Page 17 – LIFE

Superman: The First and Foremost Superhero

July 25, 2023July 25, 2023 by Bill Syken

The following is from the introduction to LIFE’s new special issue on Superman, available at newsstands and online:

Who knew, back in 1938? That was the year two young men from Cleveland, writer Jerry Siegel and illustrator Joe Shuster—the socially awkward sons of Eastern European Jews—sold the first Superman strip to a precursor of DC Comics. In the 85 years since then, the world has known few constants—but their Man of Steel endures, first and foremost among fictional superheroes. The character has generated a vast pop culture industry—comic books, radio and television series, and of course numerous films, including the 1978 classic Superman: The Movie, starring the late Christopher Reeve, which marks its 45th anniversary in 2023. But Superman isn’t merely a commercial juggernaut—he is something more, a transcendent figure, representing human hopes, fantasies, and ideals.

“Superman took on a symbolic, emblematic life surprisingly early in his career—and to a degree that even his most successful superhero peers, such as Batman and Wonder Woman, have never matched,” says Ben Saunders, founder of the University of Oregon Program in Comics Studies and author of Do the Gods Wear Capes?: Spirituality, Fantasy, and Superheroes. Following Pearl Harbor, three years after Superman’s debut, the Man of Steel truly came into his own. “It was a rare period of national unity—when the abiding inequalities and hypocrisies of American life were overshadowed by the looming Nazi threat,” Saunders says. “Superman went from the latest kids’ craze to an emblem of America itself, representing the ideas of ‘truth, justice, and the American way.’ I think that heightened symbolic resonance—or the lingering reverberations of that resonance—have clung to the character ever since.”

Superman’s emblematic power has changed along with the country over the past eight decades. “The truth is that he has always evolved to reflect the zeitgeist and America’s idealized self-image of the time,” says Roy Schwartz, author of Is Superman Circumcised? The Complete Jewish History of the World’s Greatest Hero. “When he debuted in 1938, he was known as ‘Champion of the Oppressed,’ a firebrand New Dealer promoting immigration reform and racial equality. When America entered World War II, Superman changed from rabble-rouser to role model and became a national icon. In the 1950s, he became a patriarchal authority figure and a ‘Big Blue Boy Scout,’ which is the version people remember from The Adventures of Superman TV show starring George Reeves. Then in the 1980s, he became a Yuppie ‘Super Republican,’ embracing the Reagan Revolution and the era’s esthetic. But, for all the changes, he’s still the same guy Siegel and Shuster created. A hero who preaches tolerance for all but the intolerant, and who personifies the indomitable human spirit.”

Whatever Superman represents on a macro scale, he also connects to audiences on a more personal, intimate level. Many, if not most of us, feel from time to time that we’re getting kicked around or bullied by malevolent forces large and small. We see evil people doing terrible things to the innocent—an isolated robbery, rape, or murder; one of America’s daily mass shootings; a genocidal war—and we’re seemingly unable to do anything about it. That helplessness can bubble over into rage or spiral into despair. And so, the idea of an all-powerful, virtually indestructible champion of righteousness can be appealing. Perhaps it’s aspirational—we fantasize that, like Clark Kent, we might duck into a utility closet, change into something a little more superheroic, then fly off to vanquish this or that villain.

“Superman resonates, very instinctively and very universally,” says Schwartz. “He’s the ultimate human fantasy; that our weakness, insecurity and awkwardness are just a facade. That, hidden not too deep, there’s a secret Super-me that’s invulnerable, omnipotent, and confident.”

Jerry Siegel sounded that note when he discussed the character’s genesis in a 1983 interview in the magazine Nemo: The Classic Comics Library. “Joe [Shuster] and I had certain inhibitions . . . which led to wish-fulfillment which we expressed through our interest in science fiction and our comic strip,” he said. “That’s where the dual-identity concept came from, and Clark Kent’s problems with Lois. I imagine there are a lot of people in this world who are similarly frustrated. Joe and I both felt that way in high school, and he was able to put the feeling into sketches.”

