Siskiyou Union High School - White and Gold Yearbook (Weed, CA)

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A CENTURY OF PROGRESS IN TRANSPORTATION SECOND PLACE ESSAY In the beginning, man was his own beast of burden. It was the woman, though, who did most of the actual burden bearing, as it is still customary among primitive peoples. Simple devices were invented to enable a person to carry greater loads, such as yokes to suspend weights from the shoulders, tumplines around the forehead or chest to help sup- port che load, and crude sledges for dragging loads along the ground. Man had tamed the ox and the donkey and taught them to carry loads and to draw the wagon, we find records of their use in Egypt as far back as 2700 B.C. The horse did not appear until later, and then it was used chiefly in war. The camel became the ship of the desert in very ancient times. The elephant was trained for riding and to carry or draw heavy loads in the Far East. The llama became the pack animal of South America, the yak, of Tibet, the water buffalo or carabao, of the Malay Peninsula and the Philip- pine Islands. Dogs were used by the Plains Indians of North America to drag their tent poles. Eskimo dog trains and reindeer still do the carrying in the Arctic regions. The ox cart and the prairie schooner, drawn by horses, oxen, or mules, enabled white men to occupy the interior of North America. But long before men had invented the wheel, or had tamed animals, they discovered that a hollowed tree trunk or the inflated skin of an animal could be easily pushed through the water by a flat piece of wood. For over a hundred years, the means of transportation in the American colonies were few and simple. Since the highways at first were the streams and the Indian trails, the colonists used boats or walked. They at once adopted the birch- bark canoe of the Indians as well as the dugout It did not take them long to improve on the hollowed log. They built flat boats, heavy rectangular craft with straight sides about four feet above the waterline, and larger ships fitted with sails. The development of means of transportation is an important part of the story of civi- lization. The backward peoples are the isolated peoples, who have not the means of coming into contact with others. It is by waterways that Europe has expanded to the far corners of the earth. It is the waterways, which, more than any other geographic factor, have determined the direction and the character of significant historic movements. In America, roads developed slowly, because the large towns were on or near the sea- coast, and coastwise ships furnished transportation between them. Trails were considered good enough for postriders and farmers who traveled by land. The first improvements were blazing the trails by slashing patches of bark from trees with an ax to mark the wav, and clearing out stumps to make a path wide enough for a wagon. Work of this kind marked the start of the Common Road between Boston and Providence in 1654, and other noted colonial roads. Stage coaches did not come in until 1774, when the first stage coach service was begun between Boston and New York. From 1830 to 1860 was the golden age of travel on the Mississippi River. Log rafts, flatboats, and keeled boats floated down the river, loaded with manufactures for the inland and with the farmers' pork and grain for the great export market at New Orleans. The modern industrial era passed into its second phase with the introduction of the steam railroad and the steamboat in the first half of the Nineteenth Century. Up to 1850 there were only about nine thousand miles of railway lines in the United States. Between the Middle West and the Pacific, travel was by foot, horse or ox team. The first street cars were run in 1832 in New York City. They were pulled by horses. Railroad lines also were given a right-of-way on elevated lines or subways. New York 24

