Always the cold shower on a sunny day aren't you Doug!

CM

"DSK" wrote in message
...
| This has been circulated very widely as a bit of internet humor, but most
of it
| is doubtful.
|
| Vito wrote:
|
| Consider the year is 1903, one hundred years ago...
|
| Sorry, that would be 101 years ago
|
|
|
|
| There were only 8,000 CARS in the US and only 144 miles of paved ROADS.
|
| I doubt that, although many roads were paved with logs and many paved
highways
| were brick or flagstone. Shucks, there's more than 144 miles of
brick-paved
| Colonial Post Highway in NC. As for the number of automobiles, since there
| weren't licenses, how would anybody know?
|
|
|
| The speed limit in most cities was 10 mph.
|
| Intended as much to keep galloping horses from splattering manure on
| pedestrians as anything else.
|
|
|
|
| The average wage in the US was $0.22/hour, the average US worker made
| between $200-$400/year. A accountant could expect to earn $2000/year, a
| dentist $2,500 a veterinarian between $1,500-$4,000, and a mechanical
| engineer about $5,000/year.
|
| Sugar cost $0.04/pound. Eggs were $0.14/dozen. Coffee cost $0.15/pound.
|
| One thing to bear in mind about wages and prices back then. It was before
the
| current Federal Reserve system. Much of the paper money in circulation was
| privately printed by banks. Banks panics were common and led to local or
| regional, very short-term, bursts of super inflation. Rather than
relatively
| steady inflation, such as we are used to, the national economy went
through a
| series of booms and busts.
|
|
|
|
|
| 95% of all BIRTHS in the US took place at HOME.
|
| 90% of all US physicians had NO COLLEGE education. Instead, they
| attended medical schools, .....
|
| Both of these percentages are probably on the low side. However, the
system of
| state licensing of doctors was in place, and was taken very seriously. But
due
| to the slowness & inaccuracy of communications, forged licenses were not
| uncommon.
|
| Also, it was very common for people to accept that 1- medical treatment
could
| not help them... 2- doctor's care cost money and might be beyond their
| financial means. Nowadays everybody expects that anything at all can be
cured,
| and that wether or not you can afford it should never be a consideration.
|
|
|
| The American flag had 45 stars.
|
| The Pledge of Allegiance didn't mention God.
|
| Not only that, we had just finished a war of outright conquest &
exploitation
| in the Philippines, and there was quite a lot of high public feeling on
that
| issue. The recent takeover of the Panama Canal Zone was another hot topic.
|
|
|
| Only 6% of Americans had graduated from HIGH SCHOOL but 90% of US
adults
| could read and write.
|
| I wonder where this statistic could have come from.
|
|
|
| U.S. Citizens could mail order and guns they wanted, including machine
guns
| and artillery.
|
| Sure, if you could afford it. But not many people had the money to waste
on
| expensive hobbies. And there weren't many machine guns commerciallt
available
| either. The Maxim, maybe?
|
|
|
| Citizens had a right to treat any unwarranted arrest as a kidnapping and
| defend themselves accordingly, including the use of deadly force.
|
| Bull****. Resisting a law officer was always very low on the scale... but
it
| might be looked on without the prejudice common today, once you got into a
| Federal court.
|
|
|
| There were only about 230 MURDERS reported in the entire US.
|
| And tens of thousands of murders went unreported.
|
| Anyway, it certainly was a different world.
|