Siegel and Shuster both acknowledged that their youthful yearning for unattainable women played into the creation of this square-jawed hunk. As Saunders points out, there is certainly an undeniably erotic component to Superman’s lasting appeal. “One thing I think doesn’t get talked about enough is the sexual nature of the superhero fantasy,” he says. “Superman and other superheroes aren’t just powerful. They are gorgeous and glamorous, and they wear costumes that might as well be painted on. These fantasy figures of glamour and power are then spliced into stories that emphasize ethics, morality, decency, sacrifice. It’s a heady brew.”

An argument can be made—and has been made—that the Man of Steel is a bit bland in comparison with other more flawed and complicated superheroes. Yet Superman’s reign over his fantastic universe remains unchallenged. “In a genre teeming with heroes who are faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, and able to leap tall buildings in a single bound,” says Schwartz, “the one thing Superman still does better than anyone else is inspire hope. That we can live up to our own potential, that we can make tomorrow better than today, that we’re innately good. He makes us look up in the sky and see ourselves.

“Plus, he looks really cool when he flies.”

Here is a selection of photos from LIFE’s new special issue to Superman.

(Reeve) Photo 12/Alamy (sky) Aaron Foster/The Image Bank/Getty Images

In 1948 Kirk Alyn became the first actor to play Superman, appearing in a 15-part movie serial that year and another in 1950; he is shown here in Clark Kent mode with actress Noel Neill, who played Lois Lane..

Photo by Donaldson Collection/Getty Images

George Reeves starred as Superman and Jack Larson as Jimmy Olsen in the “Adventures of Superman” television series that ran from 1952 to ’58.

Photo by ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images)

George Reeves with a cameraman on the set of “Adventures of Superman,” the television series that ran from 1952 to ’58.

Photo by ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images

On the set of the Superman: The Movie, from left to right: Director Richard Donner and actors Marc McClure (playing Jimmy Olsen), Jackie Cooper (Daily Planet editor Perry White), Margot Kidder (Lois Lane) and Christopher Reeve (Clark Kent/Superman).

(Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)

Margot Kidder and Christopher Reeve during the filming of the 1978’s Superman: The Movie.

Photo by Harry Hamburg/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images

Superman creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster.

Photo by Steve Schapiro/Corbis via Getty Images

Christopher Reeve in the 1978 movie Superman; its $55 million budget made it the most expensive movie ever at the time of its release.

Photo by Warner Bros/Dc Comics/Kobal/Shutterstock

Christopher Reeve soared above Metropolis in the first of four movies in which he would don the red cape.

Photo by Warner Bros/Dc Comics/Kobal/Shutterstock

AC/DC: 50 Years of Massive Rock ‘n’ Roll

July 25, 2023July 25, 2023 by Bill Syken

The following is from LIFE’s new special issue to AC/DC, available at newsstands and online:

An imp in a bloodred crushed-velvet schoolboy outfit held 50,000 rock and roll fanatics in the palm of his hand. Not literally, as he had his hands around a classic Gibson SG guitar. But he had the audience rapt. Diminutive and drool-flecked, Angus Young, then 60 years old, tore into a 12-minute guitar solo. Throughout the wailing, Young duckwalked across the mammoth stage at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts. He jammed away while standing on a hydraulic lift that rose three stories above the thunderstruck crowd. He crashed to the ground and kicked like a toddler having an epic temper tantrum—and he never missed a note.

The year was 2015, during AC/DC’s last world tour. But if you had closed your eyes, it could have been 2002, or 1982, or 1975. Over 50 years, 18 albums, and a few thousand gigs, AC/DC with Young, all five-foot-two of him, has delivered the same high-voltage energy, thrilling multiple generations of fans.

It’s tempting to award Angus the lion’s share of the credit for the band’s electricity and endurance. Certainly his Energizer-bunny-with-devil-horns act makes him equal parts lead guitarist, front man, focal point, and band mascot. But AC/DC’s success derives more from its ethos than anything else. And Malcolm Young, Angus’s older brother, defined AC/DC’s ethos right from the start.

“I’ve never felt like a pop star; this is a nine-to-five sort of gig,” Malcolm told Rolling Stone in 2008. “It comes from working in the factories, that world. You don’t forget it.”

