historic black and white photos

The Titanic's propellers in Harland and Wolff's Belfast shipyard shortly before the ship's launch, May 1911.

Construction of the Eiffel tower in July, 1888.

Douglas MacArthur signing the official Japanese surrender instrument aboard the USS Missouri, 1945.

Co Rentmeester Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 1972 | A masked Palestinian terrorist looks out from a balcony of the athletes' housing complex during the Munich Summer Olympics. On September 5, eight Palestinian guerrillas took 11 Israeli athletes and coaches hostage, and subsequently murdered all of them, in what came to be known as the "Munich Massacre" the most infamous and violent outrage in Olympic history.

Hulton-Deutsch Collection/CORBIS News of the Titanic disaster spreads in London on the day the ship went down, April 15, 1912.

Carl Mydans Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 1963 | New York Commuters read of John F. Kennedy's assassination, November 1963. This Carl Mydans photo did not appear in LIFE when the magazine published as a weekly, but has been printed in later books.

Vought F4U Corsair crashes on the deck of a carrier when the arresting gear failed

Unfinished German Type XXI U-Boats at the AG Weser shipyard in Bremen, Germany, 1945.

Small with a big Parisian baguette, 1952. (Photo by Willy Ronis / Agence Rapho)

 Children watch the play "St. George and the Dragon" in the puppet theater in Paris in 1963. (Photo by Alfred Eisenstaedt / Time & Life Pictures)

USA, New York, 1988. (Photo by Elliott Erwitt / Magnum Photos)

Paris, 1989. (Photo by Elliott Erwitt / Magnum Photos)

Club "Allegro Fortissimo", Paris, 1990. (Photo by William Klein / 'William Klein ABC' / Abrams)

Pont Alexander III, Paris, 1960. (Photo by William Klein / 'William Klein ABC' / Abrams)

 Dance School in New York, 1977. (Photo by Elliott Erwitt)

London, 1939

John Dominis Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 1967 | A leopard, seconds away from killing a terrified baboon, in a hair-raising picture that was, photographer John Dominis admits, entirely staged.

"Pistol 1", New York,1955.(Photo by William Klein / 'William Klein ABC' / Abrams)

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and John, Jr., Central Park, September 24, 1969.

"I am the champion!" - Cassius Clay yells after defeating Sonny Liston in the fight for the title in the heavyweight division, February 25, 1964, Miami Beach, Florida, USA. (Photo by Bettmann / Corbis)

Manfred von Richthofen, aka “The Red Baron”, petting his dog on an airfield.

Lisa Larsen Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images Smiling in a brisk March wind and surrounded by photographers and fans, Grace Kelly poses just off of Fifth Avenue in New York, 1956.

Lisa LarsenTime & Life Pictures/Getty Images. Kelly inside a New York jewelry store, where she perused possible gifts for her groom.

John F. Kennedy having a tea party with his daughter, Caroline.

Margaret Bourke-White Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. 1937 Astronomer Edwin Hubble peers though the eyepiece of the 100-inch Hooker telescope at California's Mt. Wilson Observatory. Originally published in the November 8, 1937, issue of LIFE.

William Vandivert Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images- 1940 | A heavily bandaged British infant, Margaret Curtis, badly injured in a German blitzkrieg attack on London during the Battle of Britain. Originally published in the September 9, 1940, issue of LIFE.

David Duncan Douglas 1950 | Early in the Korean War, American Marines march through bitter cold down a canyon road they dubbed "Nightmare Alley" during a grim retreat from the Chosin Reservoir.

Lisa Larsen Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 1953 | Senator John Kennedy and his bride, Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy, smile during their wedding reception, September 12, 1953, in Newport, Rhode Island.

Dennis Stock Magnum 1955 | Hunkering against the cold and rain, a haunted-looking James Dean strolls through Times Square, mere blocks from the famous Actors Studio where he and other legends-to-be studied "the Method."

Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 1961 | Freedom Riders Julia Aaron and David Dennis sit aboard an interstate bus as they and 25 other civil rights activists are escorted by Mississippi National Guardsmen on a violence-marred trip between Montgomery, Alabama, and Jackson, Mississippi.

