Close Shaved Iranian Boy

Boy, Tehran September 1972

 

 

 

 

From September 1972, an Iranian boy wonders where his hair has gone.  I was traveling back home to New Zealand with my father and grandfather after having spent almost three months in the UK with my grandfather.  While this was a great vacation for me and I got to miss some school, I think it was a cunning plan by my parents that relieved my mother of having to deal with three boys all by herself while my father went to summer school at Cornell.     

 
Originally posted February 3, 2012

Mehrabad International Airport 1972

This was shot through the windows of the bus carrying us from the plane to the terminal which accounts for the white discoloration on the image.

The welcoming committee at Tehran's International Airport is a lot more diverse in this photo than you would likely see today.  Today, women are not allowed in public without a head covering and there are more than a few without in this photo.  There are also a few women in decidedly western outfits suggesting how much more cosmopolitan Tehran was under the Shah than today.  (Of course, he compensated in other ways).  Another thing about this image is that flying used to be an event and while today we crowd around unimpressive and anonymous double doors waiting for our family members and colleagues to get through immigration, in the old days we could go to the viewing balcony and maybe get a glimpse of them, and more importantly the plane, before we met them in the terminal.  I would expect many of the people in this photo are visiting the airport for the first time.  Imagine what they thought of that gigantic Boeing 747 sitting on the tarmac.

If you look carefully near the middle of this group, I think there's a g-man (one of ours that is).

In addition to the images I've posted on Flickr and those I've periodically posted on PND, I have now produced a Big Blurb Book: From the Archive 1960 -1980 of some of the images I really thought were special.

I now have an iPad version of this book for sale ($4.99) on the Blurb site which you can find here: STORE    

Pan Am in Tehran

Yes, if you look closely there is a person in there and it's me.  Sitting in row 2; approximately, and just about to depart the plane which is on the tarmac at Tehran International airport.  Over the northern summer in 1972, I got to travel with my Dad back to the UK (from New Zealand) where he left me and went on to Columbia Business School for the summer.

There are four photos in this sequence which also includes a full length image of the entire plane set against a brilliant blue sky, and seeing that Pan Am 747 brings back a lot of memories.  This jet named Clipper Pacific Trader was with Pan Am from 1971 (when it was delivered) to 1984 but at one point it was loaned (oddly) to Iran Air.  Interesting that we were flying on an almost new aircraft at the time and Jumbo jets were still very new generally.  People used to come to the airport to see them!

Naturally, through the power of the internet you can trace this aircraft's entire history all the way to the bone yard in Arizona where it now sits on blocks.  Everything has been removed including the wings and the fuselage and it just sits there like a beached whale. 

Another weekly image from my archive. Click on it to make it larger.

In addition to the images I've posted on PND, I have now produced a Big Blurb Book: From the Archive 1960 -1980 of some of the images I really thought were special.