Malcolm, who died in 2017, ran the band like a factory foreman. Writing together, Malcolm and Angus stamped out impeccable riff after impeccable riff. They recruited a series of rhythm sections—bassist Cliff Williams and drummer Phil Rudd are the definitive pair—that served to reinforce the blue-collar churn that underpins the band’s catalog. The Young brothers also brought in two singers—first Bon Scott, then Brian Johnson—who echoed AC/DC’s keep-it-simple-stupid approach.

Scott gave the band its nasty, naughty, bawdy color. He also spent his days careening 100 miles per hour until his rock-or-bust lifestyle killed him. Amazingly, the Youngs found a fitting replacement in Johnson and then graduated from underground legends to mainstream rock gods with Back in Black.

Across its long and extraordinary career, AC/DC has proved it has nine lives, abusing every one of them and running wild, yet continuing to outlive new trends. Doing the same old thing, AC/DC thrived (often) and survived (at the very least) through the peaks and valleys of disco, synthesizers, rock operas, hair spray, glam metal, pop metal, thrash metal, grunge, unplugged sessions, and power ballads. “It was Malcolm who had the vision of what the band should be,” Angus told the Chicago Tribune in 2003. “He said, ‘We’re going to play the only music worth playing: rock and roll. And we’re going to play it hard.’ ”

That unwavering value system led AC/DC to sell more than 200 million albums. It put the band on tours that packed American football stadiums, British soccer stadiums, and festival grounds in Moscow. In short, it lifted the band to extraordinary heights.

The journey to get there, not surprisingly, is testament to AC/DC’s own adage: It’s a long way to the top if you want to rock and roll.

Here are a selection of images from LIFE’s new special issue on AC/DC.

Steve Rapport/Hulton/Getty

AC/DC members (left to right) Malcolm Young, Bon Scott, Angus Young, Cliff Williams and Phil Rudd posed in London, 1979.

Fin Costello/Redferns/Getty

Bon Scott, lead singer of AC/DC from 1974 until his death in 1980, performed at the Hordern Pavilion in Moore Park, Australia on Dec. 12, 1976.

The Sydney Morning Herald/Fairfax Media/Getty

AC/DC’s Angus Young and Bon Scott during a concert in New York, 1979.

Michael Putland/Hulton/Getty

Angus Young led the AC/DC performance in London, 1980.

Michael Putland/Hulton/Getty

Brian Johnson, who joined AC/DC in 1980 as their lead singer following the death of Bon Scott, brought his own special energy to the role.

Kevin Mazur/Wireimage/Getty

In 1988 AC/DC added to its vast collection of gold records.

Bob King/Redferns/Getty

Angus Young shredded during an AC/DC performance at Hampden Park National Stadium in Glasgow on June 28, 2015.

Ross Gilmore/Redferns/Getty

AC/DC was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2003.

Kevin Kane/WireImage/Getty

Willie Mays: Remembering the Legend’s Return to the Polo Grounds

June 19, 2024July 25, 2023 by Bill Syken

Sandy Koufax once said of Willie Mays, who died on June 18, 2024 at the age of 93, “He was probably the best all-around ballplayer when you take everything into consideration. It seemed like that Willie never made a mistake.”

That glowing assessment from the legendary Dodgers pitcher gives you a sense of what fans of the New York Giants lost when the team moved to San Francisco in 1958, taking their 27-year-old star with them. It also tells you why it might have been a big deal when, five seasons later, the Say Hey Kid returned to play in New York for the first time. And not only was he back in the city, but he would once again be patrolling centerfield in the Polo Grounds, which was the former home of the Giants. The Polo Grounds was being used by New York’s new team, the Mets, for two seasons while they waited for their own stadium to be built.

Mays had burnished his legend at the Polo Grounds, winning baseball’s MVP award in 1954 and making perhaps the most famous defensive play in baseball history there, with his seemingly no-look, over-the-shoulder catch in the 1954 World Series on a ball hit by Vic Wertz into the stadium’s unusually deep centerfield.

Here’s how LIFE reported on Mays’ return in its June 15, 1962 issue:

“It’s a good feeling,” said Willie Mays, the great centerfielder, coming back to play again in the Polo Grounds. He had been an institution there before the Giants moved from New York to San Francisco almost five years ago. Now the fans came out to cheer both for him and their new home team, the Mets. Doffing his cap, Willie went to work; 3 homers, 6 hits, 6 RBIs in four games, all won by the Giants.