Hank Walker Time & Life Pictures/Getty images 1960 | In a Los Angeles hotel suite, John F. Kennedy confers with his brother and campaign manager Bobby during the Democratic National Convention, at which JFK was picked as the 1960 party nominee.

Mona Lisa being returned to its home at the Louvre in Paris, France after WW2. 1945.

Larry BurrowsTime & Life Pictures/Getty Images 1966 | Wounded Marine Gunnery Sgt. Jeremiah Purdie (center) moves to try and comfort a stricken comrade after a fierce firefight during the Vietnam War.

Bill Eppridge Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 1968 | Senator Robert Kennedy lies in a pool of his own blood on the floor of the kitchen at Los Angeles' Ambassador Hotel, June 5, 1968, after being shot by Jordanian-born assassin Sirhan Sirhan. A dazed, frightened hotel busboy, Juan Romero, tries to comfort the mortally wounded presidential candidate, who died hours later. Robert Kennedy was 42 years old.

John Dominis Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. 1969 | Concert-goers huddle under a sheet of cardboard in the rain at the three-day, era-defining Woodstock Music and Art Fair in Bethel, New York.

Robert Capa Magnum 1944 | In the face of devastating German fire, American troops land at Omaha Beach on D-Day, June 6, 1944.

Davison & Associates Ltd/Fr.fm Browne SJ Collection. Aboard the Titanic, six-year-old Robert Douglas Spedden, plays with a spinning top while his father, Frederic, looks on.

Winston Churchill in a swimsuit, 1922

Charles Godefroy taking his Nieuport 11 “Bébé” through the Arc de Triomphe in Paris on August 7th, 1919.

A British soldier hiding from the rain under an overturned Tiger tank. Italy, 1944.

An American M4A2 carrying a Japanese Type 94 light-tank on its back, Namur, 1944.

RMS Titanic ready for launch, 1911. The ship was constructed on Queen's Island, now known as the Titanic Quarter, in Belfast Harbour where was part of the Harland and Wolff shipyard.

German prisoners of war marching east under the supervision of Soviet soldiers, 1944.

F1 pilot ejects at extremely low altitude. The pilot survived with multiple fractures. 1962.

German engineers testing the Messerschmitt BF109 E3.

Golden Gate Bridge construction. 1937.

Jimi Hendrix driving a dune buggy with an unidentified woman. October 6, 1968.

Rotterdam after a bombing, 1940. Photo taken after debris clean up.

Folsom Street in San Francisco, USA after the great earthquake of 1906.

Soviet sniper, Lyudmila Pavlichenko. By the end of World War 2, she had 309 confirmed kills - thus making her the most successful female sniper in history.

US Customs agent pointing a gun at a car that is suspected of transporting marijuana across the US-Mexico border. 1969.

Construction of the Manhattan Bridge. 1908

Adolf Hitler's pants after the assassination attempt at the Wolf's Lair. Rastenburg, East Prussia, 1944.

Ferdinand Porsche showcasing the Volkswagen Beetle to Adolf Hitler. 1935.

Queen Elizabeth II firing a British L85 battle rifle. Surrey, England,1993.

Luftwaffe pilots playing cards during the African campaign, 1942. The plane in the background is a Me-109.

Elisabeth "Lilo" Gloeden stands before judges, on trial for being involved in the attempt on Adolf Hitler's life, 1944.

Horten H. VII (Ho 254) flying over Göttingen, Germany. It was one of the first flying wing experiments. 1945.

Star Wars set at lunchtime.

The Kiss of Life.Taken in 1967 by Rocco Morabito, this is one of the most powerful photographs we’ve seen. Called the Kiss of Life photo, it shows a utility worker named J.D. Thompson giving mouth-to-mouth to co-worker Randall G. Champion after he went unconscious following contact with a high voltage line.

William Vandivert Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. Oberwallstrasse, in central Berlin, saw some of the most vicious fighting between German and Soviet troops in the spring of 1945

William Vandivert Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. Russian soldiers and a civilian struggle to move a large bronze Nazi Party eagle that once loomed over a doorway of the Reich Chancellery, Berlin, 1945.

Bill Ray. John F. Kennedy arrives in a limo at Madison Square Garden for a "Birthday Salute" in his honor, New York, May 19, 1962.

