20 Vintage Selfies Taken With Actual Sticks (Before the Selfie Stick Was Even a Thing)

John Summers • Contributor

Sep 20, 2025 7:00 PM EDT

Before Bluetooth, before ring lights, before Instagram filters… there were just people, a camera, and a really long stick.

Yes, long before the modern "selfie stick" flooded gift shops and theme parks, some absolute legends were out there doing it manually. These vintage geniuses used actual sticks - broom handles, tree branches, maybe even a mop or two - to snap photos of themselves the old-fashioned way: with ingenuity, nerve, and probably zero focus control.

And you know what? It worked. Sure, they didn't have stabilizers or countdown timers, but they had spirit. These photos are proof that the human desire to take a slightly awkward, slightly blurry photo of your own face with friends is eternal.

So here they are - 20 moments from the past when people used real sticks to take selfies. Because long before influencers had tripods and vlogging kits, folks were out here doing DIY content creation with whatever they could find. Respect.