divebardaveI got a whiff of what it must have been like to ride coach class in the early 1900s when a family of hard working old order amish got on my rural transit bus to my VA CBOC clinic..https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lNCMRWTLLu8 So getting on a wooded un-airconditioned coach car in farm country with wood benches and a bucket for a toilet. like Vermont or Nebraska must have been hell with the smoking and people who only bathed once a month in addition to layers and layers of clothing. I have noticed that old stations in New England had seperate waiting areas for men and women in part due to smoking and hygene.(Also the old school has seperate entrances for girls/boys as well. Your traveling middle class salesman from the city would have gladly paid a few bucks extra for Pullman first class for this very reason.Chewing tobbaco and spitting/urinating on the platform were common practices for gentleman as well.I remember that my grandparents had a bath night weekly. Today even when I am on the road I go to a YMCA to baith on a daily basis--So even though we romance about the old days of steam train travel it may not have been as glamorouse as we think of it for thr common working man.
Yesteryear is never as 'wonderful' as our minds eye remembers it. The present isn't as bad as we think of it in real time, because in the not too distant future it will transform itself into the 'wonderful' idea of our memories.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Different times, different standards, different expectations, and you don't miss what you've never had.
For example, we all know about the "luxurious" First Class cabins on the Titanic. The fact is only the most expensive First Class cabins had their own bathrooms. The rest of First Class was set up like an old-fashioned hotel, with lavatories and bath facilities at the end of the halls. Individual cabins would have a sink with hot and cold tap water, but nothing else. Second Class was similar. Third Class had only two bathtubs for everyone, although they did have all the other necessarys in their lavatories.
Titanic's sister ship Olympic was set up the same way. It was one of the reasons it was taken out of service in the 1930's, those types of facilities were unacceptable to the traveling public by that time.
Interestingly, many college dormitorys were set up the same way until fairly recently. Sink in the room, maybe, full facilities down the hall.
I've ridden on a lot of the narrow-gauge steam railways in Eastern Germany. The toilet is a seat on top of a large, wide pipe that is open to the tracks. There is toilet paper but the tour I was on encouraged you to bring sanitary wipes as there is no running water.
On another tour we did the narrow gauge line in Northern Germany called the Mollibahn that runs from Bad Doberan to Kuhlungsborn on the Baltic. The train runs down the middle of the street in town and there are no toilets on it at all. The funny thing, steam trains run many times every day but everywhere are people taking pictures of it. You'd think they'd be used to it, unless they're all tourists.
In 1910, the weekly Saturday bath was still the most common standard except among the better off in urban areas. Chewing tobacco was more common then smoking in the country as a whole. Cigars were as common as cigarettes. Drinking from the same cup or dipper regularly occurred. Rural areas still used the Sears Catalogue and corn cobbs in the outhouses.
BaltACDYesteryear is never as 'wonderful' as our minds eye remembers it.
Whenever my wife watches another Victorian PBS drama or Victorian love story, I hold my tongue, wanting to remind her that those lovely Victorian ladies went outside to outhouses, bathed once a week, and were subject to diseases and pain that we don't think about.
York1 John
York1 BaltACD Yesteryear is never as 'wonderful' as our minds eye remembers it. Whenever my wife watches another Victorian PBS drama or Victorian love story, I hold my tongue, wanting to remind her that those lovely Victorian ladies went outside to outhouses, bathed once a week, and were subject to diseases and pain that we don't think about.
BaltACD Yesteryear is never as 'wonderful' as our minds eye remembers it.
Well, there were chamber pots, otherwise known as "thunder mugs." You didn't have to use the outhouse all the time!
The really high-grade chamber pots had lids on 'em too!
There was a big auction of a collection of Lionel products and railroadiana two months ago. One of the articles sold was a Central Pacific chamber pot from 1869. Just think, Leland Stanford could have used it on the way to the "Golden Spike" festivities! Wish I'd known about it...
I've seen the Molli. They are tourists, though many are from other areas in Germany. There are many museum railways as well, that run special excursions on mainlines.
A lot of life is like that. I recently reread a book I have on Ohio rail disasters and one winter night just after Christmas an iron bridge failed in a blizzard and sent a train plunging into a ravine. Needless to say the loss of life was horrendous but it was made all the worse by gangs of thugs who came to rob both the survivors and the dead. Some survivors were murdered.
Today's world isn't neccessarily better or worse than the old days, we just hear about things faster.
Trains, trains, wonderful trains. The more you get, the more you toot!
Flintlock76Interestingly, many college dormitorys were set up the same way until fairly recently. Sink in the room, maybe, full facilities down the hall.
My dorm at Purdue in 1964-66 had a single bath/shower/toilet area for each floor of the building. Just a desk, book case, closet and bed in the rooms - two persons to a room, with each having the same set up. 'Housekeeping' provided one sheet a week for bed making.
Housekeeping? We did it ourselves, though the janitor (who tended the furnace) carried the trash out from the GI cans that stood at the ends of the halls and swept the hall floors. We did have two shower room with washbasins and toilets on each floor (each served 15-16 boys), but we supplied our own sheets and blankets--and did our own laundry.
Johnny
BaltACD 'Housekeeping' provided one sheet a week for bed making.
You went to a high class university. We had to provide our own sheets and wash them. That's why I spent 1½ years sleeping on a mattress with no pad or sheets.
York1 BaltACD 'Housekeeping' provided one sheet a week for bed making. You went to a high class university. We had to provide our own sheets and wash them. That's why I spent 1½ years sleeping on a mattress with no pad or sheets.
Oh yeah, what about Monty Python's Four Men from Yorkshire?
"Huh? We used to live in an old water tank on top of a rubbish tip. We woke up every morning to a load of rotten fish, dumped all over us!"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ue7wM0QC5LE
If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?
Purdue is a 'high class' university. I'd sleep with 2 clean sheets one week, one used sheet for one week and repeat the cycle. Blankets worked too. Too high class for my intellect in higher mathematics required for a Engineering curriculum. Subsequently attended Vincennes University where I found out I was not the dummy the Purdue had made me out to be. Graduated from Kent State.
BaltACD York1 BaltACD 'Housekeeping' provided one sheet a week for bed making. You went to a high class university. We had to provide our own sheets and wash them. That's why I spent 1½ years sleeping on a mattress with no pad or sheets. Purdue is a 'high class' university. I'd sleep with 2 clean sheets one week, one used sheet for one week and repeat the cycle. Blankets worked too. Too high class for my intellect in higher mathematics required for a Engineering curriculum. Subsequently attended Vincennes University where I found out I was not the dummy the Purdue had made me out to be. Graduated from Kent State.
Did your professors at Purdue treat you like this?
"What's this, then? People called 'Romanes' they go to the house?"
https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=youtube+life+of+brian+romans+go+home&view=detail&mid=1829168E1885014FB5571829168E1885014FB557&FORM=VIRE
BaltACDToo high class for my intellect in higher mathematics required for a Engineering curriculum. Subsequently attended Vincennes University where I found out I was not the dummy the Purdue had made me out to be.
Was it not Thorstein Veblen who went so off the rails as to castigate Purdue as a social drinking school instead of a mid-American MIT by the time of the Higher Learning in America? He had some choice language regarding the situation...