David Douglas Duncan Life Magazine. Marine Capt. Francis "Ike" Fenton ponders his fate and the fate of his men after being told that his company is nearly out of ammunition, Korea, 1950.

David Douglas Duncan Life Magazine. "This," Duncan told LIFE.com of a picture made during the fight for Seoul, "is the best picture I made in Korea of civilians — a family running down stairs, a father holding a baby, tanks firing away. Those tanks are taking fire from North Koreans right down the street!"

David E. Scherman Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. Princess Margaret (left), the future Queen Elizabeth II (third from left) and the Queen Mother (third from right) with the Grenadier guards on the occasion of Princess Elizabeth's birthday, 1942.

Loomis Dean Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. Queen Elizabeth with Prince Charles and Elizabeth II at Princess Margaret's wedding, 1960.

Alfred Eisenstaedt TIme & Life Pictures/Getty Images. Parisians at a sidewalk cafe, 1963

Alfred Eisenstaedt TIme & Life Pictures/Getty Images. Woman sitting with her pet cheetah having tea at a Bois de Boulogne cafe, Paris, 1963

Alfred Eisenstaedt TIme & Life Pictures/Getty Images. People enjoying an afternoon on the banks of the Seine River, 1963

George Rodger Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. Troops watch the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius, Italy, 1944

Alfred Eisenstaedt Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. Japan's Emperor Hirohito in Yokohama during his first visit to see living conditions in the country since the end of the war, February 1946.

Fritz Goro Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. American sailors shield their eyes during a nuclear test at Bikini Atoll, July 1946.

Paul Schutzer Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. American forces, in foreground, face East German forces across the newly built Berlin Wall in 1961.

Vernon Merritt III Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images Charles Manson in custody, 1969.

Bernard Hoffman Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. Hiroshima, 1945.

Gjon Mili Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. Nazi War Criminal Adolf Eichmann awaits trial in Israel, 1961.

Lady Diana Spencer wears her wedding dress on the steps of St. Paulís Cathedral in London on July 29, 1981 on her way to the wedding ceremony. (AP Photo/Michel Lipchitz)

The Princess of Wales waves to onlookers while boarding the train at Waterloo Station on July 29, 1981, as she and Prince Charles set off on their honeymoon. (AP Photo)

Drivers from the French ambulance corps near the front, waiting to be called Italy, 1944. Robert Capa.

Soldiers trying out their gas masks in every possible way. Putting the respirator to good use while peeling onions. 40th Division, Camp Kearny, San Diego, California 1918. Anon.

A Royal Navy sailor on board HMS Alcantara uses a portable sewing machine to repair a signal flag during a voyage to Sierra Leone, March 1942.Cecil Beaton.

Warrant Photographer Jess W. January USCGR, American USCG Cutter Spencer destroys Nazi sub April 17, 1943

The body of an American paratrooper killed in action in the jungle near the Cambodian border is raised up to an evacuation helicopter, Vietnam 1966. Henri Huet.

Jackie Kennedy, Arlington, Virginia, 1963. Elliott Erwitt , Magnum Photos

Nikita Khrushchev and Richard Nixon, Moscow, USSR, 1959. Elliott Erwitt / Magnum Photos

Nicholas II, Tsar of Russia with the Tsaritsa pictured as they leave church, circa 1900

The assassination of King Alexander. This dramatic news photograph was taken just moments after the Bulgarian gunman, Vlado Chernozemski, shot the king of Yugoslavia on 9 October 1934

Colonial troops in London.Members of the British empire's armed forces gather for a group portrait on a wet London street. Tens of thousands of soldiers from all parts of the empire took part in a procession to mark Queen Victoria's diamond jubilee on 22 June 1897. Photograph: London Stereoscopic and Photographic Company/ Hulton/ Getty Images

Haile Selassie, the Emperor of Ethiopia, in a railway station in Geneva, Switzerland, 1935 Lucien igner/Corbis

Chilean coup, 1973. One of the last known images of the socialist president of Chile, Salvador Allende, which was taken during the army's assault on the presidential palace during the coup d'etat which toppled his government.Photograph: Keystone/ Getty

