Do you remember a time before the Internet? Of course you don’t. Don’t lie. However, there was such a time when you had to look in an encyclopedia to find out something or just live with not knowing it. But then, there was also a time even further back when reference books were rare and many people would write into certain magazines with questions that would be answered in a regular column.
Now imagine this: you have things you want to Google. Pick just one question and write it down. Mail it to a magazine. Wait a month or two. Hope it gets picked out of the hundreds of others they receive and then gets published for the whole world to see (nothing NSFW). Things have hardly changed a bit!
The following are excerpts from a magazine called Current Events. All of these are from 1915, which for historical context means that World War I had just started but the US was still neutral. The questions may surprise you as much as the answers.
That is almost $18,000 per shot in today’s money. Apparently war has never been cheap.
Well, that’s convenient. I think I’d rather . . . not be sued today.
Aww, that’s cute: 1.7 billion people. The world must have felt so empty back then.
This surprised me. The Supreme Court didn’t get its own building until 1935.
“We think paper wheels are not now used.” I think I’d feel better knowing for sure my wheels weren’t made of paper, no matter how much less jarring there was.
Back in 1915, the US was more the kids on the playground surrounding the fighters and yelling “Fight, fight, fight!”
Remember DC citizens: when you get that urge to vote, just go for a brisk run or do some yoga or something.
Ah, the good old days. For context, that is about the amount of oil the United States currently consumes in 10 days.
James Smith 3d, unlike his flat father and linear grandfather.
$2500 in 1915 is about $57,000 today, which was about the salary of the average Vermont government employee in 2008.
“I really want to be a citizen, honey. A little more arsenic in your tea?”
Methinks someone has a guilty conscience about cutting off President Woodrow Wilson on the highway.
I think we should annex Cuba right now. See how that turns out.
I’m actually a little disappointed that by this point in history we don’t have supersupersupersupersupersupersuperdreadnaughts.
Ouch! Poet-laureate burn!
The Green-Walled Tower 
December 6th, 2014 at 12:17 am
how society evolves!
December 6th, 2014 at 4:15 pm
Reblogged this on Mind Chatter and commented:
Must read the small comments under each picture!