Toozday. Tewsday. Tuesday. English is a funny language.
I have a deep interest in my ancestry. I want to know about where I came from and from whom I came. Not just one or two generations back, but as far back as I can go. I put together an ancestry book three years ago ahead of a family reunion and in it I wrote,
“No human being is birthed in a vacuum. Everyone’s ancestry reaches back hundreds of years, each generation’s historical context, values, experiences and DNA shaping the next. It’s natural to ask, what did I get from my ancestors? Or, more precisely, in what ways did my ancestry shape who I am?”
Because of my interest in the past, I get energized when I come across historical photos or videos that show how our cultural ancestors lived. In today’s Broadside, I share three videos, two of which are more than 100-years-old, that give us a look at how “modern” life looked back then.
The first is “A Trip Down Market Street” in San Francisco (with sound added). It was filmed on April 14, 1906—four days before the devastating earthquake that destroyed 80 percent of the city. Remember, this is 114 years ago.
Horse-drawn carriages and wagons, automobiles, trolleys and pedestrians patiently share the road. No lanes. No cross walks. No hot-rod Harry’s racing around the slow pokes or other “stupid drivers.” Everybody just works their way along with everyone else. (Seems to work fine.)
- If you want to see a hi-resolution version of this video, go here.
- If you want to see a colorized version of this video, go here.
- If you want to hear a narrated version of this video, go here.
- If you want to see side-by-side videos before and after the earthquake, go here.
Next is “A Trip Through New York City” taken 109 years ago in 1911. Again, note that sound has been added.
Like the video from San Francisco, horse-drawn carriages and carts, automobiles, trolleys and people share the road. Most of the men wear hats, either felt derbys or straw hats with colored bands. Women wear fancy hats, blouses and ankle-length skirts.
- If you’d like to see a colorized version of this video, go here.
- If you’re a glutton for punishment, you can listen to an amateur sleuth describe how he figured out who the family is in the car with the chauffer, by going here (doing the work so you don’t have to!).
Here’s another video, also from New York City, this time in 1937, the year my mother was born. Shot by some sightseers who were in town to attend the American Legionnaire parade, it has the feel of a home movie, but captures an epoch in time that no longer exists.
In this video it’s easy to see that streets are now dominated by cars, there are sidewalks for pedestrians, and parking meters have been placed along the street. Right outside the NBC Studios there is a sign that says, “No parking in this block,” the elite regulatory state already being felt.
To see a dozen or more videos like these (including a colorized one from Moscow in 1896!), go here.
I enjoy these videos because they capture images of a bygone era. We can read about the San Francisco earthquake in historical texts, but to actually see life as it hummed along, unperturbed by the calamity barreling down on it, is almost better than an eye-witness or time capsule.
No one alive today saw San Francisco as it was then (or if they were alive, like Hester Ford, they were too young to remember it). Every one of those people you see in the video from 1906 are now dead and gone, as are likely most of those in the 1911 video. They exist only as shadows on celluloid or in their descendants’ memories. But they are evidence of a culture and society that came before us, a society out of which we grew.
The Bible contains a lot of genealogy. It lists the descendants of Adam, beginning in Genesis 5, until it gets to Noah and the story of the flood. It then picks up Noah’s lineage, following the descendants of Shem to Abram, and then the lineage of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, who has twelve sons, who become the twelve tribes of Israel. And from Israel comes the Messiah, Jesus Christ, whose genealogy is traced in Matthew 1.
Not that tracing my own genealogy is biblical in the same way or for the same purpose, but it does give precedent and a model. Do any of you spend time tracing your lineage?
[Photo by Roman Kraft on Unsplash]
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A Personal Note
I write five days a week on personal time because it’s one way I can contribute to strengthening the resolve of Christians, conservatives and other like-minded compatriots in the face of unprecedented division in our country. I would like to eventually do more. If you like what you’re reading and think others would benefit from it, please consider regularly sharing and commenting on my posts. Also invite your friends to subscribe. They can do that right on the home page. Thanks for reading! — Dave