Contrast that with Sylvia Preston's Vassar, where she made a 90 average in seven courses (some of them technical) ... those that couldn't hack the math got tutors.
Got me thinking about Astor, and Charles Hays, and the rest who left too soon. Read Bearwarden's speech and think what might have been. And that brings me to
Graduated from Kent State.
which will forever be associated with those four words.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YX95QSKBODo
Romans? Somebody bring up Romans?
I should mention this, a little ethnic pride you know...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7tvauOJMHo
BaltACD Flintlock76 Interestingly, many college dormitorys were set up the same way until fairly recently. Sink in the room, maybe, full facilities down the hall. My dorm at Purdue in 1964-66 had a single bath/shower/toilet area for each floor of the building. Just a desk, book case, closet and bed in the rooms - two persons to a room, with each having the same set up. 'Housekeeping' provided one sheet a week for bed making.
Flintlock76 Interestingly, many college dormitorys were set up the same way until fairly recently. Sink in the room, maybe, full facilities down the hall.
I'm not sure if my son's dorm at Purdue has a single bath/shower/toilet area per floor, but the facilities are shared by everyone on the floor. My first dorm at Cal was set up the same way, though the second one had varying numbers of bathrooms per floor as there were varying numbers of rooms on each floor (only room 101 had an attached bahroom as it was the only room on the first floor).
Paul MilenkovicDid your professors at Purdue treat you like this?
"Romani eunt domus" -- sounds about right for Purdue professors. Boilermakers not big on the classics ...
The analogue at Purdue would be professors finding a student putting an M-80 under a trashcan and making them work to synthesize RDX and package it properly instead...
UGA 1969-1972. All facilities at end of hall. No one provided sheets. In each symmetrical room 2 sofas that pulled out laterally to make single beds, and two small desks. When in beds mode, less than 3 ft. between them. Cozy. Fortunately I had two great roommates in the three years in that dorm. Senior year I shared an off-campus apt; seemed palatial.
In 2002 I attended the ICCCR, an international meeting of Citroen enthusiasts held at the University at Amherst, Massachusetts. People were there from all over the world and many brought their vintage Citroens. I stayed in a dorm room and the toilet and shower were down the hall. It was hotter than hell that weekend; both days it was over 100 degrees. No air conditioning, no fan, no breeze, no nothing. Well, that was the closest I ever got to an ivy league education.
Do you recall a movie called "The Freshman" from about 1987 with Matthew Broderick and Marlon Brando? Brando plays a character who Matthew thinks is a Mafia don just like you-know-who. Brando is in his prison-like dorm room and says, "So this is college? I didn't miss much."
Paul Milenkovic BaltACD York1 BaltACD 'Housekeeping' provided one sheet a week for bed making. You went to a high class university. We had to provide our own sheets and wash them. That's why I spent 1½ years sleeping on a mattress with no pad or sheets. Purdue is a 'high class' university. I'd sleep with 2 clean sheets one week, one used sheet for one week and repeat the cycle. Blankets worked too. Too high class for my intellect in higher mathematics required for a Engineering curriculum. Subsequently attended Vincennes University where I found out I was not the dummy the Purdue had made me out to be. Graduated from Kent State. id your professors at Purdue treat you like this? "What's this, then? People called 'Romanes' they go to the house?" https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=youtube+life+of+brian+romans+go+home&view=detail&mid=1829168E1885014FB5571829168E1885014FB557&FORM=VIRE
BaltACD York1 BaltACD 'Housekeeping' provided one sheet a week for bed making. You went to a high class university. We had to provide our own sheets and wash them. That's why I spent 1½ years sleeping on a mattress with no pad or sheets. Purdue is a 'high class' university. I'd sleep with 2 clean sheets one week, one used sheet for one week and repeat the cycle. Blankets worked too. Too high class for my intellect in higher mathematics required for a Engineering curriculum. Subsequently attended Vincennes University where I found out I was not the dummy the Purdue had made me out to be. Graduated from Kent State. id your professors at Purdue treat you like this?
id your professors at Purdue treat you like this?
Took a French class - Ms. Yamamoto was the insturctor.
OvermodGraduated from Kent State. which will forever be associated with those four words. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YX95QSKBODo
May 4, 1970 was my last day in class. Was in a Business Communications class at the time things went down. Walked on campus that morning past a armored personnel carrier parked at the main gate - National Guardsmen, younger than many of the students going on campus, cleaning the rifles etc. Guardsmen were lead by incompetent 'weekend warrior' leadership that had no training in crowd control and paniced at the first sign of confrontation. I might add that the Guardsmen were fatigued as they had been on duty for the prior two months or so account of at Teamsters strike against the steel haulers in the Northeast Ohio area (it was not yet the Rust Belt).
In the video of '4 Dead in Ohio' the images displayed from about 2:10 on are not from Kent.
"Today's world isn't neccessarily better or worse than the old days, we just hear about things faster."
Quite true, and add to the mix a 24 hour news cycle on so many news networks that has to be filled one way or another it's no wonder we get so many bad news stories (If it bleeds, it leads!) that it's enough to make us think the whole world's coming apart at the seams! Bad stuff happens all the time and always has, we just never used to hear about it.
That Ohio wreck story reminds me of the aftermath of the battle of Waterloo when Belgian civilians descended on the battlefield looting the dead and wounded, even killed some of the wounded who made too much noise. In an odd way I can understand, these were tough country folk who didn't ask for two armies to show up and devastate their fields and crops, but jeez, don't take it out on the poor guys who had to do the fighting!
The thugs who descended on the train wreck had no excuse at all.
Flintlock76The thugs who descended on the train wreck had no excuse at all.
I think Penny's talking about Ashtabula. The kind of damage and rapid spread of the fire might have contributed to reports of opportunistic 'thuggery', but there was also very little to be done for survivors trapped even incidentally in the wreckage. See the Angola Horror by comparison.
Yes. I was. But what I typed isn't here today.
Penny TrainsYes. I was. But what I typed isn't here today.
Yes, I read your post. It was on page two. Page two? There was a page two, but it's not there anymore!
I saw what you submitted yesterday - it sure isn't here today.
Kalmbach IT strikes again.
Penny Trains Yes. I was. But what I typed isn't here today.
Gone indeed! Becky left a very detailed post, and it WAS the "Ashtabula Horror."
Briefly, while the rescue operations were going on masked thugs came out of the darkness indulging in corpse (and not-so-corpse) robbing. Disgusting.
And by the way, the Forum's gone berserk today, posts disappearing and users not being able to log in. I just managed to log in through Microsoft where I usually do it with no problem through Bing/Google. Consideing the lack of posts today I suspect others are having the same problem.
Flintlock76Well, there were chamber pots, otherwise known as "thunder mugs." You didn't have to use the outhouse all the time! The really high-grade chamber pots had lids on 'em too!
When I went to my grandparents house on a farm in Indiana (near lebanon) in the late 40's, they did not have runing water or indoor facilities. Baths were done weekly in a galvanized tub filled with well water heated on the coal/corn cob fueled kitchen stove. There was no other heat in the house though it did have a stove in the parlor (which they did not use very often). When I was there, I slept in a feather down bed with a chamber pot under the bed. And it had a lid. There was a privey (outhouse) down a path from the house. They worked the farm but did not notice any bad smells. Hard working people. Today's people don't know how well off most of us are by comparison to our forebearers.