The first tank is produced. On 6 September 1915, Britain produced the first completed prototype tank in history. It was known as Little Willie, weighed 14 tons and crawled at only two miles per hour. It was developed to break the stalemate of trench warfare during the First World War. By 1916, a second prototype had been produced and this was deemed ready for battle. The Mark I made its debut at the Battle of Flers–Courcelette during the Somme Offensive of 1916.IWM/Getty

Liberation of Paris, 1944. French civilians line the streets to welcome General Charles De Gaulle to liberated Paris. Photograph: CNP/Corbis

Funeral of Rudolph Valentino, 1926.The body of the 31-year-old screen idol rests at Campbell's Funeral Parlour in New York. Outside, fans smashed windows as they tried to storm the building. Inside, actors posing as Mussolini's blackshirts gave the fascist salute over the body – which was alleged to be a wax dummy to save it from 'wear and tear'. At his funeral, 100,000 lined the streets. Admirer, Miss Eva Miller, prays by the body of screen Idol, Rudolph Valentino the day after his death in New York. Corbis

Leon Trotsky assassination scene, 1940. Leon Trotsky, the exiled Russian revolutionary, was assassinated on this day in 1940. He was sitting at his desk in this studio in Coyoacan, Mexico, when Ramon Mercader – a Spanish-born Soviet agent, posing as Trotsky's friend but really under Stalin's orders – attacked him in the back of the head with a mountaineering ice pick. Trotsky died of his injuries a day later, aged 60. Mercader was found guilty of murder and sentenced to 20 years in prison; he was released in 1960. Murder scene where Spanish communist Ramon Mercader assassinated Leon Trotsky on 20 August 1940, in Coyoacan, Mexico. Photograph: Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis

Berlin, Germany, August 1961: An elderly woman tries to escape through her window to reach the street underneath, which is part of West Berlin. Some men try to pull her back into the house. The house was located right at the sector border in the eastern part of Berlin. Photographer: DPA/Corbis

The B-29 Superfortress, 'Enola Gay,' returns from the bombing mission over Hiroshima to the North Field of Tinian airbase, North Marianas Islands. Photoquest/Getty

Mick Jagger sentenced to three months in prison. On 29 June 1967,lead singer for the Rolling Stones band Mick Jagger is found guilty of possession of illegal amphetamine pills and is sentenced to 3 months in prison. Stanley Sherman/Getty

Gavrilo Princip, the assassin who killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand, is taken into custody by the local police in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914. Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie were assassinated in Sarajevo by a Yugoslav nationalist, Gavrilo Princip. Bosnia and Herzegovina had been annexed by Austria-Hungary in 1908 and the archduke was there in his role as Inspector General of the Armed Forces of Austria-Hungary. The Serbian government were blamed for the assassination and, on 28 July 1914, war was declared on Serbia by Austria-Hungary, who had the support of Germany. Russia backed Serbia and the peace between Europe's great powers had begun to disintegrate.Topical Press Agency/Getty

Gandhi in his garden. American photojournalist Margaret Bourke-White's photograph of the Indian independence leader Mohandas K. Gandhi. The Mahatma was assassinated in the garden of his compound on this day in 1948. He was shot at point-blank range by Nathuram Godse, a Hindu nationalist, only five months after India gained independence from Britain. Photograph: Margaret Bourke-White/ Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

Robert Doisneau. San Marco Square, Venice

Robert Doisneau. Cafe Black and White

Robert Doisneau. Kiss by the Hotel de Ville

Robert Doisneau. By the railings around the Luxembourg Gardens

A gang of skinny dippers is chased down the street at Hyde Park by a police woman. 1926

Eve Arnold. Anthony Quinn and Anna Karina on the set of Guy Green’s “The Magus,” in Mallorca, Spain. 1976

Eve Arnold, G.B. England. Nottinghamshire. Kelham. Father Gregory Wilkins, Director of the society of the sacred mission at Kelham. 1963.

A lone anti-war protester confronts police in Whitehall during the Cuban Missile Crisis, London, 1962 Photograph: Don McCullin

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Snowy the Mouse Man, Cambridge, UK 1973 by Don McCullin’s photography.