That paragraph, and one photo of Mays acknowledging the fans, was the extent of LIFE’s coverage in the magazine. But the full set of images by Arthur Rickerby is a treasure trove, capturing the spirit of Mays’ return, and occasionally using panoramic photography to do so. This was a moment of appreciation for a beloved figure who was not just one of the game’s all-time greats but who would famously played stickball with the local kids in the streets of Harlem. And Mays was no oldies’ act in 1962. He was still in his prime—three years later, in 1965, he would win his second MVP award.

And while today the returns of sports stars to play their old arenas and stadiums can stir up mixed feelings—in this era of free agency and trade demands, the top players usually leave because they want to—there was none of that here. Willie Mays didn’t leave so much as he was carried away. Thus could fans come to the park with signs that read “Bring Willie Back” and “Mays for Governor” and show nothing but unabashed affection for a returning hero.

Click here for more photos of Willie Mays from the LIFE archives.

Willie Mays left the visitor’s clubhouse to take the field at the Polo Grounds as he returned to his former home stadium to take on the New York Mets, 1962.

Arthur Rickerby/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Fans welcomed Willie Mays in his return to the Polo Grounds for the first time as the San Francisco Giants took on the New York Mets, 1962.

Arthur Rickerby/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Willie Mays of the San Francisco Giants returned to the Polo Grounds, his former home field, to face the Mets in 1962.

Arthur Rickerby/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

GIANTS RETURN TO POLO GROUNDS

Arthur Rickerby/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Willie Mays of the San Francisco Giants returned to the Polo Grounds, his former home field, to face the Mets in 1962.

Arthur Rickerby/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Willie Mays spoke with a New York Mets player during Mays’ return to the Polo Grounds as a member of the San Francisco Giants, 1962.

Arthur Rickerby/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Mets manager Casey Stengel during the Giants-Mets series that brought Willie Mays back to the Polo Grounds for the first time, 1962.

Arthur Rickerby/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Willie Mays returned to the Polo Grounds for the first time as the San Francisco Giants took on the New York Mets, 1962.

Arthur Rickerby/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Fans welcomed Willie Mays in his return to the Polo Grounds for the first time as the San Francisco Giants took on the New York Mets, 1962.

Arthur Rickerby/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Willie Mays returned to the Polo Grounds for the first time as the San Francisco Giants took on the New York Mets, 1962.

Arthur Rickerby/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Scenes From the 1960 Actor’s Strike That Was Led by Ronald Reagan

July 18, 2023July 18, 2023 by Bill Syken

In the summer of 2023 Hollywood’s actors and writers are both on strike—the first time that has happened since 1960. The modern strike is all about the changes to the entertainment business being wrought by streaming services and artificial intelligence, and the 1960 strike was also inspired by new technology—specifically, television. Movies that had originally shown only in theaters were now having their television rights sold, and actors and writers wanted in on the action. The writers struck first, with the actor’s joining later, just like in 2023.

LIFE’s coverage of the 1960 strike discussed the issues at hand but was chiefly taken by the spectacle of Hollywood coming to a halt. Here’s how LIFE opened it’s coverage in its issue of March 21, 1960:

Nightmares filled the nation’s dream factories. In movie studios everywhere there was a frenzied scurrying to finish films before the big actor’s strike began. Casts worked almost around the clock on seven-day weeks, catching naps in dressing rooms and on sets. Directors had two scenes shot at once to speed things up. … Then the strike that no one believed would really happen—movies after all are devoted to happy endings—did happen. The cameras stopped. And a kind of panic seized Hollywood.

The photos, mostly by Ralph Crane, depict the drama both in negotiations and on the set, chronicling movies in their last moments of production. A few capture the poetry of Hollywood gone quiet, including a desolate but beautiful photo of a worker watering a patch of indoor lawn on an otherwise empty Paramount Studios set, tending the plot while waiting for the stars to return.

