*The Year 1906* This will boggle your mind, I know it did mine! The year is 1906 - one hundred years ago. What a difference a century makes! Here are some of the U.S.A. statistics for the Year 1906: The average life expectancy in the US was 47 years. Only 14 percent of the homes in the US had a bathtub. Only 8 percent of the homes had a telephone. A three-minute call from Denver to New York City cost eleven dollars. There were only 8,000 cars in the US, and only 144 miles of paved roads. The maximum speed limit in most cities was 10 mph. Alabama, Mississippi, Iowa, and Tennessee were each more heavily populated than California. With a mere 1.4 million people, California was only the 21st most populous state in the Union. The tallest structure in the world was the Eiffel Tower! The average wage in the US was .22 cents per hour. The average US worker made between $200 and $400 per year. A competent accountant could expect to earn $2,000 per year, a dentist $2,500 per year, a veterinarian between $1,500 and $4,000 per year, and a mechanical engineer about $5,000 per year. More than 95 % of all births in the US took place at home. 90% of all US doctors had no college education. Instead, they attended so-called medical schools, many of which were condemned in the press and by the government as "substandard. Sugar cost .04 cents a pound.
Eggs were .14 cents a dozen.
Coffee was .15 cents a pound. Most women only washed their hair once a month, and used borax or egg yolks for shampoo. Canada passed a law that prohibited poor people from entering into their country for any reason. Five leading causes of death in the US were:
1.Pneumonia and influenza
2.Tuberculosis
3.Diarrhea
4.Heart disease
5.Stroke The American flag had 45 stars; Arizona, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Hawaii, and Alaska hadn't been admitted to the Union yet. The population of Las Vegas, Nevada, was only 30! Crossword puzzles, canned beer, and ice tea hadn't been invented yet. There was no Mother's Day or Father's Day. Two out of every 10 US adults could not read or write. Only 6% of all Americans had graduated from high school. 18% of households in the US had at least one full-time servant or domestic help. There were about 230 reported murders in the entire US. Try to imagine what it may be like in another 100 years. |