The little morons currupted the sign-in system yesterday. But I am still signed in on the phone. Go figure!
The "official" site has a timeline of events that says the organized 'masked robbing' took place between 11:00pm and midnight, which is several hours after the accident and presumably after most of the fires had done their worst. There are reports that injured passengers were 'killed' for their money and valuables, but this raises a further question: why were victims still 'out there' wholesale?
In a form of triage, the 'early responders' seem to have been bringing up only the worst injured; the others were apparently arranged in a row down in the ravine (pending removal?) and it was there that opportunity evidently became too overwhelming to the yeggs, whoever they were, who went home, 'masked up', and raided the scene.
Becky mentioned a book on train wrecks in Ohio that recounted the story of one young man who had put valuables into various parts of his clothing. He was 'rolled' repeatedly for money and other valuables, but the thieves missed his 'heirloom watch'.
Electroliner 1935When I was there, I slept in a feather down bed with a chamber pot under the bed. And it had a lid.
Your description of the house is exactly like my grandparents' house. The cob stove in the kitchen was the heat for the whole house. The parlor heater was never used that I remember.
You were lucky to have a pot under the bed. I didn't get one of those. I had to run outside, down the path, to the outhouse.
It was spooky at night. I made sure to never drink anything after supper, and go to the outhouse right before bedtime.
There was never anything better than waking up on a freezing morning, and running downstairs to the kitchen to warm up at Grandma's stove as she cooked.
When I was in the fifth grade and my brother Tommy was in the seventh grade, we spent six weeks in the spring on a farm--kerosene lamps, draw water using a windlass, outhouse, range in the kitchen. That summer, REA was able to come through. In the fall fall, we spent three weeks on the same farm--electric lights and range, indoor plumbing, and telephone (the telephone line came through near the electric line). I was invited once to try milking a cow, but did not do well so I was not invited again (I understood the basics, even those of stripping, but just could not apply them).
Flintlock76the Forum's gone berserk
Yeah I suspect my post just vanished into the ether. I don't think it was moderated or anything, it just vanished. I did type it on the day that the forums were supposed to be "read-only". I'm just too lazy to type it over again.
I hear you! I posted some fine examples of my usual wit and brilliance yesterday, now vanished. Trouble is I forget what I said.
Penny Trains Flintlock76 the Forum's gone berserk Yeah I suspect my post just vanished into the ether. I don't think it was moderated or anything, it just vanished. I did type it on the day that the forums were supposed to be "read-only". I'm just too lazy to type it over again.
Flintlock76 the Forum's gone berserk
Yeah Erik, when I retired and lost my company computer I had to start all over again, so "Firelock" went away and "Flintlock" took his place.
I don't know about the threads getting thousands of replies, but they always seem to have a lot more "Views" than "Replies." Maybe that's a good thing, who knows just how much work the software can handle?
I guess if everyone only bathed once a week, everyone for the most part smelled the same and you just didn't notice it. Growing up I went to a school in the country that was next to a hog farm and with no air conditioning the windows had to remain open most of the day, but after awhile you didn't notice the smell because you just got used to it. The same with all your sweaty classmates after recess.
I always thought about how bad the fly problem must of been in town. After all there were still a lot of horses being used then and what they left in the street or at the hitching post had to attract lots of flies. Before a/c people would have to leave their windows and doors open and even with screens you couldn't keep everything out. Even as a kid I could remember being yelled at when entering or leaving the house, "hurry up! you'll let the flies in"!
I remember reading in the Little House On The Prairie books about the time that they went to vist Pa when he was working for the railroad. The train stopped to allow everyone onboard to eat at a hotel and Laura remembered the food on the tables covered with screen cage covers to keep the flies off the food.
Maybe not so much "the good old days". But with everything moving so slow one smell they probably didn't have to deal with was the "dead skunk in the middle of the road"!
Ralph
I worked part time at a Sears garage. One of my co-workers was also a part timer. His full time job was at the sewage treatment plant. I guess he didn't notice the smell.
MARTIN STATION The train stopped to allow everyone onboard to eat at a hotel
Reminds me of the story (legend?) of how the Harvey Houses got started. The trains would stop and just a minute or two after the passengers got their beans they'd have to dash back to the train. So they just scraped the plates back in the pots and waited for the next train to show up. Travelers owe a lot to Fred Harvey! Now we just need an airline equivalent.
I think I read somewhere the Harvey House organization got so sophisticated they had printed menus on the trains, passengers would make their selections and give them to the conductor. The conductor handed them off at the next station to the telelgrapher who'd relay the menu selections down the line to the next station with a Harvey House. When the train pulled in the meals were waiting.
Eventually Harvey House moved on to the Santa Fe trains themselves. "Great Fred Harvey meals!" it used to say in the Santa Fe ads.
In 1973, my wife, her threee childrem, and I went to Albuquerque and back. Going from Chicago to Albuquerque, the dining car steward was an old hand who knew what to do, what not to do--and what he could do. Later, I wished I had asked him if we could eat in the Turquoise Room. While we were at table for dinner, he took a picture of the five of us. Going back to Chicago, the steward obviously was new, and knew only what was required and what was forbidden.
Fred Harvey believed in giving his customers their money's worth, but only their money's worth. His last words are reputed to have been "Slice the ham thinner."
That being said, Fred Harvey's English Oak Room in the Cleveland Union Terminal was, hands down, the finest restaurant in which I have ever dined.
Luckily, you still can. https://executivecaterers.com/venue/the-oak-room/
Not Fred Harvey though I'm sure the food is still quite spectacular.
My favorite restaurant in the world is this one right here:
Until Becky fixes the link: she's referring to Cinderella's Royal Table at the Magic Kingdom
divebardaveSo getting on a wooded un-airconditioned coach car in farm country with wood benches and a bucket for a toilet. like Vermont or Nebraska must have been hell with the smoking and people who only bathed once a month in addition to layers and layers of clothing.
Not sure where you're getting this from. In 1910 passenger car seats were generally covered in plush, some might have wicker (though I think that was more common in streetcars). In 1910 flush toilets were over a half-century old, and railroad cars had restrooms not that different from what we'd see now. The toilets did flush down onto the tracks, hence the "passengers will please refrain from flushing toilets while the train is standing in the station" warning.
