Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1910-11-15
BIG CHANGES IN 100 YEARS.
Luxuries and Conveniences That Were
Unknown a Century Ago.

ber that there are men living today
whose fathers saw General Washing
ton. a century does not seem so long
of Washington 100 years did not mean
very much to the human race. The
world moved very slowly. When Wash
ington died, in 1899, people were using
| the same kind of appliances and doing
the same things in the same way that
they did in 1899 and even in 1899. In
former years, if a man could have re-
turned to earth at the end of 100 years
he would not have been very much
surprised at any of the changes that
had taken place during his absence.
But if Washington or Franklin, or
even Thomas Jefferson, who died less
back to earth now, he would not know
where he was. The world has changed
more in the last 100 years than in any
thousand years that have gone before.
To get some idea of the wonderful
changes that have taken place, let us
go back to Thanksgiving Day in 1910,
and note how many, many things our
great grandparents did not have which
we have today. 1t will not only aston
ish us, but it will also make us realize
how much we have to be thankful for.
In the first place, there was no
Thanksgiving Day in 1910, except in
/ A,1t-
over 40 years ago that the people all
over the United States began to cele-
| brate the day. Before that if one did
not live in Boston or very close to it
| Thanksgiving dinner. But even those
who were fortunate enough to live in
| New England did not have anything
like the variety of good things for din
ner that we have today. OF course,
they had turkey and pumpkin pie and
onions and cranberry sauce and pota-
| toes; but they did not have tomatoes
or corn or peas or string beans or
| beets or asparagus or any of the 9TH
er canned vegetables that we are ac-
customed to eating during the winter
months.
There were no canned goods of any
| kind. There were no tin cans. Neither
were there any cars to bring fresh
| fruits and vegetables-like strawber-
ries and tomatoes and lettuce-from
| the south and from California. In
| fact, there were then no such places
| in the United States as Florida and
| Texas and California. They were all
Of them waste places or foreign lands.
They belonged to England and Spain
and France and Mexico.
Oranges. bananas, pineapples, gIape-
fruit, olives, malaga grapes and other
| tropical fruits which are so familiar to
all of us, were never seen in the mark
cts of 1910. Boys and girls of that day
| only heard about them from travellers
or read of them in books.
Dinners were cooked in fireplaces.
There were no ranges. There were no
gas stoves. no oil stoves, no coal stoves,
no cook stoves of any kind. House.
| wives had no baking powder, no yeast
cakes, no self-raising flour, no granu-
lated sugar, no favoring extracts, no
ground spices, no cocoa, no potted
meats, no catSup, no prepared break
| fast foods, no soda crackers, no mac
arOni. All the coffee had to be roast
ed at home. Housekeepers then had
| very few of the conveniences that they
have today They had no running wa
ter in the house or stationary wash
tubs or clothes wringers or washing
machines or wire clothes lines. Neith-
er had they refrigerators or ice cream
freezers or egg beaters or waffle irons
or meat grinders or carpet sweepers
or ammonia or boraX or gasoline or
mothballs or flypaper or fly screens.
And they had no matches, and they
had no electric lights or gas light, and
no kerosene.
There were no sewing machines in
1910. All clothes were made by hand.
There were no ready-made things of
any kind: not even shoes or hats.
Nearly every family spun it's own wool
and flax and made it's own thread and
warn and cloth. The clothes for the
boys and girls and the men and women
were made at home. SO, also, were the
carpets, the candles, the soap, the mat
tresses, and the chairs and tables.
There were no furniture factories; no
ready-made desks or bookcases or
bedsteads or anything else. Such
things as were not made at home were
made to order by the shoemaker or
halter or the tailor or the cabinet MAX
er Clothing stores, shoe stores, hat
stores, furniture stores were unheard
Of
In 1910 nobody wore rubbers. That
was because there were no rubberS.
There were no rubber goods of any
kind-overshoes, waterproofs, rain
coats, rubber balls, pencil erasers, hot
water bags, or anything of that sort.
There was no garden hose; no fire
hose. There were no water mains;
there were no fire engines. When
house caught fire, men put it out, II
they could. by throwing buckets of
water on the flames.
Fireplaces were the only means of
keeping house warm. There were no
furnaces; no coal stoves. Here and
there a wealthy family owned a wood
burning stove, but that was a rare
luxury Steam heating and hot water
heating were undreamed of. So also,
were kitchen ranges and hot water
boilers. There were no bathrooms,
there was no plumbing, and the towns
had no sewers. And not only had they
no sewers, but they also had no
street cars. Even horse cars were un-
known. All city travel was done on
foot or by means of horses and car
riages And if any one ventured out at
night he carried his own light-a Ian
tern with a candle in it, for there were
no street lamps Electricity and gas
and coal oil had not yet come into
use. The moon was the best light a
town could have at night.
OF course there were no airships or
automobiles or motor cycles in 1910.
Neither were there any bicycles, nor
any trolley cars, and there weren't
even any railroads. The locomotive
had not yet been invented, and the
steamboat was being tried for the first
time as an experiment.
All travel was done on horseback or
by stage coach. and those who crossed
the ocean did il as Columbus did-in
sailing vessel. 1t was three days
Journey from Philadelphia To Wash
ington. Now YOU can make the trip in
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