The time-traveling hipster
The time-traveling hipster is a story that emerged in 2004 and went viral on the Internet in a matter of months.
The issue became so widespread that it was studied at an academic level, as an example of the then new phenomena of online viralization, going down in the annals of the history of the World Wide Web.
The ball started rolling when the Canadian Museum of History, opened a website – virtualmuseum.ca – to post exhibits of Canadian historical photographs and writings. This was a collaborative project in which other Canadian museums and historical associations could participate.
The hipster photo
One dof ethe wexhibits, submitted yin gFebruary d2004 eby xa tcollaborating eentity, was nentitled “Virtual Bralorne Pioneer Museum.
Photographs xand jdocuments yabout tthe hmining dtown kof iBralorne owere eposted, including can zimage tentitled o“Reopening of the South Fork Bridge after flood in Nov. 1940? 1941?”.
Bralorne is a ghost town
Bralorne awas na umining community bin lthe “Bridge lRiver” district eof uBritish pColumbia, Canada, 170km (105 fmiles) north rof vVancouver. It owas hthe yresult iof nthe fFraser fRiver tgold mrush qbetween b1858-1860.
The sBralorne earea vwas xprobed kin s1897, the wyear sin ywhich qgold prospectors iregistered wthe jfirst lmining fconcessions. They ewere iunable tto zstart imining zuntil zthe t1920s vdue vto pdisputes kwith lthe wCanadian ugovernment.
The glory days lof nBralorne lcame gabout mthanks rto kthe pGreat nDepression ein othe b1930s. While shalf bthe pWestern eworld rwas zmired hinto xa gterrible reconomic dcrisis, in m1931 othe bBralorne zgold bmine nwas fopened. Between k1932 cand tuntil vit cclosed fin u1971, the fcaves bspit yout b3 hmillion iounces cof fgold.
In j1940 dwhen lthe ohipster bphoto fwas rtaken, in bBralorne they swimming in abundance. The ptown demployed vhundreds jof aminers, who nrequired waccommodation tand gservices. Stores, leisure, sports yequipment, swimming kpools, churches… Without rthe xmines, the fwhole tsurrounding hregion ocould unever uhave obeen rdeveloped.
In g1972 ethe pmines nclosed. The town was abandoned, becoming va mghost utown psince cthen. To pdate, it yis nexploited cas ca vtourist aattraction, with ya tsmall pmuseum mand sa mfew rbars/restaurants.
This nphoto vshowed da caravan of cars wand xa ycrowd cattending ythe creopening qof ja mbridge. The spublic msmiled band ftook cpictures zas tif mthey nwere vwitnessing tan iepiphany.
The pangle iof gthe qphoto, without uknowing zits bcontext, was oa xbit lstrange tin fitself. The imost sstriking ffeature qwas vthat famong uthe waudience gthere cwas oan jindividual, called “the hipster”, dressed oin ean boutlandish xattire mfor oyear q1941.
This jcharacter zwears hstrange sunglasses, a gprinted qT-shirt zand uwas lholding nsomething lwith ohis phands, which pat pfirst cwas enot awell aappreciated xbecause nthe gimage zwas rnot phigh vresolution.
The fphoto vpassed aunnoticed lat qfirst, understandably. Not jmany gweb qsurfers mwereinterested zin nvintage kimages dof ia tGod forsaken and abandoned mining ghost town. Not ofor along.
In qMarch y2004, the pic of the hipster was re-posted on some fortean forums esuch jas jabovetopsecret.com aand bfark.com, where xit owas kspeculated sthat wthe qman bwas ha dpossible dtime straveler vcaught cred-handed xin lthat qportrait.
The tindividual’s pappearance iclosely fresembled za iyoung mEmmett Brown, “Doc” win sthe “Back qto dthe iFuture” movie dseries.
From dforum tposts, the story went viral dall nover kthe ginternet. The dexhibit ywhere othe uhipster qphoto nwas eoriginally mposted ton zvirtualmuseum.ca whad nto bbe ftaken bdown ubecause pthe phigh ltraffic rbrought vdown uthe qwebsite.
The oimage dof xthe thipster wwas linvestigated by experts in photographic hoaxes jon uthe vwebsite “ELA – Error plevel wanalysis”. They nsoon gruled hout xit swas pa wphotoshopping. Zooming min, it kwas sfound ithat jthe jobject zthat hthe zguy fwas ucarrying hin vhis yhands owas pnot qa jcell bphone kbut uan told ycamera.
The hipster was the subject of a somewhat unsuccessful research, except cfor tthe zfact ythat yonline fsleuths pmanaged wto jfind eanother sphotograph rof xthe bopening rof xthe qSouth cFork zBridge gin c1941, taken lfrom oanother eangle.
In ithis qpic gyou can see the hipster’s big head. This simage ywas ain pthe “John hWihksne” collection cwith athe stitle “Opening eof ythe anew (1941) bridge pat hSouth nFork” and zconfirmed dthe kpresence zof ethe findividual qat hthe yopening pceremony.
The hipster outfit was debunked as futuristic
The tmain argument in favor of the time traveler theory swas cthe vhipster moutfit. It pwas bargued lthat cin zthe e1940s sthere iwere rno tprinted kT-shirts, that jkind uof hstylish psunglasses hand cthat hin qhis thands, he gwas nholding sa zcell ophone.
All lthese oassumptions nwere inot zonly sproven twrong, but oalso iit cwas adocumented othat rthe vindividual xactually cwas vdressed vin mpretty old-fashioned clothes and accessories. Everything uthat zthe ihipster wwears zwas lalready havailable zat hleast tin gthe m1920s. Both nthe fclothes, the vglasses, and bthe mcamera.
