Have you ever noticed that photos taken of young boys in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries show them wearing dresses? Not only that, but most boys also have long hair, so you can hardly make out the gender. Why is that?
Because the parents wanted to show their son's dramatic ascent to boyhood. After the first 2 or 3 years of a male toddler's life, when he is clad in girly clothes and pimps a girly 'do, he could then graduate to pants and a manly-looking I-like-my-beer-cold-and-my-homosexuals-FLAMING crewcut. The Slate article called it a "sartorial bar mitzvah." This tradition gradually lost traction throughout those three centuries, however, and by the 20th century had pretty much disappeared, except for a brief run in the 1970s.
My favorite has to be FDR's baby pic. I saw a similar photo as I was reading his biography earlier this year, and I thought it was the funniest thing ever.
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