, a woman wearing a hat and black coat strides across the screen, holding an object to her ear and speaking into it. The year? 1928 years earlier than there were cell towers or satellites.
Most of the researchers believe that she was using an early portable hearing aid, but the weirdness of the clip has sustained it in internet culture. The fact that she is sitting like that, the position of her hand, and the shape of the object all contribute to making it an easy thing to glance at and say, “phone.”
5. Vladimir Putin Through The Ages
Two war photos, taken in 1920 and 1941, show Russian soldiers who closely resemble Vladimir Putin. The face, expression, and even posture seem almost identical to the present-day leader.
While it’s probably a doppelgängers situation, the idea of a politician jumping through time without anyone paying attention has been too tempting for conspiracy theorists. The photos continue to circulate in memes and speculaweb forums with tongue-in-cheek remarks about immortality.
6. The 1905 Mohawk Mystery
There is a 1905 shipyard photograph of workers unloading a banana boat with one figure standing at the sidelines, wearing a classic, pointed, angular, modern-style mohawk haircut decades, even centuries, prior to the haircut becoming synonymous with punk culture.
Historians note that forms of the mohawk have existed for centuries in other cultures, but in the history of early 20th-century Western fashion, it’s certainly out of place. For many online sleuths, it’s precisely the kind of unique detail to stoke “time traveler” rumors.
7. The 1943 British Beach Break
A wartime photo of factory workers on a seaside vacation captures a man wearing a brown suit bending down to peer at what is in his hand. To us today, it seems suspiciously like a smartphone.
Scoffs that it could be a pocket watch or a cigarette case, but his slouched position and the angle make it easy to assume 21st-century behavior in the photograph. It is a reminder of how much our interpretation of historic photographs is the result of the technology we are used to.
8. The Rudolph Fenz Legend
Rudolph Fenz’s story is one of a man dressed in 19th-century clothes appearing in 1950s New York, being hit by an automobile, and discovered with 1800s belongings, including a letter dated after 1876. Accounts allegedly reported that a man by the same name went missing in that year.
And holding on to it, the tale continued to be traced back to a short story by Jack Finney, a work of fiction, not an actual event. Still, it’s been repeated so often that the majority of people still believe it to be an honest-to-goodness example of accidental time travel.
9. The Salamanca Cathedral Astronaut
On the facade of Salamanca Cathedral in Spain, a small astronaut statue looks out from centuries of stone. Since the construction of the cathedral began in 1513, some saw it as proof of the arrival of a time traveler.
Actually, the astronaut was added in 1992 restorations by stoneworker Jerónimo García de Quiñones as a humorous nod to modern times. The addition is now a popular tourist attraction, demonstrating how even deliberate anachronisms have a tendency to provoke fanciful speculation.
Whether they’re witty jokes, historical misreadings, or just creepy coincidences, they appeal to a shared fascination the possibility that time is more malleable than we think. And while science does not condone the idea of carefree time-traveling, the enduring popularity of these images proves that a tremendous mystery especially one with an added dash of the impossible is never out of style.