Daily washing was perhaps more common than daily bathing - some Victorian doctors warned that bathing was bad for you, plus many urban people didn't have access to bathtubs - but the idea that everyone X number of years back was so much dirtier than today is really nonsense. People haven't changed for thousands of years, what bothers us now bothered people in the past.
wjstix divebardave So getting on a wooded un-airconditioned coach car in farm country with wood benches and a bucket for a toilet. like Vermont or Nebraska must have been hell with the smoking and people who only bathed once a month in addition to layers and layers of clothing. Not sure where you're getting this from. In 1910 passenger car seats were generally covered in plush, some might have wicker (though I think that was more common in streetcars). In 1910 flush toilets were over a half-century old, and railroad cars had restrooms not that different from what we'd see now. The toilets did flush down onto the tracks, hence the "passengers will please refrain from flushing toilets while the train is standing in the station" warning. Daily washing was perhaps more common than daily bathing - some Victorian doctors warned that bathing was bad for you, plus many urban people didn't have access to bathtubs - but the idea that everyone X number of years back was so much dirtier than today is really nonsense. People haven't changed for thousands of years, what bothers us now bothered people in the past.
divebardave So getting on a wooded un-airconditioned coach car in farm country with wood benches and a bucket for a toilet. like Vermont or Nebraska must have been hell with the smoking and people who only bathed once a month in addition to layers and layers of clothing.
The 1890s RR growth was very fast. I can imagine that many secondary routes had pre and just post civil cars in use. Plush probably only the very 1st class trains.
Plush was quite common in ordinary coaches by 1910, and the fabrics used were incredibly tough. On streetcars rattan was preferred by most companies, until women started getting their stockings caught.
NKP: I posted this some years ago regarding Cleveland's Oak Room. !957 - !967, work-place was Bolt Beranek and Newman's Cambridge, MA office. Had jobs and a few conventions in St. Louiis, Indianapolis, Dayton, Cincinnati, Columbus. Return trip was usually coach to Cleveland, then a sleeper on the New England States to Boston. Regular was dinner between trains in the Oak Room with Walter Holtkamp (Senior), Cleveland organ builder, third generation. (His grandson, the fifth generation, Chris Holtkamp, runs the still-successful company today.) We exchnanged lots of ideas. One evening was devoted to Corpus Christe R. C. Church near Col. U., with how the choir hears the organ and how both are in balance for the congregation were worked out. Living in NY 1970 - 1996, once a month "Music Before 1800" concerts, Louise Basbas director, were a must for me at that church. They are still going strong. Good music and good food and beautiful surroundings go well together.
Personal hygiene is a relatively recent phenomenon. 100+ years ago people didn't bathe daily, brush their teeth, and deodorant and other hygiene products were simply not available. The good old days.. bad teeth and horrible BO.. on trains and everywhere else.
Ddin't the Romans have hot running water and public baths? Wasn't Penn Station's concourse based on the Roman baths at Caracalla? (sp) Also, regarding flush toilets- they were invented by one Thomas Crapper in England. Today at Kings Cross station in London there is a pub called the Parcel Yard. It's a fairly new place. The toilets are reproductions from way back when and are labelled for Thomas Crapper. His invention along with indoor plumbing in general had a good effect on life expectency back then.
The Romans had public baths all right, and quite sophisticated ones. Hot running water? I'm not so sure about that. Running water in the wealthier homes, I believe so. Everyone else went to public fountains for water, there was plenty of those, and it was good water as well.
Flintlock76I'm not so sure about that.
Look up 'caldarium' and you will be.
But that's hot and cold bath water (see 'hypocausts' to see how the hot water got that way). That's not hot and cold taps. For that you require pressure. The Romans had all the technology (see inverted siphons) to build such a system, gravity-pressurized and sealed with tasty lead, but to my knowledge didn't use it for hot potable water...
Caldariums and hypocausts. Right, I watched a documentary a few years ago about the Baths of Caracalla that described exactly that, even showed the ruins of the same.
I was sure the Romans didn't have hot water from a tap, but if they had cold water from a tap, by whatever means, that wouldn't surprise me.
Those times were still having water systems in many places that were not really potable. There were many locations that the best drink was c2h5oh.
Flintlock76I watched a documentary a few years ago about the Baths of Caracalla that described exactly that, even showed the ruins of the same.
Probably the one I'm thinking of where they built a small replica? I remember they had hot coals under the floor in the one I saw. Probably a Nova episode btw.
Ulrich Personal hygiene is a relatively recent phenomenon. 100+ years ago people didn't bathe daily, brush their teeth, and deodorant and other hygiene products were simply not available. The good old days.. bad teeth and horrible BO.. on trains and everywhere else.
Lifebuoy Soap radio ads from the '30s were famous for the "B.O." foghorn, so the shift in personal hygeine was definitely taking place by 1930. I would suspect that air conditioned trains also helped as people weren't sweating as much in transit.
Penny Trains Flintlock76 I watched a documentary a few years ago about the Baths of Caracalla that described exactly that, even showed the ruins of the same. Probably the one I'm thinking of where they built a small replica? I remember they had hot coals under the floor in the one I saw. Probably a Nova episode btw.
Flintlock76 I watched a documentary a few years ago about the Baths of Caracalla that described exactly that, even showed the ruins of the same.
I don't remember anyone building a replica on the show I watched, it was more of a walk-through the ruins and a "this-did-that" and "this-was-that" show.
Doing some follow up research last night I learned the Baths lasted until the 9th Century AD, the buildings that is, not the bath function, and were wrecked by an earthquake. Much of the masonry was removed for other building projects, not uncommon in those days, leaving what we see now.
Erik_Mag Ulrich Personal hygiene is a relatively recent phenomenon. 100+ years ago people didn't bathe daily, brush their teeth, and deodorant and other hygiene products were simply not available. The good old days.. bad teeth and horrible BO.. on trains and everywhere else. Lifebuoy Soap radio ads from the '30s were famous for the "B.O." foghorn, so the shift in personal hygeine was definitely taking place by 1930. I would suspect that air conditioned trains also helped as people weren't sweating as much in transit.
In childhood, I recall a character in the Dick Tracy cartoon called B.O. Plenty.
https://www.google.com/search?q=b.o.+plenty&oq=b.o.+plenty&aqs=chrome..69i57.7976j0j7&client=ms-android-vivo&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8#imgrc=fuz8Na8CH1ozgM:
The Chicago Tribune still carries Dick Tracy, and B O Plenty and his daughter Sparkle turn up every now and again.
Monday night! I typed in a 'researched response to one of the Forum Threads'...About three or four times! I'd type in the 'Enter' key, and the darn [***!@#$..}thing would disapper..... That really SUCKED!
So thanks for the 'explanations' ! I thought, I was the one, being singled out for a frontal 'Gremlin' attack ..
Personally, I'd love to see some of those IT 'Gremlins' take a ride in a really hot tub;installed in an AMTRK sleeper car, riding over a jointed rail territory at about top speed.... OR MAYBE, sittin' in an incenerator(?) As the ambulance chasers say: EQUAL JUSTICE!
CSSHEGEWISCH The Chicago Tribune still carries Dick Tracy, and B O Plenty and his daughter Sparkle turn up every now and again.
Incidentally, "Dick Tracy" must be stuck in time; seventy years ago, B.O. was not a young man. Are Junior Tracy and Sparkle still around? I have not see the strip for perhaps fifty years.
Dick Tracy is still being published? I haven't seen it in many years. I stopped reading it when the characters were flying around in space in spacecraft that looked like garbage cans. The original strips done by Chester Gould could be pretty violent, sort of a comic strip version of Warner Brothers gangster movies of the 1930s.
54light15 Dick Tracy is still being published? I haven't seen it in many years. I stopped reading it when the characters were flying around in space in spacecraft that looked like garbage cans. The original strips done by Chester Gould could be pretty violent, sort of a comic strip version of Warner Brothers gangster movies of the 1930s.