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A CENTURY OF PROGRESS BEST ESSAY Many changes, discoveries, and improvements have been made during the past one hundred years. During this time, clothing styles and fads have changed, going from one extreme to another. Educational systems and transportation have been greatly improved. Farming has been made easier through the invention of new machinery and the develop- ment of scientific methods. Manufacturing has gone from the home into the factory, where it is done faster and more easily. The recent World War brought forth new medical and scientific discoveries. Few people fully realize the value of a free education. School is just something which everyone is required to attend for a certain length of time. Before public schools were in- stituted, few parents could afford to send their children to school because of the cost of books. At that time it was believed that women did not need an education, and they were not allowed to attend school. The schools were small, one-room buildings, poorly lighted, ventilated, and equipped. Slates were used to write upon and there were few books. The modern schools of America are well lighted, heated, and ventilated. They are open to all races and religions and wel- come both boys and girls, men and women. Most states furnish the books. Most school teachers were not trained and knew little more than the pupils they were paid to instruct. At first anyone having any education at all could teach school. Later teachers were re- quired to pass a test and if this was passed, even with no college education, the person could become a teacher. Today teachers are required to have a college education. The requirements for teaching in California today are among the highest in our country. Pioneer farmers had few tools with which to do their work, and these were very crude. The hoe, hand plow, axe, spade and sickle were their main equipment. They knew little about farming, did not know what to plant, or even how to care for soil and animals. People have experimented to improve different crops, and they have learned how to take care of them. New equipment has been invented, such as tractors, milking machines, and combine harvesters, to save time and much hard work for modern farmers. Through years of work by horticulturists and scientists, new and improved varieties of almost every kind of plant have been grown. Styles have gone from long to short and back to long again. Pioneer women wore long hoop skirted dresses under which were several layers of petticoats. It was not ladylike to show your legs. Bonnets were usually worn to protect their faces from the sun. Modern women take sun baths in order to get a good sun tan. Men,s clothes have not changed much except that they are now much plainer. A century ago, little was known about diseases or how to treat them. During this century, cures and preventives for some of the most serious diseases have been discovered. The use of anaesthetics has been greatly extended and improved. Great strides have also been made in surgery. Simple operations, such as appendectomies, were once considerd major surgery. Today most appendectomies are performed with as little concern as the pulling of a tooth. The past century has brought: greater advancements along more- lines than any other century in the history of the world. It would be very interesting to live during the next century to compare it with the last one. Will the advancement of the next century be for better or worse, constructive or destructive? DOROTHY WASHINGTON '50, Weed High School. 23

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had the world's first L line, opened in 1868, with small steam locomotives as power. The earliest successful electric lines were put in service in 1888. Work started on the world,s Hrst subway, in London, England, in 1853. It was not ready for service until ten years later. The supremacy of the railroad, as the common carrier, is today being challenged by the automobile, the motor bus, truck, airplane, and sea-going ships which are taking freight through the Panama Canal at cheaper rates than the railroads can offer. Busses and trucks are public carriers in cities and between cities across the continent. GORDON TRUAX '50, Butte Valley High School. SILVER LIGHTNING Don West stopped as usual on his way home from school to gaze through the window of the secondhand store. , Yes, it's still therelv he said aloud and gave a long sigh of relief. Each day he almost dreaded to look for fear Silver Lightningf' as he called the bicycle to himself, would be gone. It certainly was a handsome bike and obviously it had been used very little. The tires were scarcely worn at allg the leather seat had a smart looking cover of blue and orange plaid material. Even the headlight still worked. The price of the bike was very reasonable, considering its condition. Don would have bought it weeks before if he had had enough money. The trouble was he couldn't buy it until he got a job, and he couldn't get the job he had in mind until he got the bike. Don promised to pay Mr. Blake from his earnings the first week, but Mr. Blake had declined to sell except for cash. No, Don, not that I don't trust you, but you see that sign-it says 'cashf and I have to treat my customers all alike in order to be fair. Once in awhile I do let an article go out for half cash-you could pay the rest later. Mr. Blake's offer did not help, because he did not have that much money. Across the street he saw John and Bill riding past on their bikes. Wouldn't I like to be going with them on 'Silver Lightningf thought Don. Then he remembered he and John were not on speaking terms. For years, almost all their lives, in fact, Don and John had been the best of friends. In a way it was Johnls bike that had caused their trouble. Whenever they went anywhere they would walk because Don did not have a bike. Then when Bill moved into the neigh- borhood, Don found himself left out of practically everything. Bill had a fine bike and naturally enough John and Bill liked to ride together to the more distant places. One Saturday, some weeks earlier, the three boys had planned a trip to the lake. John and Bill had ridden on ahead with lunches for all three. Don had furnished the sandwiches, and the others, the fruit and cookies. Walking, Don was to join them as soon as he could. When he reached the lake John and Bill were nowhere in sight. After waiting for some time, Don decided they were playing a trick on him and did not want him along, so he trudged the long way home, hungry and tired. John had come over in the late afternoon demanding to know why Don didn't go on to Indian Back, as they had asked him to in the note they had left on a rock near the lake. I didn't see any note, said Don, stiffly. I don't think you left one. Of course this remark started the real quarrel. They had glared at each other and had said many unkind things, with the result that they were no longer friends. 25