iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 16h

Wow, my junior high gym teacher was right.

Menard's store display for a palm shaver. Price is $16.84, or $14.99 after the 11% "rebate."

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

Thanks to AI, an *extremely* rare Gutenberg Bible/Moby Dick volume will be offered for sale.

AI-generated image of a heavily tattooed guy holding three weighty tomes, the one on the left says "Gutenberg Bible" on the back cover and "Moby Dick" on the spine. The one is the middle is gibberish, and the one on the right is Alice's Adventures in Wonderland with a block stamp of ohmygod may be sexual activity involving the caterpillar I can't tell.

Close up of the three books described in the previous image.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

"By 1959, 3 out of every 4 Thorstensons had a bike basket."

Four young Thorstensons on their way to school in 1959. Each has a balloon tire bike, 3 have a big effing metal front basket.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

You say I'm being passive aggressive but I call it

Title card for the film "Friendly Persuasion" (1956) starring Gary Cooper.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

Why it's the 473 arm chair! I'd know it anywhere!

A page from an inventory of chairs at the Minnesota Capitol Building

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

Very nice color at Banning State Park this morning. Barring high winds, should hold up for a week or so.

The Kettle River runs through a ravine of sandstone boulders. The leaves are mostly yellow.

An abandoned stone crushing building sits amid the changing trees and moss-covered rocks.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

🎵 Yankee Doodle...🎵 (details in alt text)

Four urinals in a men's room at the Pine County History Museum in Askov, MN. They are arranged from left to right at ascending heights beginning with the third from the left, reminiscent of the first four notes of the tune "Yankee Doodle."

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

Seems familiar, though without the drug culture undertones.

Plastic model of Speedy Alka Seltzer, an advertising mascot of a freckled red haired boy with an Alka-Seltzer tablet for a body and another tablet for a hat. The hat says "SPEEDY" in a gothic font.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Compliments of the season, courtesy of a Wisconsin salvage yard.

Two old, stained and badly weathered juvenile store mannequins are seated on the rusted springs of a rusted yellow truck cab that is missing the driver side door altogether. Seated next to them is a plastic Santa Clause riding shotgun.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

True sons and daughters of Wisconsin know what's happening here.

Beef chunks braising slowly in a garlic-laced broth, an early stage in the preparation of tavern-style hot beefs.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

It's the kind of day that gives folks an urge to form a queue.

Shoppers wait in line for Kramarczuk's to open for fresh pączki on Pączki Day in the late 20teens.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

That seems like a terrible ice cream flavor.

Small detail from the posted photograph is an outfield advertising board for "Steel DeSoto Ice Cream."

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

YOU get a fez! YOU get a fez! Fezzes for ALL!!

A platoon of men riding 3-wheeled motorbikes topped with giant red fez canopies ride past a Hennepin Avenue sidewalk filled with blue-shirted befezzeled men.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

When State Senator Twyla Ring died back in 2022, I had this photo that I wanted to post in tribute, but couldn't find the negative. Long story short - it turned up and here's the shot. Shot on a Rollei twin lens reflex back in 1999. Better late than never.

Shot in the North Senate corridor of the MN Capitol Left to tright Twyla Ring, unknown, Dennis Johnson.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

What was your first computer growing up? (I think I might be older than some of you guys.)

Cover to the 1887 edition of Ropp's Commercial Calculator. Black script lettering on red buckram.

Page open to a dense table labeled "Table Showing Value of Cattle, Hogs, and Flour Etc."

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

From the File of Forgotten Fotos: (2004) Conservative education activists hold a press conference in support of embattled Minnesota Education Commissioner Cheri Yecke. The backdrop is "Attack on New Ulm" by Anton Gag. Yecke was ultimately rejected by the MN Senate.

The background painting by Anton Gag depicts the Dakota on New Ulm. A building can be seen on fire in the center left.

Standing in front is a group of about a dozen well-dressed people with one woman speaking into a microphone.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

The analysts are going over the numbers now, they'll get back to you after their nap.

Reddit image of two cats staring into a laptop screen displaying an excel spreadsheet.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

I caught that place during a sudden evening thunderstorm in July 1999. I felt a certain presence - of wind, rain, and hail.

Devils Tower Wyoming during a thunderstorm. Dark clouds loom over the monument from a distance of about half a mile. Photo taken on Kodak TMax 100 on a Rolleiflex 2.8D TLR.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Took advantage of a free admission day to visit the National Railroad museum in Green Bay this week. I'm no expert on trains, but I do appreciate things that go clickety-clack. Hand-held red/blue #anaglyh photo, you need 3-D glasses to see the effect.

A long wooden walkway between two old steam engine locomotives and tenders and some cars inside a train shed. At the far end are people checking out the display.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

There will not be an unboxing video. You already know what happens next.

The outside of a cardboard pie box from the Norske Nook in Osseo, WI.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

I dunno, I think I could figger it out in a pinch.

