Showerthought: My grandpa's 1953 Polaroid snaps beat the Kodachrome slides he took the same summer, and I think I know why

Susan Wells · 2026-09-22T19:35:05.799342+00:00

I inherited two boxes from my grandpa's attic in Toledo, one with about 40 Polaroid prints from 1953 and one with Kodachrome slides from that same July. The Polaroids are faded and soft but every single one still shows a face you can recognize, while half the slides have gone magenta or green and the colors on the rest look nothing like real skin. Turns out the instant film was processed at home in minutes, so nothing sat around waiting on a lab or a projector bulb to cook it. If you have old family slides in a hot garage, get them scanned now, and tell me if yours held up better than mine did.

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Showerthought: My grandpa's 1953 Polaroid snaps beat the Kodachrome slides he took the same summer, and I think I know why | 1950s Time Capsule - HW Forums