It's Dick Tracy in name only.
As a kid, Dick Tracy was on the front page of the four page color Sunday comics in our paper. The cartoonist had great criminals in the strip.
York1 As a kid, Dick Tracy was on the front page of the four page color Sunday comics in our paper. The cartoonist had great criminals in the strip.
I remember those full-page Sunday comics in the New York Daily News decades back, and "Dick Tracy" was one of them.
Chester Gould was still alive at the time, and he drew criminals the way he always did, all the criminals were ugly. Stood to reason, crime was ugly, and Gould didn't glamorize it. And when a villian was killed the last you saw of him was stretched out on a mortuary slab.
charlie hebdo 54light15 Dick Tracy is still being published? I haven't seen it in many years. I stopped reading it when the characters were flying around in space in spacecraft that looked like garbage cans. The original strips done by Chester Gould could be pretty violent, sort of a comic strip version of Warner Brothers gangster movies of the 1930s. It's Dick Tracy in name only.
As I recall, the strip" Gasoline Alley", was the only one I saw which had the characters aging.
Cookie Bumstead was born about 1941 or 1942--she and Alexander ("Baby Dumpling") are still teenagers.
There is a Canadian strip called "For Better Or Worse" that's carried by the Tribune in which the characters are aging.
CSSHEGEWISCH There is a Canadian strip called "For Better Or Worse" that's carried by the Tribune in which the characters are aging.
Wonderful strip! And it's actually in it's second go-'round. The creator, Lynn Johnston, wrapped up the first story line in 2008, then decided to re-boot not long afterward and do the Patterson family story again. And yes, the strip does place in "real-time" and the characters age.
CSSHEGEWISCHThere is a Canadian strip called "For Better Or Worse" that's carried by the Tribune in which the characters are aging.
She also sticks in railroad themes every so often since her husband was a model railroader!
Here's her page with the strip running each day. If you go back through the archives, you can find some of the model railroad strips:
https://fborfw.com/
Is Gasoline Alley still being published? It's funny how the characters age but still, Skeezix has to be over 100 years old and Walt has got to be about 130! If they are both still in the strip, that is. But Calvin and Hobbes never get old! Cripes, I miss that strip but I do have all the books and still laugh my head off.
"Gasolene Alley" is indeed still being published! I only get to see it when traveling out-of-state, the local paper doesn't carry it.
I sure miss "Calvin and Hobbes" as well, but I think it hit its zenith with...
"The Attack Of The Deranged Mutant Killer Monster Snow Goons!"
Really! Now how do you top that?
Remember- "Snow goons are bad news." Words of wisdom!
Flintlock76 "Gasolene Alley" is indeed still being published! I only get to see it when traveling out-of-state, the local paper doesn't carry it. I sure miss "Calvin and Hobbes" as well, but I think it hit its zenith with... "The Attack Of The Deranged Mutant Killer Monster Snow Goons!" Really! Now how do you top that?
Some of your favorite comics are as close as your computer.
https://www.gocomics.com/comics/a-to-z
https://www.comicskingdom.com
These two sites have many comics, including some no longer being produced and political comics. I have my favorites that I check everyday. I started using it after local papers dropped some favorites.
The gocomics site does have more than it's share of ads.
Jeff
The Far Side has finally made it to the web.
https://www.thefarside.com/
Intersting, the gocomics site. I see L'il Abner and Alley Oop, but it doesn't list Pogo, Terry and the Pirates or Steve Canyon. The most important oversight is the first comic strip ever, Hogan's Alley by Richard F. Outcault. Hogan's Alley introduced "The Yellow Kid " to the world as the first real comic strip character in 1895.
54light15Also, regarding flush toilets- they were invented by one Thomas Crapper in England.
He didn't actually invent them, they'd been around for about 50 years. Crapper was apparently the biggest producer and installer of "water closets" in Britain, and he did make some refinements that made them work better than prior ones.
54light15: "Also, regarding flush toilets- they were invented by one Thomas Crapper in England."
wjstix: "He didn't actually invent them, they'd been around for about 50 years. Crapper was apparently the biggest producer and installer of "water closets" in Britain, and he did make some refinements that made them work better than prior ones."
This British company is still in business and highly sought after by people restoring fine houses.
https://www.thomas-crapper.com
As Tessio said, 'They have the old fashioned toilet, the box with the chain thing. We could tape the gun behind that."
54light15 As Tessio said, 'They have the old fashioned toilet, the box with the chain thing. We could tape the gun behind that."
I actually ran into one of those! About thirty years ago I was repairing a copier in one of Virginia Commonwealth University's offices, it was in an old mansion on West Franklin Street here in Richmond.
Finished the job and needed to wash up, went into a men's room and there it was! "Wow!" I said to myself, "Mom told me about those! They had one in the apartment she grew up in in Manhattan!"
Needless to say I didn't pass up a chance to experience a bit of history.
Hey, Teddy Roosevelt might have used that thing!
Remembering an old Bill Cosby routine about pull-chain toilets before I pulled the handle I muttered...
"Torpedo los!"
Living history, you can't beat it!
Remember the Maine! To hell with Spain! And don't forget to pull the chain!
Back in 1948, when I went to the wedding of one of my brothers, in West Virginia, I found, in the bride's home, one with a plunger that you pushed. The water was supplied through a ram a hill or two away. No, the ram was not one of the sheep that they raised.
DeggestyThe water was supplied through a ram a hill or two away. No, the ram was not one of the sheep that they raised.
Nor was it a Dodge truck with a pump belted to a raised wheel.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydraulic_ram
My 1976 Eldorado had an analogue of this for its ride leveling: engine vacuum rprovided thrust for a simple reciprocating air pump. It could produce surprising pressure, if you gave it long enough to run ... until the little rubber dome diaphragm in it went bad.
Back to the original post/issue, I have to wonder if someone from c.1920 were brought into the present day, if they wouldn't be amazed at how sloppy and unkempt people are today. My parents were teenagers in the 1930's, and recalled how boys wore shirts and ties to schools, and of course girls only wore outfits with skirts. I was just reading where someone was talking about how in the 1940's his grandfather wore a suit and tie to ride the streetcar to his job as a steelworker. At the plant, he changed into work clothes, then took a shower and put his suit back on for the trip home. Many railroaders did something similar.
Schools taught classes covering things like manners and behavior. Our ideas of 'do your own thing' and asking your kids to pretty please stop doing whatever they doing wrong didn't exist.
Regarding steelworkers, I've seen in movies how workers didn't have lockers for thier street clothes but would hook them onto a chain thing and hoist them upwards to hang. Was that for real? Are there any places like that? Maybe it was in "The Deer Hunter" I saw that, I don't really recall but I did see more than once the chain arrangement.
In the movie, "I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang," near the end, Paul Muni is not just playing a criminal bum, but a tie-wearing criminal bum.
wjstixin the 1930's, and recalled how boys wore shirts and ties to schools, and of course girls only wore outfits with skirts.
I'm old, but not that old!