Viewed all these years later, perhaps the most remarkable aspect of the strike is that it was led by Ronald Reagan. He was president of the Screen Actor’s Guild back then, and he would of course go on to serve as President of the United States. While in the Oval Office this former strike leader was no friend to labor. In 1981, his first year as president, the nation’s air traffic controllers went on strike, and he responded by having the 11,000 striking workers fired in what is seen as a pivotal moment in the decline of unions.

In 1960 the actor’s portion of the strike lasted about a month before all sides made a deal was made and everyone was back to making movies.

Screen Actors Guild president Ronald Reagan answered questions about the progress of strike negotiations, 1960.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Ronald Reagan, to the left in a bowtie, leads a meeting of the Screen Actor’s Guild, 1960. James Garner is the third to Reagan’s left, and Dana Andrews also sits nearby.

J.R. Eyerman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Ronald Reagan, president of the Screen Actors Guild, answered questions during their strike, 1960.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Ronald Reagan, president of the Screen Actor’s Guild, during the union’s strike, 1960.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Actor James Cagney in midst of strike negotiations, 1960.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A scene from the Screen Actor’s Guild strike of 1960, Los Angeles.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A film crew frantically trying to finish its work on “The Dark at the Top of the Stairs” before the start of an actor’s strike, 1960.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A crew frantically trying to finish work on the film “The Dark at the Top of the Stairs” before the start of an actor’s strike, 1960.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Robert Preston and Dorothy McGuire in a scene from movie Dark at the Top of the Stairs, which rushed to finish production before the 1960 actor’s strike.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Fred Astaire kissing Lilli Palmer in a scene from the film The Pleasure of his Company, 1960; the movie was one of those whose filming was interrupted by the actor’s strike.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Charles Ruggles and Debbie Reynolds clowning on set after actor’s strike halted shooting of The ‘Pleasure of His Company, 1960.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Fred Astaire in his dressing room, talking to co-star Debbie Reynolds, after the studio where they were filming The Pleasure of His Company, was shut down by the strike called by the Screen Actors Guild in 1960. Astaire was against the strike, saying “It is violently wrong to interrupt production in the middle.”

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The clapboard was raised in front of actress Suzi Carnell during the shooting of Studs Lonigan in L.A.’s Griffith Park before the actor’s strike, 1960.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Slapstick comic and bit player Snub Pollard (foreground) took a lunch break during the filming of Studs Lonigan with the actor’s strike looming, 1960.

.Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Actors Dennis Morgan, Jimmy Brown and Jack Carson on a golf outing during the actor’s strike of 1960.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The deserted back lot at Fox studios during the actors’ strike, 1960.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dick Webb watered an indoor lawn on a set at Paramount Studios during shutdown caused by SAG strike, 1960.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The New Crew: Women Testing Weapons During World War II

July 14, 2023July 14, 2023 by Bill Syken

Maryland’s Aberdeen Proving Ground opened in 1917 and today is the military’s oldest weapons-testing facility in the United States. It’s a big operation. At its peak in World War II, Aberdeen had housing for more than 27,000, and today it still employs more then 12,000 people.

Through its first decades Aberdeen was a man’s world. But that changed during World War II. LIFE covered extensively the real-life Rosie the Riveters who moved into industrial jobs during that era, and the women who became weapons-testers for the first time in Aberdeen were part of that same phenomenon.

The story in LIFE’s Feb. 1, 1943 issue described how the soldiers who once worked the testing grounds but had been deployed overseas were at first replaced by male civilians. Then “as the draft hit hard, the civilians began to disappear and in their place came thousands of women.”

And who were these women?

The women come from everywhere. Many have husbands in the Army. Others have husbands who also work at Aberdeen. They wear bright-colored slacks, and their “firing fronts” are a rippling blend of pink. blue and orange, mixed with white and black powder from the guns. They serve on crews of all weapons up to the 90-mm A.A.’s. [anti-aircraft guns]. They handle highly technical instruments. They drive trucks, act as bicycle messengers, swab and clean vehicles. A few of them have even been tested as tank drivers, but that work, with its physical bruises, is still a little too tough for them.

The declaration of that last sentence reflected a time when women were making their first inroads to military service. In 1942 the WACs had just come into being (see LIFE’s coverage of the first WACs here) and the change in attitudes about what roles women could play was slow and incremental. It was not until 2015 that the Department of Defense opened all military occupations and positions to women.

