The Air Ship: A Musical Farce Comedy (1898)

The 1960's TV show The Jetsons taught an entire generation what to expect of the future. Using comedy to create fanciful expectations of the future is not an idea exclusive to the twentieth century. The posters above advertise The Air Ship: A Musical Farce Comedy from 1898.

Below is an article which appeared in the January 18, 1899 Fort Wayne News (Fort Wayne, Indiana) along with illustrations from a January 16, 1899 Fort Wayne Gazette article.


"The Air Ship," a new and original spectacular musical farce comedy, written by J.M. Gaites, possesses some novel and realistic scenic features, and it will probably draw a big audience at the Masonic Temple ton-night. One of the most realistic stage scenes ever presented will be the flight of a real air ship with fifteen passengers on a Klondike expedition, and a view of Dawson City in winter. While the author does not claim a plot, "The Air Ship" has a central idea or theme, with which it is infested by amusing dialogue, new songs, dances and specialties. Careful attention will be given to staging "The Air Ship," and the company of artists engaged will give a lively presentation of the farce. The principal members are Marie Stuart, the clever vaudeville artiste; Lattie Burke, Marlaud Tyson, Raymond Finley, Ben Welsh, James T. Kelly, Max Millian and Shields, and Nana Bancom. The management of the company announce that the scenic features and the performance of the piece will be both new, novel and worthy of cordial support.

There are many places online to buy posters like those shown below but I would recommend downloading the Library of Congress files here and here and bringing them to your favorite photo-printing establishment that can handle poster-sized prints.



See also:
Going to the Opera in the Year 2000 (1882)
Futuristic Air Travel (circa 1900)
Postcards Show the Year 2000 (circa 1900)
What May Happen in the Next Hundred Years (Ladies Home Journal, 1900)

Up-Wing Priorities (1981)

Paleo-Future reader Mark Plus sent me a very interesting piece from the June 1981 issue of Future Life magazine. The author, F.M. Esfandiary, insisted that the Right/Left political and social dynamic was outdated. The new direction was Up.

Mr. Esfandiary would later change his name to FM2030 because he was convinced that he would live to see the year 2030, which would have been his hundredth birthday. He died in the year 2000 at the age of 69 and was cryogenically frozen.

An excerpt from his 1981 piece about "Up-Wing Priorities" appears below. I will likely return to this article in the future as it goes in many interesting directions.

Around 2010 the world will be at a new orbit in history. We will translive all over this planet and the solar sphere - at home everywhere. We will be hyperfluid: skim on land - swim in the deep oceans - flash across the sky.

Family will have given way to Universal life. People will linkup/linkout free of kinship and possessiveness.

We will stream ahead propelled by a cornucopia of abundance.

Life expectancy will be indefinite. Disease and disability will nonexist. Death will be rare and accidental - but not permanent. We will continuously jettison our obsolescence and grow younger.

At 2000 plus ten all this will be the norm - hardly considered marvelous.

Much-Needed Rest (1903)

A common fear of the future is that life will become much too hectic. This idea is commonly portrayed in cartoons such as the one above, which ran in the June 4, 1903 edition of Life Magazine. The caption reads, "Mr. A. Merger Hogg is taking a few days' much-needed rest at his country home."

This image by Charles Dana Gibson was found in the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Online Catalog via the book Turn-of-the-century America: Paintings, graphics, photographs, 1890-1910

See also:
Future Plane Travel (1920)

Space Spiders (1979)

The 1979 book Toward Distant Suns features the "Space Spiders," illustrated below. Space Spiders are designed to help build the space colonies of the (paleo)future.


Use of Space Spiders to build a space colony of the Stanford torus type. In the foreground mobile teleoperators carry rolls of aluminum to restock the Spiders' supplies. Detail shows a Spider laying down the hull of the colony, which has the shape of a bicycle tire. Central disk structure will carry solar arrays.


See also:
Space Colony Pirates (1981)
Sport in Space Colonies (1977)
Space Colonies by Don Davis
More Space Colony Art (1970s)
Mars and Beyond (1957)
Challenge of Outer Space (circa 1950s)
Like Earth, Only in Space .... and with monorails (1989)
Space Colony Possible (The News, 1975)

Sees World Better or Worse (1923)

Of all the contributions to the February 12, 1923 Bridgeport Telegram article Thinking Men and Women Predict Problems of World Century Hence Educational Director of the Rand School, Algernon Lee makes the most non-commital prediction of them all.

A hundred years hence the world will be either a great deal better than now or a great deal worse.

In the field of individual morality we have made a good deal of progress. On the average, we are less cruel more truthful, more capable of mutual understanding, foresight and self-control than our ancestors were. But this does not enable us to solve the problem which arise out of the increasing complexity of our social system and the enormous growth of our powers of production and destruction.

