I am at a conference this week at Disneyland, California, although this conference is a yearly event for Podiatric Physicians (the 3rd largest meeting in the country), this year it is quite special because we are also celebrating our National Association, the APMA, 100th Anniversary. In honor of that I thought I would repost a fun trivia, I did over a year ago on what it was like 100 years ago in America, I hope you enjoy it.
Even though one hundred years seems like a long time ago, it really is not. There are not too many people alive now who lived then, and the world was a very, very different place than it is now. When you read some of these facts it will cause you to realize how much our country has advanced in just 100 years. Technology has moved us forward at lightning speed. You have got to wonder what will be written a 100 years from now about what today is like. Enjoy and ponder…
100 Years Ago
A lot of this is applicable to our grandparents, and even some of our parents. It may be hard to believe that a scant 100 years ago… The average life expectancy in the United States was forty-seven.
Only 14 percent of the homes in the United States had a bathtub.
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 ten mph.
Alabama, Mississippi, Iowa, and Tennessee were each more heavily populated than California.
With a mere 1.4 million residents, California was only the twenty-first most populous state in the Union.
The tallest structure in the world was the Eiffel Tower.
The average wage in the U.S. was twenty-two cents an hour. The average U.S. worker made between $200 and $400 per year.
A competent accountant could expect to earn $2000 per year, a dentist $2500 per year, a veterinarian between $1500 and $4000 per year, and a mechanical engineer about $5000 per year.
More than 95 percent of all births in the United States took place at home. Ninety percent of all U.S. 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, either as travelers or immigrants.
The five leading causes of death in the U.S. 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 thirty. The remote desert community was inhabited by only a handful of ranchers and their families. Plutonium, insulin, and antibiotics hadn’t been discovered yet. Scotch tape, crossword puzzles, canned beer, and iced tea hadn’t been invented.
There was no Mother’s Day or Father’s Day.
One in ten U.S. 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.
Coca-Cola contained cocaine instead of caffeine.
Eighteen percent of households in the United States had at least one full-time servant or domestic.
~author unknown
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