The commercial. (Union City, Tenn.) 190?-193?, 1909-02-26
WASHINGTON COULD SEE
If He Came Back and Toured the
Country.

Country
When George Washington was born
the people were using stage coaches.
When he died they were still using
stage coaches.
There was little progress in invention
during Washington's life.
The calendar had long before been
perfected, but because it had been cor
rected by Pope, England held back
two hundred years before conforming
to it.
During Washington's life the profess
sins of arms and hunting were the only
pursuits of gentlemen.
Washington was land surveyor and
even this honorable calling was not
looked upon as one of the polite pro-
fessions.
The physician was not far away from
the barber shop, and the law was much
misunderstood as an occupation. The
lawyer was regarded as trouble-maker
rather than peacemaker. The pro-
fession of law did, however, advance in
the esteem of the people when Jeffer-
son, Madison, the Randolphs and the
Adamses began to discuss the natural
rights of man and the liberty that
Americans were deprived of under the
English constitution.
A few years after the death of Wash
ington we had the first steamboat. Less
than thirty years after his death the
building of railroads commenced No
for twenty more years did the railroad
win favor as transportation medium
over the canal. In another twenty-five
years we had the electric telegraph, anC
few years afterward the ocean going
steamship.
The Mississippi River steamboat, at
this time, was looked upon as mans
most superb work.
In the meantime medical science be-
gan to advance. Physicians had de-
veloped the use of chloroform and
ether, had solved the secrets of the cir
culation of the blood and begun to
vaccinate for smallpox. Soon after
they abandoned bleeding and leeches.
About this time men also began to
eat tomatoes Before the middle of the
last century they were called love apples
and were regarded as poisonous.
After the Civil War we got the sleep
ing car, but you and both remember
when the bicycle, the electric light and
the telephones were dreams of the fu-
ture.
If George Washington should come
back to life to-day and march into
Washington City salute would be
fired with smokeless powder. He would
use great iron bridge in crossing the
Potomac. Possibly the wireless tele-
graph might signal that the head of
the procession was opposite the White
House
Washington could leave his coach
and four there, and after Mr.. Roosevelt
expressed his delight" at seeing him,
the pair could tear down Pennsylvania
avenue, on asphalted streets, in an auto
mobile and dodge around electric cars.
If he desired to go over to New York
and stand in Wall street, where his
monument now is, Washington could
enter an electro-lighted coach, have
dinner and be in that city soon after
he had finished his pipe (they did not
smoke cigars in Mr.. Washington's day..
In New York, Washington could see,
instead of a struggling town of twenty
five thousand people, city, the center
of the population of six millions. He
would see ocean-going steamers that
cross to Europe in five days, elevated
railroads, underground railroads, pos
sibly flying machine and sky line
of buildings that all but shoot into the
heavens.
The venerable patriot would have
cause to feel proud of all of this, for he
made these things possible.
But along with all this progress of
wealth and culture and in the good
things of life there came with it pow
erty, misery and suffering, and after
looking both on the lights and shad-
ows of life of the twentieth century,
the Father Of His Country would real