In the 1950s and early 60s, girls in my school wore skirts. On very cold days, they would wear pants under their skirts! If I remember high school, by the late sixties, girls had switched almost completely to pants.
54light15 Regarding steelworkers, I've seen in movies how workers didn't have lockers for thier street clothes but would hook them onto a chain thing and hoist them upwards to hang. Was that for real? Are there any places like that? Maybe it was in "The Deer Hunter" I saw that, I don't really recall but I did see more than once the chain arrangement. In the movie, "I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang," near the end, Paul Muni is not just playing a criminal bum, but a tie-wearing criminal bum.
Quite true, about those hanging "lockers," at least in one case.
Several years back "Weird New Jersey" magazine published an "urban explorer-industrial archeology" photo essay of the abandoned Bethlehem Steel works in Bethlehem PA, and sure enough in the men's locker room there were steel "cauldrons," for lack of a better term, suspended on chains from the ceiling. And that was the drill, street clothes went into the cauldrons and were hoisted up out of the way. Remarkable.
Continuing with the personal hygene thoughts...
One of the things we like to do while traveling is pick up local real estate brocures, you know, the ones they give out at supermarkets? It's a fun thing to see what homes are selling for in the vicinity.
A while back we were looking at some brochures in the southeast Pennsylvania region, and in the town of Phoenixville there were a number of homes for sale built in the 1910-1920 era. Nice houses too, well-built and substantial, and going for VERY reasonable prices, much less than you'd think. We wondered why until we saw the specs, most of which were "Four bedrooms, one bath," or "Five bedrooms, one bath."
"Aha!" we thought, "No wonder they're so cheap!" Then we realised that even though one bathroom for a house that size would be unacceptable nowadays, when those homes were built the original owners were probably thrilled to have a complete indoor bathroom, many probably had first-hand experience with a washtub in the kitchen and an outhouse or a chamber pot and were ecstatic to be through with that way of life!
Five bedrooms and one bath? No big deal to those folks 100 years ago. They probably thought it was heaven on earth.
Let's not forget that change is often evolutionary, not revolutionary. Somewhere between that little shack out back, and indoor plumbing, was a wooden base cabinet called a "commode" that typically had a tight fitting door to put that chamber pot inside of, and which typically sported a pitcher of water, a wash bowl, and a towel rack on the top side.
And of course the well-to-do victorian ladies had servants to service their commode. Talk about your "dirty jobs".
Running an image search for "antique wooden commode" will produce a bounty of creative thinking once employed towards that "end"...ahem!
Question, the OP mentions the crude conditions imposed upon rail travelers back in the day, but what options for bathing exist today for someone traveling coach long distance via Amtrak?
In London across the pond there is a museum at Kew Bridge that is all about water and sewerage. It well describes what life was like in the early 19th century and in previous years. You've heard the expression, "I ain't got a pot to p*** in or a window the throw it out of." That was the usual way of disposing of what was in the chamber pot and makes you realise just what a benefit indoor plumbing and flush toilets are. It also make you realise that if you ever travel back in time to that era, make sure you have all your vaccinations. And wear a wide-brimmed hat.
And don't drink the water!
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
54light15 In London across the pond there is a museum at Kew Bridge that is all about water and sewerage. It well describes what life was like in the early 19th century and in previous years. You've heard the expression, "I ain't got a pot to p*** in or a window the throw it out of." That was the usual way of disposing of what was in the chamber pot and makes you realise just what a benefit indoor plumbing and flush toilets are. It also make you realise that if you ever travel back in time to that era, make sure you have all your vaccinations. And wear a wide-brimmed hat.
True as well, although as a matter of courtesy and good form you were supposed to shout a warning to the street below before the toss!
SD70Dude And don't drink the water!
And THAT reminds me of something they left out of the movie from General Patton's address to the troops...
"When we get to Europe DON'T drink any water unless you get it from our engineer water points! ALL the water in Europe is p***! You wouldn't drink p***, would you? Of course not!"
54light45 -- " Regarding steelworkers, I've seen in movies how workers didn't have lockers for thier street clothes but would hook them onto a chain thing and hoist them upwards to hang. Was that for real? Are there any places like that?
What you are describing is a 'dry' and they are very much still around. All Mines with no exceptions have drys for your work clothes. They are hoisted high up into the heat, usually heat fans up there that blow the air around and dry out your work clothes,socks, boots, underwear, the works. Also cakes all the mud and dirt and it flakes off real easy. Steel mills have the as well.
There are still lockers for your street clothes and valuables and usually a large shower for multiple people in between the two areas.
At the older dorms of MSU in East Lansing, all facilities down the hall is still standard.
Those spartan dorm rooms of the 1950's & 1960's helped keep the price of a college education down.
But college kids could be spoiled all through history. I once read of a rich businessman from the South who had two sons attending Yale University around 1900. He had his private car sent up to New Haven, presumably fully staffed, because he "wanted his sons to have Thanksgiving dinner under (their) own roof" and not in some hotel or stranger's house.
NKP guy But college kids could be spoiled all through history. I once read of a rich businessman from the South who had two sons attending Yale University around 1900. He had his private car sent up to New Haven, presumably fully staffed, because he "wanted his sons to have Thanksgiving dinner under (their) own roof" and not in some hotel or stranger's house.
Wonder if someone at Yale was bribed to permit the kids to enrole.
BaltACD NKP guy But college kids could be spoiled all through history. I once read of a rich businessman from the South who had two sons attending Yale University around 1900. He had his private car sent up to New Haven, presumably fully staffed, because he "wanted his sons to have Thanksgiving dinner under (their) own roof" and not in some hotel or stranger's house. Wonder if someone at Yale was bribed to permit the kids to enrole.
Maybe, maybe not.
But the old saying "Money talks" was just as true back then as it is now. And why is everyone so shocked and "outraged" by this?
What General Patton said is sure true-when I made my four Med cruises in the 1970s, the water in the various ports was undrinkable. Barcelona, especially. But there, if you want water to drink, you buy it at the store. Tap water was for washing and flushing. And Barcelona water sure stunk. I wonder if it's still like that.
Flintlock76 BaltACD NKP guy But college kids could be spoiled all through history. I once read of a rich businessman from the South who had two sons attending Yale University around 1900. He had his private car sent up to New Haven, presumably fully staffed, because he "wanted his sons to have Thanksgiving dinner under (their) own roof" and not in some hotel or stranger's house. Wonder if someone at Yale was bribed to permit the kids to enrole. Maybe, maybe not. But the old saying "Money talks" was just as true back then as it is now. And why is everyone so shocked and "outraged" by this?
Perhaps the word is "angry"? Many of us want to see merit be the defining characteristic, not deep pockets.
charlie hebdoPerhaps the word is "angry"? Many of us want to see merit be the defining characteristic, not deep pockets.
And I'm angry, enough I find to be almost furious, at even the implication that merit wasn't the defining characteristic for those two boys.
It might even be easy enough to consult Yale alumni records to find the last names of two boys attending at the same time, in those years, coming from the South. See if both of them graduated in four years. See what both of them did subsequent to their time at Yale. Might even be possible to see what they studied, and how they did.
But before you've done that, there's no reason to even consider them 'slacker' 'gentleman's-C' students just because their father can send up a private car for holiday dinner.
