Immigrants stand in line at Ellis Island, gateway to the United States

Unemployed men queuing for food during the Great Depression, Iowa, USA, circa 1935 (© FPG/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Unemployed men queue for food during the Great Depression in Iowa.

Mourners file past the bier of President John F. Kennedy in the Capitol Rotunda in Washington, D.C., Nov. 24, 1963. (AP Photo)

More than a quarter million people wait up to 10 hours in line to view the casket of President John F. Kennedy in the Capitol Rotunda in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 24, 1963.

A CIA employee helps Vietnamese evacuees into an Air America helicopter during the Fall of Saigon. (©Hubert Van Es/Bettmann/Corbis)

Vietnamese evacuees wait to board an Air America helicopter during the Fall of Saigon.

Hundreds lined up in The Mall to sign the Book of Condolence at St. James's Palace after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, in 1997. (© Dave Gaywood/AFP/Getty Images)

Hundreds line up in The Mall to sign the Book of Condolence at St. James's Palace after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, in 1997.

Iraqi women queue to vote at a polling station in Basra southern Iraq, in the country's first free elections.

People stand in a line that stretched around the block to enter a job fair held at the Jewish Community Center (JCC), on March 21, 2012 in New York City (© John Moore/Getty Images)

In a scene common throughout the country, people stand in a line that stretches around the block to enter a job fair in New York City in March.

People sit in a queue outside Apple's flagship store in Sydney on September 20, 2012, as they wait to buy the new iPhone 5 (© Wiliiam West/AFP/GettyImages)

Fanboys wait for the iPhone 5, the thinnest iPhone EVER.

8 images of incredibly important lines in recent history

9/21/2012

Throughout history, people have waited in or formed lines for reasons of immense gravitas -- state funerals, disaster relief, fleeing war-torn countries, and other seminal moments. The ones you see in the slideshow above are the kinds of lines that have a seriousness of purpose, weightiness and consequence. Historically important. Portentous. Indelible.

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