Posted on 11/26/2002 1:40:09 PM PST by Fiddlstix
Very interesting 100 years
The year is 1902, one hundred years ago ...Here are some U.S. statistics for 1902:
- The average life expectancy in the US was forty-seven (47).
- Only 14 Percent of the homes in the US had a bathtub.
- There was no birth control
- Only 8 percent of the homes had a telephone. A three minute call from Denver to New York City cost eleven dollars.
- There were only 8,000 cars in the US and only 144 miles of paved roads.
- The maximum speed limit in most cities was 10 mph.
- Alabama, Mississippi, Iowa, and Tennessee were each more heavily populated than California. With a mere 1.4 million residents, California was only the 21st most populous state in the Union.
- The tallest structure in the world was the Eiffel Tower in Paris,France.
- The average wage in the US was 22 cents an hour.
- The average US worker made between $200 and $400 per year.
- A competent accountant could expect to earn $2000 per year, a dentist $2,500 per year, a veterinarian between $1,500 and $4,000 per year, and a mechanical engineer about $5,000 per year.
- More than 95 percent of all births in the US took place at home.
- Ninety percent of all US physicians had no college education. Instead, they attended medical schools, many of which were condemned in the press and by the government as "substandard."
- Sugar cost four cents a pound. Eggs were fourteen cents a dozen. Coffee cost fifteen cents a pound.
- Most women only washed their hair once a month and used borax or egg yolks for shampoo.
- Canada passed a law prohibiting poor people from entering the country for any reason.
- The five leading causes of death in the US were:
- 1. Pneumonia and influenza
- 2. Tuberculosis
- 3. Diarrhea
- 4. Heart disease
- 5. Stroke
- The American flag had 45 stars. Arizona, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Hawaii and Alaska hadn't been admitted to the Union yet.
- The population of Las Vegas, Nevada was 30.
- Crossword puzzles, canned beer, and iced tea hadn't been invented.
- There were no Mother's Day or Father's Day.
- One in ten US adults couldn't read or write. Only 6 percent of all Americans had graduated from high school.
- Marijuana, heroin, and morphine were all available over the counter at corner drugstores. According to one pharmacist, "Heroin clears the complexion, gives buoyancy to the mind, regulates the stomach and the bowels, and is, in fact, a perfect guardian of health."
- Eighteen percent of households in the US had at least one full-time servant or domestic.
- There were only 230 reported murders in the entire US.
....What a difference a century makes.
Now there's one for the ages . . .
It's amazing what 100 years of "progress" will do for a country, eh?
I Posted this on Misc
What Happened?
Why is it on News/Activism ?
1. Pneumonia and influenza
My grandfather was born in 1897. Sometime in the late 1910’s or early 1920’s they had some sort of influenza outbreak that killed 17 of the 22 people that lived on their little spread. He said those that lived would look around the dinner table at each other and silently wonder who was going to be next.
And Ain't it the Truth!
LOL
The year was 1919
It was the year of the great influenza Pandemic, as it was called back then.
This means 9 out of ten, 90% were literate! Great list, but that fact was a little obscure. What % were home-educated?
The average wage in the US was 22 cents an hour.
Sugar cost four cents a pound. Eggs were fourteen cents a dozen. Coffee cost fifteen cents a pound.
So an 8 hour day would have paid around $1.76. Stopping by the grocery store to pick up a pound of sugar, a dozen eggs, and a pound of coffee would have set you back $.33, or about an hour and a half of work.
Now days, an 8 hour day pays around $100 on average ($26,000 a year). Stopping by the grocery store to pick up a pound of sugar ($.50 a lb), a dozen eggs ($1.09 a dozen), and a pound of coffee ($2.39 a lb) would set you back $3.98, or about 15 minutes of work.
In terms of "Real Living Costs" when it comes to food, we have it much, much better than we did a hundred years ago. Most of the world, including the wealthy nations of Europe, have it about the same as the turn of the century.
What does this say about us? It says we know how to feed ourselves and keep costs down. That ability is one of the myriad reason why most of the world dislikes us. They view our hard work and ingenuity as being lucky.
Indeed, America has gone from being a wealthy nation in 1902 to having even our very poor be insanely wealthy compared to most of the world.
Hey, that can't be right! We've been told that illegal abortions were killing tens of thousands every year!
Sure there was. Only they called it abstinance.Also:
* There was prayer in the schools
* Buring an American Flag would get you thrown in jail
* There was no such thing as "same-sex marriages"
* Those "substandard" physicians weren't performing a million or more abortions a year
* Nobody had ever heard of Bill Clinton, Barbara Steisand or Jacko
* Communism was an untested theory
Feel free to add to this list.
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