Flintlock76 SD70Dude And don't drink the water! And THAT reminds me of something they left out of the movie from General Patton's address to the troops... "When we get to Europe DON'T drink any water unless you get it from our engineer water points! ALL the water in Europe is p***! You wouldn't drink p***, would you? Of course not!"
C'mon guys, be realisatic..... this is America we are talking about. Since when is money (truly) second to merit? Oh,..it would be nice to suppose otherwise...'knights in white satin' and all that.....but I'd never underestimate the "ambitions" of the Bursars office, either.
After all, you remember the old manifesto: "if ya don't work, then ya don't eat"
wjstix Flintlock76 SD70Dude And don't drink the water! And THAT reminds me of something they left out of the movie from General Patton's address to the troops... "When we get to Europe DON'T drink any water unless you get it from our engineer water points! ALL the water in Europe is p***! You wouldn't drink p***, would you? Of course not!" My dad served in the 30th infantry div. in Europe during the war. He said they had pills issued to them that they dropped into their canteen after filling it with water, and it disinfected the water. Otherwise, they wouldn't have been able to drink the water. He noted that the food was horrible, as he was in a front line unit they had a hard time getting supplies up to them. He said the guys who complained after the war about eating spam were guys who spent the war in the states. At the front, a can of spam was a welcome change.
Those sound like Halazone tablets. They were still available in outdoor sports stores into the 1970's, and may still be, I'm not sure, I haven't looked in a while.
"The food was horrible..." reminds me of something Bill Mauldin said in his book "Up Front..."
"Ads in magazines back in the US show guys at the front wallowing in goodies. Only the rear-echelon troops wallow in goodies, all the guys at the front wallow in is mud! There's always plenty of that."
I never cared for those Halazone tablets ... nor did I really think they posed a relative health risk of their own if you had to use them on any sort of regular basis!
Interestingly, some Scandinavians seem to have found out that using a simple filter on the 'ambient' water, then putting it in used PET plastic bottles and exposing it to bright sunlight for a surprisingly short time, provides just as potable a water with no terrible 'side effects'. Certainly gets it to a state where much less heroic chemical treatment would be needed for safety...
Incidentally, when I was at college between the late '70s and early '80s the bathroom facilities were not 'at the end of the hall' ... they were down up to three flights of stairs in the basement, and the school arranged dormitory 'entries' by sex so they only needed one kind for everyone on a given stairwell.
Convicted OneSince when is money (truly) second to merit?
Stop with the red herrings.
The issue here isn't even whether Yale might be tempted ... as Harvard was with J.F.Kennedy after he flunked rather spectacularly out of Princeton ... to take the money and carefully skirt the academics as far as possible.
I knew quite a number of people from 'wealthier families' at the schools I attended. At least one, whose last name you'd quickly recognize, was in agony one night because he'd made a B+ in one of his classes and he was mortally terrified that his father would take him out of school as a 'failure'. Perhaps my experience was more than a little non-typical, but I knew very few students from 'non-financial-aid' backgrounds who did not work hard in all respects, certainly up to their intellectual capacity.
The issue is whether two kids with a rich father were, or weren't, good Yalies. And that is not something anyone has established here. Even if, as I might add...
Convicted OneAfter all, you remember the old manifesto: "if ya don't work, then ya don't eat"
... that is, unless ya own.
OvermodAnd I'm angry, enough I find to be almost furious, at even the implication that merit wasn't the defining characteristic for those two boys. It might even be easy enough to consult Yale alumni records to find the last names of two boys attending at the same time, in those years, coming from the South. See if both of them graduated in four years. See what both of them did subsequent to their time at Yale. Might even be possible to see what they studied, and how they did. But before you've done that, there's no reason to even consider them 'slacker' 'gentleman's-C' students just because their father can send up a private car for holiday dinner.
I had a good friend who graduated from Yale in '09...that's 1909. In his memoirs he wrote, "Yale and other Ivy League colleges required one to pass the College Board Examinations, or their equivalent: Yale's own examinations. My classmates planning to apply to Yale were permitted to divide these 24 exams over the last three years of (preperatory school)."
"Yale required passing Latin grammar, Julius Caesar and Cicero." I surmise that these were 3 of the required 24 examinations; one may guess the 21 others were on equally esoteric or difficult subjects.
My point is this: Whatever those college boys with the private car did with their educations or careers, there was a time in their young lives when they were most definitely not slackers. They had to hustle to get into college. See for reference Theodore Roosevelt at Harvard.
Once into college, however, things were different. College courses became much more rigorous by the time of the First World War; before then, "gentlemen C's" were quite acceptable. See for reference FDR at Harvard.
I like the following aphorism as it applies to our elites:
"From those to whom much is given, much is expected."
That's probably from Beebe's "Mansions on Rails". Don't have my copy with me, but seem to recall that the businessman was named in the book.
It may have been in Bill Mauldin's magnum opus that I read that the German solldiers were provided with better food than what was available to those in the rear--and they were appalled at what was given them to eat after being captured.
Yes, warn before emptying, just as we were invited to warn before flushing if someone were taking a shower at the same time--I can still see one of my classmates leaping out of the shower because no warning was given.
However, when "Picayune" Butler brought his army into New Orleans, the ladies in the houses would give no warning if a soldier should be below her window. General Butler issued an order promising punishment if the practice continued.
Sorry, maybe you are sensitive on this but my Ivy friends have some stories to tell of how privilege, i.e., an elitism based on prep schools, family and wealth, was very evident in the 1960s, not only at Yale and less so at Harvard, but also at Princeton, mirabile dictu!!
The stories of W. Bush are hilarious. He got in as a legacy case and was a pretty mediocre student who would have probably failed at other institutions where his name carried no weight.
Once they became co-ed, perhaps this pernicious influence lessened.
Deggesty It may have been in Bill Mauldin's magnum opus that I read that the German solldiers were provided with better food than what was available to those in the rear--and they were appalled at what was given them to eat after being captured.
Even more true in WWI.
charlie hebdoThe stories of W. Bush are hilarious. He got in as a legacy case and was a pretty mediocre student who would have probably failed at other institutions where his name carried no weight.
And Bush's 2004 opponent, John Kerry, had a lower grade average at Yale than Bush.
https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4684384
Flintlock76"The food was horrible..." reminds me of something Bill Mauldin said in his book "Up Front..." "Ads in magazines back in the US show guys at the front wallowing in goodies. Only the rear-echelon troops wallow in goodies, all the guys at the front wallow in is mud! There's always plenty of that."
When my dad got back to the states - as it happens, he arrived in New York harbor on V-J Day, and on the Queen Mary to boot - the soldiers were all given two tickets and told to get in line. One ticket got them a bunch of goodies: a carton of cigarettes, a big Hershey bar, a new shaving kit, a roll of 35mm film etc. The other ticket got them into a big warehouse-turned-messhall for a steak dinner. When my dad came out, a sargeant asked him if he wanted the film. My dad said no and gave him the film. The sarge had a big roll of the tickets and gave two more to my dad. He went through the line again and got the stuff, gave the sargeant the film - and went and had another steak dinner. He said it was the first really good food he'd had since leaving home.
charlie hebdo Deggesty It may have been in Bill Mauldin's magnum opus that I read that the German solldiers were provided with better food than what was available to those in the rear--and they were appalled at what was given them to eat after being captured. Even more true in WWI.