If the world grows better it will be because mankind gets beyond individual [unreadable] and individual morality and develops a capacity for social self-control commensurate with the growth of our mastery over the forces of nature and with the interdependence of human interests which that involves.

See also:
Thinking Men and Women Predict Problems of World Century Hence (1923)
Homework in the Future (1981)
The Answer Machine (1964)
The Road Ahead: Future Classroom (1995)
Closer Than We Think! (1958-1963)
Connections: AT&T's Vision of the Future (Part 7, 1993)

Wristwatch of the Future as Crimefighter (1979)

The 1979 book Future Cities: Homes and Living into the 21st Century goes into some detail about how the "risto" may be used in a variety of applications. Aside from instantly voting via your watch the device apparently has crime-fighting capabilities.


Crime in cities could get a knock from the risto. Police would all be equipped with ristos, making equipment in patrol cars unnecessary. Conversations would be "scrambled" so they could not be overheard and in an emergency, police ristos would have priority over other. In the picture above two thieves have just stolen a car - its owner presses the emergency button on his risto to get help quickly. Emergency calls could be free, though computers would add up the price of other ones.


See also:
Ristos (1979)

House of the Future for the Daily Mail Ideal Home Exhibition (1956)

The photos and excerpts below are featured in the book Fifties Source Book and highlight the Kitchen of the Future built for the 1956 Daily Mail Ideal Home Exhibition.


Peter and Alison Smithson were major exponents of Modernist architecture in Britain, commissioned to design the House of the Future for the 1956 Daily Mail Ideal Home Exhibition. The house was an exercise in futurist design, built of pre-fabricated plastic. The Smithsons admired the manufacturing methods of the American auto industry. The mass production-based industries had already revolutionized half the house - the kitchen, bathroom, laundry room and garage. The architects advocated using factory-built, fitted kitchen units which could be easily updated. The House of the Future took the concept of flexibility beyond conventional open plan with only the kitchen and bathroom modules differentiated from the rest. An electrostatic dust collector was provided and cooking utensils incorporated their own heating elements. It was ideas such as these that impressed visitors to the exhibition rather than the building itself, with no external windows.




See also:
1999 A.D. (1967)
Monsanto House of the Future (1957-1967)
Frigidaire Kitchen of the Future (1957)

Gardens of Glowing Electrical Flowers (1900)

From October 11 until December 27, 1900 the New York Observer ran a series of eight letters by a man named Augustus. He was reporting from the Paris Exposition of 1900. The second installment of the series, which ran October 18th captures the wonder of seeing a city engulfed in electric light and the hope for harnessing that revolutionary power in the future.

When the five thousand lamps on the Chateau d’Eau are lighted, and the thousands of other incandescent lights placed in the aisles and corridors, flame out, and when on a gala night, hundreds of trees are covered with electrical fruits, and the gardens filled with glowing electrical flowers, while every outline and arch and symbol on the towers and domes and minarets, from the lofty Eiffel tower to the kiosks on the lakes and the grottoes and caves of the aquarium, glows with the electric fire, one realizes as never before, how great a mastery man has acquired over this strange and powerful agent, and wonders what marvels and glories are reserved for us, by its means in the future.

To borrow a phrase from writers that would come much later, Augustus uses commas like other men use periods. Passages like the one above help those like me truly appreciate what it means to be in awe of technology.

We often throw around words like "revolution" when describing new technologies such as the iPhone or the Internet in general, and there is no doubt that they have and will make a profound impact on society, but it is important to place them in the context of what life was like before the world saw artificial, electrical light on such a grand scale.

The photo of 1900 Paris at Night is from the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Collection.

See also:
Moving Sidewalk (1900)
Moving Sidewalk Mechanics (1900)

Black & Decker Hydrator (1989)

In the futuristic world of 2015 you'll "hydrate" Pizza Hut pizzas with your Black & Decker Hydrator.

This clip, from the 1989 movie Back to the Future: Part II, also contains a pretty interesting fruit storage device along with a "Master-Cook" console which looks like some kind of recipe holder.

See also:
Back to the Future: Part II (1989)
McFly 2015
Hoverboards Are Real! (1989)
1999 A.D. (1967)
Call a Serviceman (Chicago Tribune, 1959)
Monsanto House of the Future (1957-1967)

Future Newspapers Written by Advertisers (1912)

The August 10, 1912 Chicago Defender contained this blurb about journalism of the future.

"What's your idea of the future journal?"

"It will be written by advertisers, and it will contain nothing calculated to bring a blush to the cheek of the young person except cosmetics."

See also:
Tablet Newspaper (1994)

Rebuilding Tomorrowland (1966)

The book Walt Disney's America by Christopher Finch contains a 1966 quote from Walt Disney which sums up why the (1997) redesign of Tomorrowland was antithetical to its original purpose.

