Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1892-03-18
STEAM DETHRONED.
Chauncey Depew Talks About the POSI-
BILE Motive Power of the Future.

DR.. Chauncey Depew believes in
good many great and grand things
that are spoken of as possibilities of
the future but there is one thing he
has no belief in whatever. | was very
ssoundiy convinced of that when talk
ING with him concerning the designs
and projects and hopes and aspirations
OF those who look upon our present
methods OF travelling as mere baoatelle
compared with what is to he one hun
dred years from now. The thing that
Mr.. Depew has no belief in is the cross
ing of the seas by air ships.
That air ships can ever be devised
that viii make trips from places dis
tant from one another thousands of
miles, so that the travelling public
will be benefited, or anybody else for
that matter, | do not believe. One
thing we must not lose sight of-cau't
lose sight of, in fact, if we wanted to
that is, the law of nature. The law
of gravitation, for instance, is a fixed
one. To be sure people win go up in
balloons and travel a distance. but
that air ships can ever be made to
Start from one locality with a certain
~ or even probability of arriving
thousands of miles away nj another be
forehand time tabled locality will ever
be an impOsSibility.
Even if one could 90 from here to
London or Paris by balloon by chance
occasionally, what good would that be
to mankind? That is the way to look
at it. H-and this if is in very large
capitals travel in midair could be-
come success, just like everything
else first discovered, that system would
have to be a greater one in every re-
spect than the travel ON land and sea
To be of any good.
"But what will the railroads and
steamships of the 100 years from now
be make it shorter and say twenty
five years from now?" | asked.
Il will make it shorter than twenty
five years, said Mr.. Depew. In much
less time than that steam rs motive
power will have given way to another
far greater one. That will be cleo
tricity. 1t is certain to be, and it will
be within very few years, Judging
from what has been done by electricity
during the past sixteen years. Why,
Just think of it. At the Exposition Of
1876 there was absolutely no special
department for the exhibition of the
great wonders of electricity simply be-
cause there were no great wonders.
All there was TO show was the mere
telegraph Instruments and wires &c,
that we were all familiar with Yet
at the Chicago Columbian Exposition
there is to be one grand building for
nothing else but electrical exhibits of
sol / Il, /.
then. Why, during the past twenty
five years greater developments and
discoveries of every kind have been
made than were even dreamed of dur
inc the $500 years that preceded that
period.
Isn't it, then, just rs likely that 100
years from now people viii look upon
our Inventions much as we now look
back at what people 100 years ago con-
sidored amazing developments, when
they didn't have gas, telegraph, steam,
telephones, monographs, &c?
"That is the view many persons take
of things. But they should remember
that one hundred years lgo the use of
coal was not known. But for that
where would we be to-day? HASN'T
everything, from steam TO everything
else that follows in machinery work
ing, been the result of the use of coal?
Abolish coal to-day and what would
become. say, of Great Britain? Why,
13.OD0,0 Of the population would
staryp TO death. See the thousand and
one things that men work AT there and
the world over to-day that depend on
coal for their original active basis.
No, it doesn't follow because 1892 is so
far ahead Of 1892 that 1892 will be just
as far ahead of the present age" IN
y Hpyu{H