I Love YouTube: 20th Century History Caught on Film!

The 20th century was a remarkable (and... long) chapter in human history not just because a lot of big important stuff happened, but also because people were documenting the big important stuff with moving picture cameras for the first time ever. And because of that, the world got a little smaller, people learned a little more about each other and all of a sudden there's the internet and 911 and trucker hats and here we are, a century later, twittering about the Superbowl while getting our H1N1 flu shots. The invention and advancement of film and video technology definitely for sure played a huge part in the super-acceleration of human progress during the 20th century because it gave people a chance to experience history unfolding with their own eyes and ears. Something like that, anyway. It allowed people to feel closer to and exist in the same moment as any documented milestone, inspiring them in huge, impactful ways. And those moments are preserved forever as definitive historical documents on video, easily accessible by anyone, anywhere, anytime. And you don't even have to change out of your pajamas to watch them.  God, I love YouTube...

THE HINDENBURG DISASTER
Footage of the Hindenburg disaster of 1937 instantly pulled the plug on anybody's delusions of airship travel as a new transportation standard, and it forever will stand as the best visual metaphor of humanity's hubris. Plenty of reporters were there to document the fiery crash-landing of the first trans-Atlantic airship flight, but no camera operator could have expected to capture images that would forever be immortalized on the cover of a Led Zeppelin album 32 years later. Here, you can see some beautiful colour footage of the magestic Hindenburg in better times, and it's ultimate self destruction - all set to some appropriately eerie classical music:

HITLER'S HOME MOVIES
It's no secret, really, that Hitler was a film-lover, as his immense popularity in 1930s Germany owed much to the propaganda machine that helped craft his public image. But how does an extremely vain, genocidal maniac relax on the weekends, you ask? Oh, you know, invite some friends over, play with some kids, watch a movie, relax. Oh, and definitely also shoot tons of home movie footage that future historians will analyze to death...

THE BRITISH INVASION
Shortly after the JFK assassination, The Beatles arrived in America just in time to cheer everybody up. Those goofy kids with the funny hair would go on to captivate 73 million TV-watching Americans when they later debuted on the Ed Sullivan Show, but in truth, they started making history the minute they landed on American soil. Here are 2 minutes of patched together footage of Beatle wit and charm, from their history-making 14 minute JKF Airport press-conference that's been since parodied about a million times, including on one of the best Simpsons episodes ever made.

THE MOON LANDING
Yo, they put dudes on the MOON, brah. And not only did they accomplish that absolutely insane feat, but they also figured out how to broadcast a video signal from the MOON back to the EARTH, so that the people at home could watch it all go down live. Now as indisputable proof that it actually happened, we've got this video of spacemen jumping around some desert somewhere, which you just know is going to be used in some sort of corny video montage 300 years from now during the maiden voyage ceremony of some time-travelling super-spaceship.

FALL OF THE BERLIN WALL
The USA and the Soviet Union were bitter enemies for a big chunk of the 20th century, starting pretty much the minute they found themselves standing around a still smouldering Berlin having just defeated the Nazis together. They decided, "hey, now that we're here, let's draw a line down the middle of this town to symbolize our complete contempt for each other's way of life." If, at the time, you happened to be grocery shopping on the wrong side of the line you were basically screwed - until 1989, when the Berlin wall was torn down by millions of ecstatic Germans as the world at large watched from their living rooms.