Cab of the Union Pacific #4017 Big Boy steam locomotive at the National Train Museum in Green Bay.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

The 1992 Super Bowl halftime show "Winter Magic" will no longer be opening for Ed Sheeran.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

One shot one that 25-year old roll of film I developed last month was this. Game Day at the ol' Metrodome was festive because downtown Minneapolis was a sea of parking lots in 2001. The Iowa license reads PAC SUX. #Vikings

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

6th St TOP Ribs H Chicken A Steaks M B U R

A former eatery pictured from a car window about 2001. Visible is a portion of a street sign for 26th St S, and the establishment's moving neon sign which advertised "Ribs Chicken Steaks" on the torso of a waving man shaped like a hamburger.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

I've been scanning long-neglected pages of large and medium format film lately, and found what I think is an unintentional stereo pair. Saint Louis River through Jay Cooke SP c. 2002. Requires red-blue glasses to see the cool effect. #anaglyph

The Saint Louis River running rapidly (heh) through Jay Cooke State Park in Minnesota. View is from above.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

When it comes to public safety, Arne sure knew how to pick 'em.

Article in 1996 describing damage to the MN Capitol quadriga by Commissioner Michael Jordan and friends.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

S-s-s-s-t-t-o-o-p-p th-th-th-at-at-at hha-ha-ha-ham-hamer-hammering!

Blurred photograph of a train car needlessly parked along the Mississippi Riverfront in Minneapolis reads "do not hammer car."

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Discarded marble from the Minnesota Capitol and pages from a Playboy magazine, 1999. During a partial renovation of the MN Capitol in 1989, pieces of marble and granite that were replaced were dumped in a then-vacant lot near Cedar St. and Charles Ave. They were still there in '99 when 1/2

Slabs of marble and granite amidst weeds and prairie plants. Pages from what appears to be Playboy magazine are caught amid the ruins. On one page the text reads "Carville," apparently an interview with James Carville.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

Saw a nice stone memorial to Meridel LeSueur in a blufftop park in Hudson last week. Not quite sure what the image in the middle is supposed to represent.

Moss-covered stone overlooking the Saint Croix River in Hudson reads "Meridel LeSueur 1900-1996 She Loved the Earth" in a circle. In the middle is a figure that resembles an ear of corn.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

Sorta the same way Jean Nicolet landed in Green Bay. (Nicollet Avenue is named for a different guy, Joe Nicollet, cartographer and mathematician who drew the earliest fairly accurate maps of the upper Mississippi and Minnesota rivers.)

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Basically the same for me. After 50 years, you native Minnesotans have wrung the Northern Wisconsin outta me. EXCEPT that I insist on saying 'vague' and 'bag' in their god-given pronunciations.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

The designer of the first Minnesota state flag, which was ditched in 1958, was a Center. Amelia Hyde Center.

Amelia Hyde Center's signature in pen and ink in the corner of her 1893 Minnesota flag design.

Minnesota's state flag from 1893 to 1958. Original drawing in watercolor, pencil, and pen and ink.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Without saying your age, what’s your favorite movie that came out when you were 20 years old?

Robert Redford lets his fingers do the walking through a Minneapolis phone directory to look up the phone number of Kenneth Dahlberg in All the President's Men (1976).

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Lastly, these two shots are from a roll of Ilford FP4 Plus on a Rolleiflex TLR while traipsing around the Lost Forty in the Chippewa National Forest in 2015. Much more film degradation than the Kodak TMax, even though it was taken 10 years later. But I think the age spots make for cooler shots.

A black and white shot in a white pine forest. The left side is dominated by a massive mature pine trunk.

Looking straight up at the crown of an ancient white pine tree, which appears as shadow against a sky mottled with film age spotting.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Following up this post with shots from another roll, taken 21 years ago and not developed until this month. The Kodak TMax 100 shows amazingly little degradation even after two decades in a cardboard box. More details in the alt text.

Stone Arch Bridge in Minneapolis. Photo taken in 2005 shortly after the arches were fitted with lighting. Camera was a Rolleiflex TLR on a tripod fired with a cable release.

Night shot of pedestrians and cyclists on the deck of the Stone Arch Bridge. The camera was fixed to a tripod on a slow shutter setting, perhaps 1-2 seconds. The two blurry figures in the foreground are cyclists who happened to ride into the shot during the exposure.

Another view of the Stone Arch Bridge in Minneapolis. This time the Guthrie Theater can be seen through the arch on the right. Photo taken in 2005 shortly after the arches were fitted with lighting. Camera was a Rolleiflex TLR on a tripod fired with a cable release.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

All worthy old art has craquelure.

detail of the eyes of Mona Lisa by DaVinci, showing craquelure.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

It's official- the park formerly known as Marcy has its new Dinky Park sign. #Dinkytown @eastbankmpls.bsky.social

Standard issue, (but attractive) sign that reads:
Minneapolis Park & Recreation Board
DINKY PARK.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

This was where she lived at 915 6th St SE, less than a block from her father's house on 10th Ave SE. This house as razed for student housing c. 2019. Google street map image.

A large grey gabled frame house with a prominent brick chimney.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Susan died of Bright's disease, according to the Mpls Times.

Death notice for Susan Pillsbury Snyder.

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Vic Thorstenson @vthorstenson.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Addie died less about 6-7 months after she was married apparently due to an abscess.

Death notice for "Mrs. C. M. Webster" the former Addie Pillsbury.

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