Impact1018

A Century of Change
Have you ever wondered
what life will be like
in 100 years time? A
quick trawl around the
internet revealed some
fascinating ideas. Ideas such as
controlling the weather, thought
transmission, being able to move
around the world at the speed of
light and free energy from nuclear
fusion. While we might think
most of these are the preserve of
science fi ction, we are already on
the road to a lot of them.
If these seem like fantasy to us
what would it seem like to people
who lived in 1918? If we asked
them the same question then
what would they have thought life
would be like today?
I suspect that they would look
at the innovations of the time
such as the telephone, electricity,
motor cars, aeroplanes and
many many other inventions
which existed or were in the later
stages of a design concept but
were not generally available. I
suppose they would dream about
not having to go to the toilet at
the bottom of the garden on a
freezing January night to discover
that they had not lit the oil lamp
and the toilet would not fl ush
because it was frozen up and
a burst pipe would be the most
likely outcome when the weather
improved.
I imagine that they would love
it if they did not have to boil
water to fi ll the tin bath for the
whole family to bathe in before
it was tipped down the sink by
ladling out with an enamel jug
or a bucket. What they would
have given for central heating
rather than the sometimes fraught
process of getting the coal fi re
going.
Perhaps they dreamed of
just having to fl ick a switch to
illuminate the room in which they
were trying to read the paper – if
they could read – by candlelight
or if they were lucky by gaslight.
Perhaps they would have loved
those things which are supposed
to improve our leisure time such
as a washing machine rather
than a mangle and refrigeration
to prevent food from spoiling,
all of which were around but not
affordable by most people.
Most people had manual jobs
and would probably work six
days a week with just Sundays
off which did not give them a lot
of time for leisure, which was
perhaps as well as the television
had not been invented and there
weren’t many other leisure time
activities such as talking movies,
mobile phones, the internet and
many of the other things that we
take for granted today!
Perhaps they dreamed of a
time when infant mortality was
improved, when diseases such
as pneumonia, meningitis,
tuberculosis, diphtheria, diarrhoea
and polio were eradicated and
that there would be a universal
health service such as the NHS.
We are probably living in a time
when life is changing much faster
than it did 100 years ago. Most
of the innovations of the next
100 years will be for the better,
some will be for the worse and
some that we thought would be
for the better will turn out not to
be so. However, change is always
upon us so we need to embrace
it rather than look back to the
time when everything was ‘rosy’
because it never was. It was just
different.
Steve Winks
St Chad’s Church, Linden Avenue, Woodseats
Church Offi ce: Linden Avenue, Sheffi eld S8 0GA
Tel: (0114) 274 5086
Page 22
email: offi ce@stchads.org
website: www.stchads.org