Uncle John's Bathroom Reader Extraordinary Book of Facts: And Bizarre Information (52 page)

BOOK: Uncle John's Bathroom Reader Extraordinary Book of Facts: And Bizarre Information
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EXCERPTS FROM WATKINS’S PREDICTIONS

“Man will see around the world. Persons and things of all kinds will be brought within focus of cameras connected electrically with screens at opposite ends of circuits, thousands of miles at a span. American audiences in their theatres will view upon huge curtains before them the coronations of kings in Europe or the progress of battles in the Orient. The instrument bringing these distant scenes to the very doors of people will be connected with a giant telephone apparatus transmitting each incidental sound into its appropriate
place. Thus the guns of a distant battle will be heard to boom when seen to blaze, and thus the lips of a remote actor or singer will be heard to utter words or music when seen to move.”

“The American will be taller by from one to two inches. His increase in stature will result from better health, due to vast reforms in medicine, sanitation, food, and athletics. He will live fifty years instead of thirty-five as at present—for he will reside in the suburbs.”

“Hot and cold air from spigots. Hot or cold air will be turned on from spigots to regulate the temperature of a house as we now turn on hot or cold water from spigots to regulate the temperature of the bath . . . Rising early to build the furnace fire will be a task of the olden times. Homes will have no chimneys, because no smoke will be created within their walls.”

“No mosquitoes nor flies. Boards of health will have destroyed all mosquito haunts and breeding grounds, drained all stagnant pools, filled in all swamp-lands, and chemically treated all still-water streams. The extermination of the horse and its stable will reduce the house-fly.”

“Ready-cooked meals will be bought from establishments similar to our bakeries of today. Such wholesale cookery will be done in electric laboratories . . . equipped with electric stoves, and all sorts of electric devices, such as coffee-grinders, egg-beaters, stirrers, shakers, parers, meat-choppers, meat-saws, potato-mashers, lemon-squeezers, dishwashers, dish-dryers and the like. All such utensils will be washed in chemicals fatal to disease microbes.”

“There will be no street cars in our large cities. All traffic will be below or high above ground when brought within city limits. In most cities it will be confined to broad subways or tunnels, well lighted and well ventilated, or to high trestles with “moving-sidewalk” stairways leading to the top. These underground or overhead streets will teem with automobile passenger coaches and freight wagons, with cushioned wheels. Subways or trestles will be reserved for express trains. Cities, therefore, will be free from all noises.”

“Photographs will be telegraphed from any distance. If there be a battle in China a hundred years hence snapshots of its most striking events will be published in the newspapers an hour later. Even today photographs are being telegraphed over short distances. Photographs will reproduce all of Nature’s colors.”

“Automobiles will be cheaper than horses are today. Farmers will
own automobile hay-wagons, plows, harrows, and hay-rakes. A one-pound motor in one of these vehicles will do the work of a pair of horses or more . . . Automobiles will have been substituted for every horse vehicle now known . . . The horse in harness will be as scarce, if, indeed, not scarcer, then as the yoked ox is today.”

“Everybody will walk ten miles. Gymnastics will begin in the nursery, where toys and games will be designed to strengthen the muscles. Exercise will be compulsory in the schools. Every school, college and community will have a complete gymnasium . . . A man or woman unable to walk ten miles at a stretch will be regarded as a weakling.”

“Submarine boats submerged for days will be capable of wiping a whole navy off the face of the deep.”

“To England in two days. Fast electric ships, crossing the ocean at more than a mile a minute, will go from New York to Liverpool in two days. The bodies of these ships will be built above the waves. They will be supported upon runners, somewhat like those of the sleigh. These runners will be very buoyant. Upon their undersides will be apertures expelling jets of air. In this way a film of air will be kept between them and the water’s surface. This film, together with the small surface of the runners, will reduce friction against the waves to the smallest possible degree.”

“Telephones around the world. Wireless telephone and telegraph circuits will span the world. A husband in the middle of the Atlantic will be able to converse with his wife sitting in her boudoir in Chicago. We will be able to telephone to China quite as readily as we now talk from New York to Brooklyn. By an automatic signal they will connect with any circuit in their locality without the intervention of a ‘hello girl.’”

“Automatic instruments reproducing original airs exactly will bring the best music to the families of the untalented. In great cities there will be public opera-houses whose singers and musicians are paid from funds endowed by philanthropists and by the government. The piano will be capable of changing its tone from cheerful to sad. Many devices will add to the emotional effect of music.”