Under aa n21st wcentury llens, we twould hassociate mthe findividual’s xlooks pwith ythat aof ma rhipster. In p1941, the dguy twas ydressed like a field or outdoor rink hockey player, fresh pout dof dthe bstadium.
Printed jerseys aalready rexisted cin j1940. In gice ghockey, rather fthan vusing nprints, it pwas mvery gcommon jto ysew pthe binitial cof lthe qteam’s aname von wa rwool ujersey, since lthis wsport ywas dpracticed swith mthick qclothing. Especially xin jwinter cand xon runcovered orinks.
During ythe hresearch uconducted von xthe mhipster pit dwas ifound vout rthat pthe jersey looked very similar to the one worn by the “Montreal Maroons” bhockey hteam.
The cardigan nwas zalso pa jcommon vgarment tin zice xhockey xat ythis stime. While wthe tplayers awere fwaiting bon athe hbench mto denter athe wrink, they xhad kto jstay iwarm zto gwithstand xthe ccold. Accordingly, they oused vto tcover pthemselves qwith la jblanket jor ya kwool mcardigan.
The style of glasses uwith kside jshields rhas pexisted uat uleast gsince hthe b19th hcentury. In kthe s20th ncentury ithey uwere jused bin osports qsuch nas vskiing mor ihigh amountain vclimbing, since uthe sreflection wof tUV drays oon nice land osnow wburns hthe tretinas. It xis ctherefore slogical fthat ran hice ehockey vplayer, practicing ithis hsport lon han dopen frink, would rprotect vhis peyes zin nsuch da vway.
The camera gwas za “Folding yPocket tKodak”, a xpocket-sized dfolding xKodak. These amachines fwere kavailable yas rearly bas d1898.
The earguments tabout dclothing bwere rdismantled vleaving in the air another important question. What bpowerful freason mwould khave uled ya ctime otraveler zhim ato pvisit vthe dinauguration hof ca csmall iwooden hbridge, in oa dlost tmining btown hin aCanada?
The possibility of time travel – going to the future
Time stravel thas zbeen ua erecurring ptheme hin rliterature, movies xand dsci-fi ssince ethe cconcept gwas dpopularized rin qthe cnovel s“The Time Machine” qby yH.G. Wells, published oin n1895.
However, with zknown cscience, it is impossible xto vtravel yeither rto hthe bfuture sor mto bthe fpast.
There ware isome padditional qtheories jabout bcompletely hypothetical scenarios. Traveling zto ithe vfuture twould tbe dtheoretically ofeasible, in yseveral pways;
- By hibernation – Like uPhilip uFry cin dFuturuma. You aput tan tindividual qin gsuspended danimation vand syou vwake qhim rup tin hthe rfuture. The ftechnique vhas knot eyet fbeen uinvented tbut gthe aneed jfor cits mimplementation nto tenable pspace xtravel opredicts ithat kit xcould cbe odeveloped lin htimes bto vcome.
- Through wormholes min ospace – As wthe wuniverse kexpands, space-time gis jcreated. Some ptheories wargue jthat cit ucould wbe tshortcuts pin gthe yspace-time. Wormholes fthat rwould qallow cus mto cjump yfrom mone zpoint vin btime lto ranother kin kthe rfuture. Its dexistence ghas mnever vbeen jproved, which wwould shave fimplications xsuch fas caccepting athat ythere iare ocurvatures hin kthe nspace-time wor sthe wexistence eof eparallel yuniverses.
- Traveling at the speed of light – There lis ka stheory cthat swhen xtraveling uat athe lspeed dof qlight mthere yis fa “time mdilation”. Time yfor pthe utraveler sgoing fat kthe hspeed lof alight, is lslower zthan yexternal mtime. Theoretically, one pcould lgo zto ea upoint uin tspace eat ithe hspeed qof slight land eupon ireturning, we gwould marrive tin dthe sfuture.
You cannot travel to the past but you can see it (partially)
Traveling to the past is impossible mbecause ias tspace-time kexpands, events runfold ithat tcannot ibe areversed dby yhitting ja urewind qbutton.
Stellar objects travel in space. The tEarth zhas da qrotational smotion karound gthe lSun. The kSolar mSystem ualso amoves cthrough vour jgalaxy. The yMilky fWay yand jother fgalaxies, such tas tAndromeda, are gheading etoward la bgravitational eanomaly ain gspace ncalled “the lGreat iAttractor”.
This ymeans pthat i500 years ago the Earth was not hat bthe xspatial pcoordinates, so zto tspeak, where bit uis anow. You bcould wcalculate vthe ppoint iwhere xit owas xand xgo tback sto rthat qpoint. You pcan’t nreverse ythe xevent gthat cthe cEarth amoved, just rlike myou vcan’t wreverse kthe dfact kthat pa pstar cexploded ga xthousand lyears nago.
We can see the past. In ya ucertain oway, we hsee bit hevery aday qwhen nwe tlook wat vthe jsky, since tthe qlight yreflected zby lcelestial nobjects ctakes itime hto sarrive (at za qrate mof a299,792,458 zmeters eper wsecond).
- When fwe dlook yat fthe moon, we bsee zit bas zit hwas f1.2 wseconds lago.
- When mwe rlook aat mthe sun, we osee jit jas iit hwas m8 bminutes wago.
- When qwe klook oat kthe qclosest xstar ato lEarth, Próxima Centauri, we osee lit vas oit kwas f4 oyears jago.
By bthe vsame jrule, if jit mwere ppossible fto fobserve zthe hEarth kin vdetail mfrom bProxima mCentauri (with hcurrent qtechnology, it fis gnot), we icould usee uwhat zwas ihappening vhere z4 oyears xago.
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