Ok, so some things in the golden era were not too cool...

[Dragon Soldier]

Everyday's a schoolday!

I had to cross check that to make sure it wasn't an "alternate history" tale. Never heard of it before.

 

[jamespowers]

Everyday's a schoolday!

I had to cross check that to make sure it wasn't an "alternate history" tale. Never heard of it before.

There were crazy nut anarchists and the like here during that time period. They did nutball things like that. It usually got them killed if they found them.

 

[Stanley Doble]

If you want to be sure you can go to Wall Street and examine the divots in the granite wall for yourself.

 

[jamespowers]

If you want to be sure you can go to Wall Street and examine the divots in the granite wall for yourself.

Yeah, they never fixed that did they?

 

[LizzieMaine]

If you've ever seen Buster Keaton's two-reel comedy "Cops", made in 1922, the bomb-throwing anarchist bit was inspired by the bombing of 1920. Audiences would have immediately gotten the reference.

 

[Stearmen]

Worst massacre in U.S. school! http://www.biography.com/people/andrew-kehoe-235986

 

[Fading Fast]

Yeah, they never fixed that did they?

They did not and, today, you can walk from the World Trade Center site to 23 Wall Street, in three minutes, and one feels an eerie historical and sad echo, especially as you will have just walk through a gauntlet of post-9/11 security additions (truck-bomb-resistant stanchions and metal plates that rise up and down to let inspected vehicles in and out, and a show-off-force, heavily armed police presence) and as you are looking at 23 Wall Street, just over and behind your left should you can see an enormous American flag draping the front of the New York Stock Exchange.

 

[Fading Fast]

They did not and, today, you can walk from the World Trade Center site to 23 Wall Street, in three minutes, and one feels an eerie historical and sad echo, especially as you will have just walk through a gauntlet of post-9/11 security additions (truck-bomb-resistant stanchions and metal plates that rise up and down to let inspected vehicles in and out, and a show-off-force, heavily armed police presence) and as you are looking at 23 Wall Street, just over and behind your left should you can see an enormous American flag draping the front of the New York Stock Exchange.

Should have typed: "...behind your left shoulder [not should]..." My apologies.

 

[HudsonHawk]

Not today, but speaking of school disasters in the Era...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_London_School_explosion

The reason natural gas now smells the way it does.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

If you've ever seen Buster Keaton's two-reel comedy "Cops", made in 1922, the bomb-throwing anarchist bit was inspired by the bombing of 1920. Audiences would have immediately gotten the reference.

And Harold Lloyd lost the thumb and index finger of his right hand while filming a similar gag in 1919. In the rest of his films he wore a prosthetic glove to conceal his maimed hand.

 

[LizzieMaine]

1919 was the peak of the postwar "mad bomber" scare -- due largely to these incidents.

Although the stereotype of the bearded Slavic anarchist throwing a round artillery shell with a sputtering fuse is the image that caught on, thanks to cartoonists and movie comedians, none of the actual bombings used this type of weapon. Instead they were home-made contrivances not unlike the IEDs favored by modern terrorists. Nor were the actual anarchists Slavs, Russians, or Bolsheviks -- they were followers of an Italian anarchist movement. Sacco and Vanzetti were believed to be adherents of this same movement.

 

[Fading Fast]

Not sure the best place to post this, but here it is. I just read an article in Barron's comparing prices of typical housing items in terms of hours worked for a typical production line job in 1956 versus today (using a Sears catalogue as the source for 1956 prices). The idea was to show if things cost more in amount of hours worked for a typical worker in 1956 versus today. I will cut and paste a few highlights below as well as the link to the full article (but I believe one needs a subscription to have access).

"Sears' lowest-priced no-frost refrigerator-freezer in 1956 had 9.6 cubic feet of space, and sold for $219.95 (in 1956 dollars). Because the typical production-line worker back then earned $1.89 per hour (in 1956 dollars), an average American in the mid-1950s had to toil 116 hours to buy this refrigerator-freezer. Today, Home Depot sells a similar refrigerator-freezer for $298 (in 2013 dollars). Earning $20.14 per hour, an average American worker today works 15 hours to buy that appliance. That's a reduction of work-time cost of 87%."

"...would discover that work-time costs are today much lower not only for appliances and clothing, but also for consumer electronics, sporting goods, home furnishings, children's toys—you name it. Nearly every consumer good costs less work time today than it did back in that mythical golden era."

"It's unsurprising, then, that total consumption on food at home, cars, clothing, housing, household furnishings, and utilities fell from more than 50% of Americans' disposable personal income in the 1950s to only 32% today."

"Yet, even more revealing than what can be found by browsing a 1950s catalog is what cannot be found in such a catalog. The list is long of consumer goods that ordinary Americans today can easily afford but that were unavailable commercially to even the wealthiest Americans in the 1950s. This list includes digital cameras, lightweight waterproof sportswear, high-definition televisions, recorded Hollywood movies to play at home, MP3 players, personal computers, cellphones, soft contact lenses, and GPS devices."

