A steam traction engine with a broken rear axle in Pall Mall, London. (Photo by Topical Press Agency/Getty Images). November 1923

A Hot air balloon is seen at the Cup Hot Air event during the Air Sports festival titled “70 Years of Peaceful Sky” in Minsk, Belarus July 18, 2015. (Photo by Vasily Fedosenko/Reuters)

A woman rolls a marijuana cigarette during the first “Expo Cannabis” fair in Montevideo December 14, 2014. Expo Cannabis offers conferences about different topics such as the medicinal use of cannabis and cultivation techniques as well as displaying hemp goods, cannabis cultivation items and seeds. (Photo by Andres Stapff/Reuters)

King George V (1865–1936), king of Great Britain since 1910, with his queen-consort Queen Mary (1867–1953), at Collier Hospital on a visit to Dublin. (Photo by Topical Press Agency/Getty Images)

Women in Chicago being arrested for wearing one piece bathing suits, without the required leg coverings. (Photo by Topical Press Agency/Getty Images). 1922

A Leyland lorry during the railway strike, “we supply both milk and baby” is chalked on the bonnet. (Photo by A. R. Coster/Topical Press Agency/Getty Images). 3rd October 1919

A hot air balloon flies close to the ground in the Jezreel Valley in northern Israel during an international hot air balloon festival October 14, 2014. (Photo by Nir Elias/Reuters)

At the beginning of the 20th century, Edward S. Curtis set out to document what he saw as a disappearing race: the Native American. From 1907 to 1930, Curtis took more than 2,000 photos of 80 tribes stretching from the Great Plains to the Pacific Northwest and Alaska. He then published and sold these photos, along with narrative text, in 20 volumes of work known as “The North American Indian”. It is one of the most significant collections of its kind, “probably the most important photographic document of its age and its topic,” said Jeffrey Garrett, associate university librarian for Special Libraries at Northwestern University. (Photo by Edward S. Curtis)