Now, when we opened Disneyland, outer space was Buck Rogers. I did put in a trip to the moon, and I got Wernher von Braun to help me plan the thing. And, of course, we were going up to the moon long before Sputnik. And since then has come Sputnik and then has come our great program in outer space. So I had to tear down my Tomorrowland that I built eleven years ago and rebuild it to keep pace.

See also:
Disney Calls Future a Thing of the Past (1997)
Tomorrowland, Disneyland Opening Day (1955)
Space Station X-1 (circa 1955)
Postmodern Paleo-Future
Article for MungBeing

LOLfutures

What happens when you take three summer courses at once? You go a little crazy and start making LOLfutures. If you're not familiar with the LOLCats craze, I suggest checking out the Wikipedia page, which can bring you up to speed much better than I can. My favorite incarnation is probably Ape Lad's The Laugh-Out-Loud Cats.







See also:
Jetsons
Mars and Beyond (1957)
Picturephone as the perpetual technology of the future
Postcards Showing the Year 2000 (circa 1900)
Sport in Space Colonies (1977)
No One Will Walk - All Will Have Wheels (Brown County Democrat, 1900)

The Population Bomb: Scenario 3 (1970)

It is a fitting day to look at Paul Ehrlich's third and final scenario of agri-apocalypse from his 1968 book, The Population Bomb.

Today Norman Borlaug, probably the greatest living American, received the Congressional Gold Medal. Mr. Bourlag received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 after becoming an integral figure in the "Green Revolution."

While Paul Ehrlich was advocating forced birth control and spiking foreign food aid with antifertility drugs, Norman Borlaug was figuring out how to literally save a billion people using technology.

Below are excerpts from Ehrlich's third nightmare scenario. Ehrlich thought it would get so bad so quickly that the Pope would give his blessing to abortion by 1974.

In 1974 the United States government finally realizes that the food-population balance in much of Asia, Africa, and South America is such that most areas cannot attain self-sufficiency. American expeditionary forces are withdrawn from Vietnam and Thailand, and the United States announces it will no longer send food to India, Egypt, and some other countries which it considers beyond hope. A moderate food rationing program is instituted in the United States. It further announces that food production in the United States will be increased only so long as the increase can be accomplished without damage to the environment of the North American continent.

Pope Pius XIII, yielding to pressure from enlightened Catholics, announces that all good Catholics have a responsibility to drastically restrict their productive activities. He gives his blessing to abortion and all methods of contraception. Several cheap, long-term anticonception drugs are developed and made available for wide distribution.

Famine and plague sweep the Arab world, which, in the face of Russia's growing disinterest, is forced to seek peace and cooperation with Israel. Israel, in grave economic trouble, installs a peace government and begins negotiations. Most of the countries of Africa and South America slide backward into famine and local warfare. Many adopt Communistic governments, but few are able to achieve any stability.

Ehrlich ends the chapter by callously calling the third scenario an appealing one even though it "presumes the death by starvation of perhaps as many as half a billion people, one-fifth of the world's population." Enhrlich then challenges the reader to devise a scenario more optimistic than the last and writes that he "won't accept one that starts, 'In early 1972 the first monster space ships from a planet of the star Alpha Centauri arrive bearing CARE packages . . .'"

How about a scenario that starts with, "In 1942 a young man named Norman Borlaug received his Ph.D. in plant pathology and genetics and decided to help save a billion human lives."

See also:
The Population Bomb: Scenario 1 (1970)
The Population Bomb: Scenario 2 (1970)

Frederick & Nelson Ad (1962)

The last two pages of the official souvenir program for the 1962 Seattle World's Fair contained this ad from Frederick & Nelson, prominently illustrating the monorail.


See also:
Seattle World's Fair Official Souvenir Program (1962)
Closer Than We Think! Monoline Express (1961)
Amphibian Monorail (Popular Science, 1934)
Century 21: Space Needle Designs (1962)
Monorails at Disneyland (1959 and 1960)

Lives of Women to Improve (1923)

Mary Garrett Bay, Chairman (yes, it read "Chairman") of the New York City League of Women Voters wrote a short piece in the February 12, 1923 Bridgeport Telegram (Bridgeport, Connecticut) about the women of 2022.

The life of even the average woman will be broader and better. Woman's drudgery in the household will be eliminated, her car of the family will be lessened as new inventions come in and new methods of work. Women, like men, will do the tasks for which they are best fitted by their permanent gifts and training.

Politically, women will be powerful. They will share with men the real constructive work of government. Many will hold office. If there is not a woman President, the thought of one will shock no one. It will seem natural and proper to elevate women to whatever positions they have the ability to fill. There will be no woman's political party and no man's political party. The two sexes will work together harmoniously.

