In comparison to current standards of technology, early science experiments can often look rudimentary or even amateur. But it pays to keep in mind that these "primitive" first steps actually paved the way for the more intricate experiments conducted today.
Such as the wind blast tests conducted by Colonel John Stapp in America during the 1940s, as seen in this archive footage from NASA.
What to us now looks like your basic sky dive machine at any music festival, back then was a breakthrough in the study of human tolerance to high velocity winds. Stapp's research played an important role in ensuring the safety of pilots, inlcuding finding ways for them to survive crash landings.
It's not often we take to a video without even the slightest bit of sarcasm, but this is actually pretty cool. Even with that ugly font used for the subtitles.