What in the World Will the Future Bring?

PBS ^ | 1900 | Ladies Home Journal

[HungarianGypsy]

Automobiles will be cheaper than horses are today. Liquid-air refrigerators will keep great quantities of food fresh for long intervals. Huge forts on wheels will dash across open spaces at the speed of express trains of today. They will make what is now known as cavalry charges. Hot or cold air will be turned on from spigots to regulate the temperature of a house as we now turn on hot or cold water from spigots to regulate the temperature of a bath. Man will see around the world. Persons and things of all kinds will be brought within focus of cameras connected electronically with screens at the opposite ends of circuits, thousands of miles at a span. Electric currents applied to the soil will make valuable plants grow larger and faster, and will kill troublesome weeds. Rays of colored light will hasten the growth of many plants. Wireless telephone and telegraph circuits will span the world. There will be no street cars in our large cities. All hurry traffic will be below or high above the ground...These underground or overhead streets will teem with capacious automobile passenger coaches and freight wagons with cushioned wheels....Cities, therefore, will be free from all noises. Photographs will be telegraphed from any distance. Not only will it be possible for a physician to see a living, throbbing heart inside the chest, but he will be able to magnify and photograph any part of it. This work will be done with rays of invisible light. Fast electric ships, crossing the ocean at more than a mile a minute, will go from New York to Liverpool [England} in two days. There will be Air-Ships, but they will not successfully compete with surface cars and water vessels for passenger or freight traffic. Grand Opera will be telephoned to private homes, and will sound as harmonious as though enjoyed from a theater box. Pneumatic tubes, instead of store wagons, will deliver packages and bundles. Predictions taken from The Ladies Home Journal - 1900

[HungarianGypsy]

Just came across this while trying to find sources for my children to learn about the 20th century. Thought some of you might get a kick out of it. Btw, if anyone has any good sources on the twentieth century, please let me know.

[Kenny Bunkport]

The future isn't what it used to be.

[Semper Paratus]

It's interesting to see in past popular art what today would be like.

[blueblazes]

Actually their predictions are not too bad. Grand Opera bit the big one though.

[AngryJawa]

Where's my flying car? I was promised a flying car...

[HungarianGypsy]

oops! Didn't format right. I'll redo it below.

Automobiles will be cheaper than horses are today.
Liquid-air refrigerators will keep great quantities of food fresh for long intervals.
Huge forts on wheels will dash across open spaces at the speed of express trains of today. They will make what is now known as cavalry charges.
Hot or cold air will be turned on from spigots to regulate the temperature of a house as we now turn on hot or cold water from spigots to regulate the temperature of a bath.
Man will see around the world. Persons and things of all kinds will be brought within focus of cameras connected electronically with screens at the opposite ends of circuits, thousands of miles at a span.
Electric currents applied to the soil will make valuable plants grow larger and faster, and will kill troublesome weeds. Rays of colored light will hasten the growth of many plants.
Wireless telephone and telegraph circuits will span the world.
There will be no street cars in our large cities. All hurry traffic will be below or high above the ground...These underground or overhead streets will teem with capacious automobile passenger coaches and freight wagons with cushioned wheels....Cities, therefore, will be free from all noises.
Photographs will be telegraphed from any distance. Not only will it be possible for a physician to see a living, throbbing heart inside the chest, but he will be able to magnify and photograph any part of it. This work will be done with rays of invisible light.
Fast electric ships, crossing the ocean at more than a mile a minute, will go from New York to Liverpool [England} in two days.
There will be Air-Ships, but they will not successfully compete with surface cars and water vessels for passenger or freight traffic.
Grand Opera will be telephoned to private homes, and will sound as harmonious as though enjoyed from a theater box. Pneumatic tubes, instead of store wagons, will deliver packages and bundles.
Predictions taken from The Ladies Home Journal - 1900

[ClearCase_guy]

Ladies Home Journal, huh? They did pretty well in their predictions.

I imagine that one could dig up a list of predictions from some Harvard academic from the same time period. I wonder if his "hit rate" would be as good. I doubt it.

[SlowBoat407]

Did we have "electronics" as a concept in 1900? Some of these sound a little fishy to me.

[ken5050]

They missed one....LHJ's biggest competitors for the mass woman's market would one day be two magazines...one named after a plug-ugly foul-mouth lesbian, the other after an anal- retentive perfectionist ex-convict.

[cripplecreek]

I like the idea of teleportation but that one seems out of reach in the forseeable future. I would like to be able to heat my yard to summerlike temperatures year round. Cheap, safe, personal flight would be cool.

[grand old partier]

this isnt all that off...

[henderson field]

Popular Science or Popular Mechanics -- one of the two -- promised us all a flying car in 1953. Did they mean like "Thelma and Louise?" -- flying off the top of a mesa? If not, I want one too.

[ThePythonicCow]

Yeah - several items in that post sound real fishy to me.

I seriously doubt that this post.

[HungarianGypsy]

It did come from PBS, so it probably should be something to doubt. :-)

[Doctor Stochastic]

Grand Opera bit the big one though.

Well, it was true until Chevron-Texaco cancelled its support.

[2banana]

Taxes will go up...
The Government will get bigger...
Individual liberties our fathers once took for granted will become memories...
People will live longer and look better.

[DManA]

Some of these predictions are TOO good. Makes me wonder if this is a hoax:

Photographs will be telegraphed from any distance. Not only will it be possible for a physician to see a living, throbbing heart inside the chest, but he will be able to magnify and photograph any part of it.

Fax machines, real time XRays over the internet? I don't think so.

[hosepipe]

[ Actually their predictions are not too bad. Grand Opera bit the big one though. ]

What about dititized sound and downloading music.. You can download about any Opera you want.. past or present.. Actually it better than predicted.. much better.. The acurracy of some sound systems is better than many seats LIVE..

[Fitzcarraldo]

Bootstrapped-Brain Early Warning Station

[hosepipe]

[ I like the idea of teleportation but that one seems out of reach in the forseeable future. I would like to be able to heat my yard to summerlike temperatures year round. Cheap, safe, personal flight would be cool. ]

one word.. "tent.." call it a Yard tent.. or Green house..
Its doable..