Certainly true in World War Two, but not necessarily so in World War One. Erich Maria Remarque in "All Quiet On The Western Front" speaks of "short rations" on the German side on more than one occasion. And by the autumn of 1918 many German troops were, if not on the point of starvation, pretty close to it. In his history of WW1 S.L.A. Marshall mentions German POW's bolting down their food like any half-starved man would. He should have known, he was there.
The British blockade (which lasted into 1919) caused mass starvation and deaths in the German civilian population (524000 to 783000). The military lost 1.8 to 2 million. Remember, Remarque's great novel was anti-war, so may not tell the tale accurately of back home. Also the myth "Dolchstoßlegende" that the war was lost because of the home populace, socialists and Jews, not the collapse of the military, was a favorite theme of rightist and militarists postwar.
I think the Germans in 1918 just ran out of soldiers and when there were 1 million (so I've heard) Americans in the field, it was time to give up. We all know about the big lies told by you-know-who who said that they were stabbed in the back. Yeah, right. Plus the Spanish Flu may have had an influence.
charlie hebdoSorry, maybe you are sensitive on this but my Ivy friends have some stories to tell of how privilege, i.e., an elitism based on prep schools, family and wealth, was very evident in the 1960s, not only at Yale and less so at Harvard, but also at Princeton, mirabile dictu!!
I'm sure it was, and I'd suspect it was worse in the Fifties than in the Sixties. I can only say that my experience (which brackets those decades) was different when it came to actual 'elite' families with actual wealth at Princeton. Arrogance as far as I could tell was an institutional part of the Yale experience, and a sort of expected privilege at Harvard, but it never terribly bothered me as I concentrated on how things got done rather than who prepped where or roomed with whom there, and it was surprising how the origins disappeared once the minds got to work.
For pure snobbery it was hard to beat Columbia, but that was in the post-Baird Jones collapse of young New York 'society,' when it ceased to matter, if it ever did, whose families were in or out of the Social Register. (It remains interesting to me that, in the whole decade of the Eighties that I was studying at SIA as a foreign-policy wonk, neither I, nor any of my friends, nor any of my professors remembers ever having seen or heard of Barack Hussein Obama. And I knew Michelle Robinson when she was at Princeton...)
Shrub does seem a pretty sad example as a thinking man, but one does have to wonder how he went on to secure an MBA if he were that worthless intellectually, and so well connected with the New World Order types that he needed no skillz to succeed.
charlie hebdo The British blockade (which lasted into 1919) caused mass starvation and deaths in the German civilian population (524000 to 783000). The military lost 1.8 to 2 million. Remember, Remarque's great novel was anti-war, so may not tell the tale accurately of back home. Also the myth "Dolchstoßlegende" that the war was lost because of the home populace, socialists and Jews, not the collapse of the military, was a favorite theme of rightist and militarists postwar.
Remarque was really more interested in telling the story of the Frontsoldaten, more so than the story of the home front, the life at the front is what he knew best after all.
But you are correct, the British blockade of Germany was brutally effective and a direct cause, among others, of the collapse of the German effort. While the country folk weren't really affected by starvation the cities certainly were, and that's where the unrest really took hold.
As far as the myth of the "stab-in-the-back," there was a study done by the German Army after the defeat as to "what went wrong." While recognizing the fact of the societal collapse the study didn't blame it, the German Army knew damn well why they lost. But, they didn't do much of anything to put the "stab-in-the-back" myth to rest, preferring people to think otherwise.
Getting way off topic here, the devastating effect of the British blockade is one of the reasons the Nazi government pursued the principle of "autarchy," or total national self-sufficiency of food and raw materials (as much as possible) as a preparation for the next war, when and if it occurred. Imperial Germany wasn't prepared for a long war and paid the ultimate price. They came close to winning anyway, but as the saying goes "Close only counts in horsehoes and hand grenades!"
Overmod, wasn't really a "red herring".
I was mildly offended when the suggestion was first made that wealth and privilige might have been a factor....but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that it just as well could have been......so who is to really say one way or the other?
Certainly the opportunity is there.
Convicted OneOvermod, wasn't really a "red herring".
I'm not really intending to single you out for criticism.
My real complaint is that we have a story about a father caring enough to 'send the very best' for his kids, attending one of the premier Ivy League institutions, and the argument rapidly devolves into 'kids with that kind of advantage have to be spoiled and lazy children of privilege'.
As you point out, we don't know, and that was my point as well. However, the problem in not 'really saying one way or the other' is that in doing so we commit precisely the kind of prejudice that would be cause for a Kalmbach ban if it involved 'certain tripwire social groups' and their associated stereotypical grounds for "criticism". The father is rich and loaded, and whether he sent the car out of 'caring for home life' or to show off his wealth and capability, I of course don't know. The thing is that it remains a question, not an opportunity to render judgment ... and to then apply it to the kids as recipients makes me wonder if it's more sour grapes than seeking a sense of social justice.
I confess I'm now interested in finding out who this was, and what the kids actually did in and after Yale. This is very much still in the Varmint/Stover at Yale years, so we have a little theoretical background (however fiddled for literary purposes) to work with.
I confess I'm now interested in finding out who this was, and what the kids actually did in and after Yale. I think this was very much still in the Varmint/Stover at Yale years, so we have a little theoretical background (however fiddled for literary purposes) to work with.
Overmod I confess I'm now interested in finding out who this was, and what the kids actually did in and after Yale. This is very much still in the Varmint/Stover at Yale years, so we have a little theoretical background (however fiddled for literary purposes) to work with.
Well, well, well, and guess how this turns out! And I thought 'do you live in the Blast Zone' had an ironic source twist...
It's on p.359.
The father was Louis Hill, and if that name rings a railroad bell, yes, it's the Great Northern Hills.
Beebe said it was a business car, not a 'private car' -- not that there's necessarily a difference in luxury, but it wasn't idle rich privilege...
He had not two, but three sons there at various times, and apparently didn't miss a year that any one of them was there to send the car for Thanksgiving.
Now someone can follow up on the three Hill scions at Yale and see how they did ... Louis Warren Hill, Jr.; James Jerome Hill II (he went by Jerome, not 'Jim', btw.); and Cortlandt Taylor Hill. (Incidentally, for those watching Beebe's hijinks at Yale, the Thanksgiving dinners ran from the early to late 1920s ... Louis was born 1902 and Cortlandt, the latest, 1906 ... so he was there firsthand for the first couple; I wonder if he might have been invited...)
As far as I can tell, all three went to St. Paul's, then Exeter, if that's an important detail.
I'm sure everyone will have an opinion about this PDF and the details it contains.
I might note that Jerome won an Oscar in 1957 for a documentary on Albert Schweitzer, which, what do you know, you can watch here.
Now this is what I call fine research!
Overmod It's on p.359.
Tack så mycket.
I was quickly looking through the book last night, and overlooked that paragraph. The eldest Hill was known for being careful with his money and the GN business cars were not extravagant.
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