Before he went down in history as one of the greatest film directors of all time, 17-year-old Stanley Kubrick was known for something else – New York City subway photography. Over two weeks in 1946, Kubrick worked for LOOK magazine to capture the everyday lives and intimate moments of the people of a bygone era.

While working for LOOK, Kubrick completed 129 assignments for a total of 15,000 photos. His photos captured the mundane and everyday side of an era often heavily romanticized in the U.S., giving us a closer and more identifiable look at their lives. They commuted just like us!

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More info: collections.mcny.org (h/t: mymodernmetufunk)