'Vintage' things you wouldn't bring back, but wish you'd seen?

[Edward]

I've been thinking about this concept recently: what are the things from the first few decades of the 20th century you wish you'd seen, but wouldn't want to bring back now?

One thing in my head currently is board track racing - the original motorcycle sport. Those guys were the first real sporting motorcycle racers. The bikes they rode were built for speed - and little else. No brakes, no gears, barely any controls at all (these bikes were built to run at top speed all the time) bar the steering... No concept of safety whatsoever! Many riders died. In one accident in Kentucky, a rider hit a lamp-post, which caused an explosion wit his fuel tank killing not only the rider, but - in the resultant fire - eight spectators. There's something exhilarating about the danger and I'd love to go back in time and see a race or two, and yet at the same time I couldn't bear to see it back now given the danger. Not that motorcycle racing is in any way a "safe" option today - just ask the Dunlop family (three legends across two generations all killed in action on their bikes). I suppose the closest I've seen today would be the Wall of Death. That's risky too - there are either two or three still operating in the UK, and none of them can get insurance - though as I understand it not quite so dangerous as the old board track racers.

Oddly enough, I've just discovered a small artisan bike shop in Poland where they build modern recreations of bikes from that era - except, of course, to road-going standards (brakes). Even do them with an electric engine (without compromising the look). Another beauty added to the "lottery win list"...

 

[LizzieMaine]

Baseball players batting without helmets. I'm old enough that I can remember the last few major league players who did this -- Norm Cash, Tony Taylor, Bob Montgomery -- but when I watch film footage of games where no players are helmeted it's distressing to think of what could easily have happened. One man was killed in a game by a ball to the head in 1920, and several others were seriously injured. Over in the Era Day By Day thread we saw last summer the story of Joe Medwick, an outstanding player who was hit flush in the head by a pitch -- and every time I see this picture, it's with a sense of "how stupid-macho-manly did these guys think they had to be to stand there with nothing but a flannel cap between their skulls and a hard, leather-covered sphere coming at them at 80-90 mph?"

 

[tonyb]

Baseball players batting without helmets. I'm old enough that I can remember the last few major league players who did this -- Norm Cash, Tony Taylor, Bob Montgomery -- but when I watch film footage of games where no players are helmeted it's distressing to think of what could easily have happened. One man was killed in a game by a ball to the head in 1920, and several others were seriously injured. Over in the Era Day By Day thread we saw last summer the story of Joe Medwick, an outstanding player who was hit flush in the head by a pitch -- and every time I see this picture, it's with a sense of "how stupid-macho-manly did these guys think they had to be to stand there with nothing but a flannel cap between their skulls and a hard, leather-covered sphere coming at them at 80-90 mph?"

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You would be familiar with the 1957 on-field incident that shortened the playing career of 1955 AL Rookie of the Year Herb Score.

I knew nothing of it until one summer night in 1990-something, when I found on the barstool next to mine at Vito's (a nice little dago joint, in the words of Al Black, the bartender) one Herb Score, who was in town as part of the broadcast team calling that evening's game between the Cleveland Indians and the Seattle Mariners.

It turned out that Herb Score and Al Black, both since deceased, were longtime friends. Vito's hadn't changed much since Herb Score's playing days -- dark, quiet, a white-haired bartender in a starched white shirt who kept a lid on the proceedings.

 

[tonyb]

How 'bout a "duster," one of those massive-almost-beyond-belief clouds of dust that carried away so much of the topsoil in the Depression Era Dust Bowl?

We -- the dewy-eyed bride and I -- drove through the worst-affected parts of it a few years back. Our route took us well off the Interstates, so we slowed down through the small settlements along the way and on a few occasions came to a dead stop, in those towns that had an actual stop light or two.

I haven't made a study of it, but it's not such a stretch to think that events of 85 years ago are still felt in that country. (Of course they are, Tony, you effin' idiot. How could they not be?)

It's sparsely populated and it wouldn't be inaccurate to call parts of it downright desolate. I can't say I'm in a hurry to visit there again, but I'm glad I saw it once.

 

[Harp]

Singing is one of few privileges accorded US Army recruits, march or run, and drill cadence song
dates back to pre World War I era times. Non commissioned officers use voice with remarkable effect.
This clip brings back memories of long ago days but still remembered.

 

[Bushman]

A real, life operating steam liner. They have a select few of the smaller ones still around today, but the World Wars ate up much of the iron that was riveted together into a ship back during the golden age of ocean liners. But at their height, seeing the luxury and grandeur of a steam liner on the scale of the Mauritania or Olympic in person would truly be magnificent to behold.

How 'bout a "duster," one of those massive-almost-beyond-belief clouds of dust that carried away so much of the topsoil in the Depression Era Dust Bowl?

We -- the dewy-eyed bride and I -- drove through the worst-affected parts of it a few years back. Our route took us well off the Interstates, so we slowed down through the small settlements along the way and on a few occasions came to a dead stop, in those towns that had an actual stop light or two.

I haven't made a study of it, but it's not such a stretch to think that events of 85 years ago are still felt in that country. (Of course they are, Tony, you effin' idiot. How could they not be?)

It's sparsely populated and it wouldn't be inaccurate to call parts of it downright desolate. I can't say I'm in a hurry to visit there again, but I'm glad I saw it once.

Personally, those massive dust storms that hit the American SW, and made national headlines a few years back, were more than enough of a recreation for me...

 

[tonyb]

^^^^
Yeah, massive as those haboobs can be — 60 miles wide and a half mile or more high — I’ve read they’re as pikers compared to the 1930s dust storms that eroded the Texas and Oklahoma panhandles and adjacent areas in bordering states. The clouds of dust reached as far as the East Coast. That’s a whole lotta topsoil.

The “dust pneumonia” killed thousands, which is made all the more tragic in light of how sparsely populated the region was, and is.

We romanticize it, just as we romanticize war. But the romantics are rarely the ones who directly experienced it, at least not until a few decades have passed.

 

[Just Jim]

Airships. There's just something about long distance travel in a zeppelin that interests me. I'm not sure I'd want to ride one, but I'd like to see them in the skies.

 

[STEVIEBOY1]

Airships. There's just something about long distance travel in a zeppelin that interests me. I'm not sure I'd want to ride one, but I'd like to see them in the skies.

I Went to the Zeppelin museum in Southern Germany some years ago, it was fascinating and alarming, as they had a smoking section, but you had to get a steward to light your cigarette/cigar/pipe etc as the zeppelin was full of highly flammable gas.

 

[Harp]

^^^^
We romanticize it, just as we romanticize war. But the romantics are rarely the ones who directly experienced it, at least not until a few decades have passed.

Combat is not very pleasant, nor is it a romantic experience.
War enchains youth and time in a complex equation that defies mathematical analysis of relativity
inside a constant variable of guilt that eludes age, intellect, and maturity.

 

[Edward]

THere's a certain thrill to a well-fought boxing match that I suspect one day will be as much a part of the past as the Roman gladiators. THe old barefist boxing fights supposedly still exist, but have gone underground. The thing that still messes with my head is that there were fewer severe head injuries involved in those - once padded gloves came in, you could hit the other guy harder with less impact on your own knuckles, and severe head trauma incidences increased in number as a direct result.