What were the passports 100 years ago when the photo on the document could be any

Almost every modern person has a passport - an identity document. The first passports appeared in the Middle Ages. They allowed their owner to freely enter the city through the gate without paying additional fees and taxes for visiting. Often between cities, agreements were concluded to abolish such fees from their citizens. Free persons were given pass porte.

The ruler granted such a document to officials. This allowed them to enter any city in the kingdom. The first king to issue a passport to travel around cities without paying duties was Henry V in England.

Since passports are mainly for diplomats on behalf of the rulers, they have been issued in small quantities for several centuries.

Today in every country there are rules for passport photos. In New Zealand, a black and white image is accepted, in the UK it is strictly forbidden to smile in the picture for such an important document.

However, this was not always the case. Photos in the passport appeared in the late 19th - early 20th century. No rules existed.

In 1876, an exhibition was held in Philadelphia. Then on the tickets for the first time a photo of the owner appeared along with an individual number and surname. I liked this idea so much that they began to do so in passports.

Until that moment, the passport simply described the person’s appearance. It looked something like this: "The presenter of this document has a straight nose, a light complexion, an oval chin." Here it was important not to make a mistake in the description.

Any photograph, even a group one, was suitable for a passport. In the passport of the famous writer Arthur Conan Doyle in 1915 was his family photo with his wife and sons.

People could be photographed in full growth, in a suit and hat, for their favorite pastime.

Sometimes they pasted photos from other documents, used old photos. Passport holders could not always afford a new photo. In 1929, in New York, a photograph was worth $ 30. For today's money - 200 dollars.

Women are a different story altogether. Married American women simply wrote in her husband’s passport: "Mr. Gray and his wife." That was until 1937.

Later, the strict style of photographs of criminals from the police department was adopted as the standard. At first it caused a public protest. "How so! I’m a decent person, but I should look like a bandit! Well, at least they don’t take off in profile," people thought.

With the outbreak of World War I, countries introduced border controls. This was done in order to block the entry of all kinds of agents, scouts, subversive elements. Passports were issued to help travelers overcome all these barriers. When peace came in 1918, most countries retained both border control and passports.

In 1920, the League of Nations unified the design of passports and their functions. These standards are still in force and are periodically reviewed by the United Nations.

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