Index
 

A

abalone,
107

abbreviations,
37
,
275–276

Abdul-Jabar, Kareem,
177

aboveboard
,
312

Academy Awards,
4

accidents,
34
,
151
,
167
,
199
,
210
,
220

accordion,
19

Ace bandages,
22

acne,
113
,
126

actors,
103
,
109
,
127

Adam,
67

Adam’s apple,
135

Adams, Evelyn Marie,
20

Adams, John Quincy,
163
,
185
,
250

addict
,
179

Adidas,
22

admiral
,
123

agnostic
,
14

AIDS,
353

air freshener,
74

air guitar,
286

Air Supply,
286

air travel,
144

aircraft,
295

aircraft carriers,
107

airlines,
227

airports,
144
,
227

Ajax pixies,
159

Alaska,
76
,
301

albatross,
138
,
198

alchemy,
77

alcohol,
67
,
322

Alden, Ginger,
334

Aldrin, Buzz,
1
,
356
,
360

Ali, Muhammad,
153

allergies,
393

alligators,
12

allowance,
70

alphabets,
290

aluminum cans,
92

Amazon River,
76
,
309

amber,
31

American Automobile Association,
9

American Guano Company,
346
,
347

ampersand,
45

Anableps fish,
10

Anaheim Angels,
11

And the Sea Will Tell
,
347

Andes,
309

Andrews, Julie,
4

Andrews, Tommy Lee,
366

anemia,
350

Angel Falls,
42

angels,
67

animal crackers,
69

Anka, Paul,
273

Anne, Queen,
326

Antarctica,
136
,
359

antlers,
319

ants,
84
,
126
,
201

Apollo
,
38

Apollo
11
,
356–361

Apollo
13
,
244
,
360

apples,
79
,
143
,
212

April Fools’ Day,
79

Aratus of Sicyon,
93

Archimedes,
313

Arctic terns,
125

area codes,
51

Aristotle,
136

armor,
65

Armstrong, Neil,
73
,
356

Arnasto, John,
99

Arnaz, Desi,
101

Arnold, Kenneth,
381

art,
306

Arthur, Chester A.,
120

artichokes,
212

Ashley, Erik,
380

aspartame,
69

aspirin,
121
,
221
,
329

assembly line,
228

Astaire, Fred,
109

asteroids,
162

asthma,
48

astronauts,
135
,
248
,
261
,
356–361

Atchoo!
,
85

Atlantic Ocean,
294

atmosphere,
36

“Auld Lang Syne,”
38

auto industry,
149
,
210

autobiography,
93

automobile assembly line,
228

avalanches,
34
,
88

Avis, Warren,
160

Avis Rent-A-Car,
160

Aztecs,
8

B

B.O
.,
276

babies,
168

baby boomers,
5
,
25
,
330

Babylonians,
299
,
362

Bach, J. S.,
19

back pain,
113

bacon,
297

bad breath,
33

bagels,
11

baggage handling,
144

bagpipe bands,
19

Bahamas,
42

Baker Island,
346

balding,
194
,
243

ballpoint pens,
116

Balthazard, Victor,
365

bamboo,
254
,
32

banana peels,
149

bananas,
55
,
143
,
180
,
215
,
254

Band-Aids,
116

Bank of America,
156

banyan tree,
157

baobab tree,
212
,
254

barber polls,
78

Barbie,
3
,
91
,
94

Barkley, Charles,
177

barnacles,
71

Barnum, P. T,
73

Barrymore, Drew,
109
,
183

Bartholdi, Frédéric Auguste,
29

Baruch’s observation,
139

baseball,
173
,
186
,
275
,
315

basket case
,
323

basketball,
177

Baskin, Burton,
245

Baskin-Robbins
31

Flavors,
245

Bassett Furniture,
213

bathrooms,
3
,
213
,
308

Batman,
153

bats,
46
,
217

“Battle Hymn of the Republic,”
38

Battle of Waterloo,
98

Bausman, Jane,
53

Bayard, Thomas,
63

Bayer aspirin,
156
,
329

bears,
105
,
198

beat the rap
,
312

Beatles,
13
,
302

beavers,
105

Becton Dickinson Company,
22

beer,
47
,
322

beer cans,
27

bees,
55
,
84
,
217
,
235
,
280

Beethoven, Ludwig van,
19

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