"Of course, not everything today is less costly when measured in work time. Most notably, the costs of health care and of postsecondary education have skyrocketed. And while it's proper to note that these industries operate under especially heavy government involvement, it's also important to understand that the lifetime monetary returns to earning a college degree have risen (the wage premium for college grads today is about twice what it was in the 1950s), as has the quality and effectiveness of health care."

Link to article: http://online.barrons.com/article/S...646.html?mod=BOL_twm_fs#articleTabs_article=0

 

[LizzieMaine]

"Sears' lowest-priced no-frost refrigerator-freezer in 1956 had 9.6 cubic feet of space, and sold for $219.95 (in 1956 dollars). Because the typical production-line worker back then earned $1.89 per hour (in 1956 dollars), an average American in the mid-1950s had to toil 116 hours to buy this refrigerator-freezer. Today, Home Depot sells a similar refrigerator-freezer for $298 (in 2013 dollars). Earning $20.14 per hour, an average American worker today works 15 hours to buy that appliance. That's a reduction of work-time cost of 87%."

Just the sort of corporate consumerist propaganda one would expect from a business publication. It's also a bit disingenuous when you consider that the "lowest priced no-frost" refrigerator freezer in 1956 was in fact close to the top of the line. You could get a regular refrigerator from Sears in 1956 for $149. Consider also that a refrigerator purchased in 1956 was engineered to be far more durable than one purchased today -- the low price of the modern unit is a function of shoddy cut-rate manufacture as much as anything else.

But much more to the point is that regardless of price, you can save even more money by not participating in modern consumerist society. Amazingly enough, it's entirely possible to live a completely satisfying life without a cellphone, a GPS, a digital camera, lightweight waterproof sportswear, high-definition television, or contact lenses, and a twelve-year-old computer you got for free from a box at the side of the road.

 

[Stanley Doble]

I have long suspected that if a family were willing to live as the typical family did in the fifties, they could get along fine on the salary of one bread winner, as most families did in the fifties.

 

[AtomicEraTom]

My question is where in the heck is the average American worker making over 20 bucks an hour? I'm one of the best paid people at the best paying factory in town and I make a little over 17.

"Sears' lowest-priced no-frost refrigerator-freezer in 1956 had 9.6 cubic feet of space, and sold for $219.95 (in 1956 dollars). Because the typical production-line worker back then earned $1.89 per hour (in 1956 dollars), an average American in the mid-1950s had to toil 116 hours to buy this refrigerator-freezer. Today, Home Depot sells a similar refrigerator-freezer for $298 (in 2013 dollars). Earning $20.14 per hour, an average American worker today works 15 hours to buy that appliance. That's a reduction of work-time cost of 87%."

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

"Sears' lowest-priced no-frost refrigerator-freezer in 1956 had 9.6 cubic feet of space, and sold for $219.95 (in 1956 dollars). Because the typical production-line worker back then earned $1.89 per hour (in 1956 dollars), an average American in the mid-1950s had to toil 116 hours to buy this refrigerator-freezer. Today, Home Depot sells a similar refrigerator-freezer for $298 (in 2013 dollars). Earning $20.14 per hour, an average American worker today works 15 hours to buy that appliance. That's a reduction of work-time cost of 87%."

Of course the old 1956 model probably lasted some 30 or 40 years. Maybe I'm exaggerating a little but the average American still has to toil 116 hours to buy the six replacements when the Home Depot Special gives up the ghost after just a few months. I bought two sprinklers at Lowe's and not only did both last less than two weeks but they also had the exact same defect!

Edit: I just noticed that Lizzie made the same point a couple of posts up. I gotta stop posting first thing in the morning! Or at least until I've had some coffee.

 

[LizzieMaine]

My question is where in the heck is the average American worker making over 20 bucks an hour? I'm one of the best paid people at the best paying factory in town and I make a little over 17.

Indeed. The only people around here I know of who make that kind of money are unionized shipyard workers, and they're highly trained, highly skilled labor.

Around here if you make more than $10 an hour you're in the chips.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Of course the old 1956 model probably lasted some 30 or 40 years. Maybe I'm exaggerating a little but the average American still has to toil 116 hours to buy the six replacements when the Home Depot Special gives up the ghost after just a few months. I bought two sprinklers at Lowe's and not only did both last less than two weeks but they also had the exact same defect!

We have several modern cooler units at work -- these are extremely expensive, "commercial grade" refrigerators supposedly built to a higher standard than the average consumer-grade stuff. I have had to replace each of them at least once in the eight years since the first ones were installed, and one of them has had to be replaced *twice.*

At more than $700 a throw, I think I have a right to feel gypped.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

I still remember the story that a fairly well-known radio personality (now deceased) once related about buying a new car and and then he started hearing faint clanking sounds. He kept taking the car to the shop and no one could ascertain the source of the clanking. He finally had them take the entire car apart and discovered that the clanking was caused by a tuna can with a bolt in it that somebody, apparently on the assembly line, had welded to the frame as a joke! :eusa_doh:

 

[Otis]

When it comes to typical manufactured goods, you can have

1) Style/Features
2) Quality
3) Price

Pick any 2 you want. You can't have all three.

As long as Quality is 'good enough', most consumers pick Features and Price, which is why Big Box stores do so well.