Continuing my exploration of British newspapers 100 years ago, I am fascinated by the scale of changes within that comparatively short period of time (100 years ago my father was a toddler). My extract this week comes from the Dover Express and East Kent News of Friday 16 January 1914. "Rainy Days Are Welcome", it proclaims, because of the joy of returning home to a Pianola Piano. I have a feeling that if you asked the people of East Kent whether rainy days would be welcome at the moment - pianola or not - the answer would be in the negative, given the amount of rain that has fallen there over the last weeks. These days it is difficult to imagine a working man sustaining himself through his labours in order to return home to the joys of a mechanical duet produced by a primitive musical machine, but there again what was a pianola other than an early Magadrive? And looking at what else was in store for our weary wage-slave in the adjoining advert, perhaps things don't change all that much after all.
I think I'll 'take the 5th' and make no comment on the corsets.
ReplyDelete'In Dover' is going to have a whole new meaning for me know.
ReplyDeleteNot that I ever had an 'In Dover' meaning in the past, . . I'm just saying. . . .
One wonders how fast the change will come in the next hundred years? Technology has speeded things up.
ReplyDeleteForget the pianola. The new FREE-HIP-BONE model has me intrigued. Not for myself, you understand.
ReplyDeleteRoyal corsets no less, she looks comfortable all trussed up:)
ReplyDeletePianos featured heavily in the homes of this country's pioneers as farms were established and became reasonably prosperous. As did corsets, and both from Sears & Roebuck.
ReplyDeleteWell many get home to a keyboard in front of their computer these days but I doubt many would wear such a corset now. Not in this heat anyway.
ReplyDeleteA pianola required foot power to work the pumps so it was an exercise machine too. There were some controls for the operator to adjust tempo and dynamics, but it was tramp tramp tramp right to the end of the song. And unless a husband was prepared to hear the same tune over and over, he had to buy his wife more music rolls. Just like downloading another mp3 file from the iTune store.
ReplyDelete