The photographs by Myron Davis and Bernard Hoffman capture a world in transition. Some pictures indulge in the novelty of the moment—such as the photo of a woman who looks like a schoolmarm set up behind the sites of a machine gun with an ammunition belt being fed through it. But in other photos the women, such as Mrs. Ruby Barnett, a grandmother who had never fired a gun before coming to work at Aberdeen, look right at home in their new jobs. Those pictures seem to ask the question about the women taking on this new line of work: Well, why not?

A woman tested a 30 caliber machine gun at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, 1942.

Bernard Hoffman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Women loaded shells into an anti-aircraft gun at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, 1942.

Myron Davis/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A group of men and women tested a 90 mm anti-aircraft gun at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland, 1942.

Bernard Hoffman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Viola Testerman carried a 41-pound shell at the Aberdeen Proving Ground, 1942.

Bernard Hoffman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Betty Wainwright and Opal Burchette fed cartridges into magazines at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, 1942.

Bernard Hoffman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Nealie Bare at work at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, 1942. Here she hammered a plug into a test shell to keep the shell’s sand from running out.

Bernard Hoffman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Mrs. Ruby Barnett, a grandmother, had never fired a gun before coming to work at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland during World War II.

Bernard Hoffman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Mrs. Ruby Barnett at work at the Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland, 1942.

Myron Davis/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Mrs. Ruby Barnett was among the women who tested artillery at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, 1942.

Myron Davis/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Mrs. Ruby Barnett, a grandmother, tested a carbine at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, 1942.

Bernard Hoffman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Women fired machine guns at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, 1942.

Myron Davis/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Women tested machine guns at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, 1942.

Myron Davis/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A woman loaded a bullet aircraft cannon at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, 1942.

Myron Davis/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A women tested a 20 millimeter aircraft cannon at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, 1942.

Myron Davis/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Aerial view of testing range at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, 1942.

Bernard Hoffman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

That Time We Were Promised Jet Packs

July 7, 2023July 7, 2023 by Bill Syken

The idea that we would all be flying around with jet packs one day has enough cultural currency that a Scottish indie rock band could call itself We Were Promised Jet Packs with no further explanation needed. It’s a shorthand way of saying that the future we now inhabit isn’t what we once imagined it would be.

But was there ever actually a promise about jet packs in the first place?

The idea of a jet pack was first hatched in 1919, about sixteen years after the first flight of the Orville Brothers, when a Russian inventor drew up a design that was never actually built. The idea then progressed in fits and starts, inching closer to a working prototype around 1960.

That prototype, known as the Rocket Belt, was presented to readers of LIFE in its June 18, 1961 issue, when a picture by Ed Clark showed Harold Graham making the first public untethered flight. The sight of a man soaring through the air was more than enough to capture the imagination—though the text might have kept expectations closer to Earth. The caption explained that the Graham could not go up very high, move all that fast or stay airborne for very long:

At an altitude of 15 feet, a ground speed of 10 knots, Bell Engineer Harold Graham flew gently above a track without benefit of airplane. Graham was strapped to a hydrogen-peroxide-fueled rocket which will keep a man up half a minute through its jets of invisible steam. The Army, which financed it, hopes it will someday make foot soldiers all look like Buck Rogers.

The last line of that text is, in retrospect, revealing. The Army funded the development of jet packs for a specific military use, rather than public consumption. You could argue that we were never really promised jet packs.

But pictures can make promises more powerful than words, and the sight of Graham in midair would be enough to ignite jetpack dreams—and not unreasonably. Technology tends to improve exponentially, after all. The first computers took up entire rooms, and now devices that are more powerful slip easily into our pockets. So if in 1961 Harold Graham was going aloft for 30 seconds, shouldn’t it mean that in a few decades people would be jet-packing themselves from, say, New York City to the Hamptons?

But the jet packs have proved to be a stubborn exception. The reports on their continuing development, while full of enthusiasm, still talk about the packs as having niche uses for the military and for rescue workers. The reason that jet packs still don’t make sense for everyday consumers is the weight of the fuel. The amount needed to sustain a trip of more than a couple minutes would prevent it from ever getting off the ground.

For now. But who knows, maybe one day….