See also:
Thinking Men and Women Predict Problems of World Century Hence (1923)
Longer Honeymoons, Happier Wives (1923)
What May Happen in the Next Hundred Years (Ladies Home Journal, 1900)
Futuristic Air Travel (circa 1900)
In the Twentieth Century (Newark Daily Advocate, 1901)

The Jetsons Car We've Been Waiting For?

Over at Moller International they take the idea of a flying car very seriously.

Moller's June 28, 2007 press release announced the start of production for their, "Jetsons-like M200G volantor, a small airborne two passenger saucer-shaped vehicle that is designed to take-off and land vertically." Further excerpts from the press release appear below along with video of what appears to be an earlier prototype.

CEO Paul Moller calls the M200G, “the ultimate off-road vehicle,” able to travel over any surface.

“It’s not a hovercraft, although its operation is just as easy,” he says. “You can speed over rocks, swampland, fences or log-infested waterways with ease because you’re not limited by the surface. The electronics keep the craft stabilized at no more than 10 feet altitude, which places the craft within ground effect where extra lift is obtained from operating near the ground. This lets you glide over terrain at 50 mph that would stop most other vehicles.”

While the company does not foresee the requirement for significant training or licensing to operate the vehicle, it is prepared to offer demonstration sessions in Davis, Calif., once the vehicle is ready for market.



See also:
In 50 Years: Cars Flying Like Missiles! (Chicago Daily Tribune, 1959)
Where's My Jetpack? (2007)
Automobiles Without Wheels (1958)
Flying Car Patent (1991)

More Predictions of a 14-Year-Old (1901)

A few months ago we looked at the first part of fourteen-year-old Arthur Palm's predictions for the year 2001. Arthur was writing for his school newspaper, the Milwaukee Excelsior, in the year 1901.

According to the book Yesterday's Future little Arthur was probably influenced by this image from the January 12, 1901 Collier's Weekly.

Today we have the second half to Arthur Palm's 1901 piece.

You will see a tube stretched across the city called, "The United States Mail Tube," and a sign called, The Wireless Telephone Local and European. There will be saloons in the large buildings and in the window you will see the sign "Quick Lunch Compressed into Food Tablets." You may go to Europe in six hours by "The Submarine Line." The House-keepers will have an easy time; the dishes will be washed by electricity. In the year 2001, you will not see a single horse on Broadway, New York and only autos will be seen. In war the nations will have submarine torpedo boats which will destroy a whole fleet. In the year 2001, the locomotives will travel about 300 miles an hour, but I think it is not necessary because, before you know it, you will be killed by a locomotive. The people of the Earth will be in close communication with Mars by being shot off in great cannons. The cannon ball will be hollow to contain food and drink.

See also:
The Predictions of a 14-Year-Old (Milwaukee Excelsior, 1901)
Your Own Wireless Telephone (1910)
Collier's Illustrated Future of 2001 (1901)
600 Miles an Hour (1901)
Food of the Future (Indiana Progress, 1896)
That Synthetic Food of the Future (Ogden Standard-Examiner, 1926)
Postcards Show the Year 2000 (circa 1900)
What May Happen in the Next Hundred Years (Ladies Home Journal, 1900)
Mars and Beyond (1957)
Futuristic Air Travel (circa 1900)

Paleo-Future Wallpaper: Round 2

Back by popular demand, we have a whole new batch of paleo-futuristic wallpapers. We even have a size for those of you who can't be bothered to capitalize the first letter in your phone's name.

I'll try to make wallpapers a regular thing from now on. I can't promise the consistency of say, Fish Fry Fridays, but I will try for a leap year type of schedule. (If leap years happened every few weeks.)


Personal Flying Machines (circa 1900)
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Flying Machines of Tomorrow (circa 1885)
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Gyroscopic Rocket Car (1945)
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See also:
Paleo-Future Wallpaper
Postcards Show the Year 2000 (circa 1900)
Gyroscopic Rocket Car (1945)

Closer Than We Think! Polar Oil Wells (1960)

Sometimes ideas of the paleo-future not only elicit a chuckle for their scientific improbability but, in the case of "Polar Oil Wells," political improbability. Baby penguins watching their habitat melting wouldn't be a very popular image today.

This Closer Than We Think! strip ran in the January 17, 1960 edition of the Chicago Tribune.


Valuable oil deposits thousands of feet under Arctic and Antarctic ice caps may one day be brought within reach, thanks to plans now being developed.

French Navy engineer Camille Rougeron has an idea for using giant thermonuclear pumps to draw up water from under the ice. Such water, which is 7 degrees above freezing temperature because of the pressure on it, would in turn begin to melt the ice.

Constant stirring would keep the warmer water coming to the surface. The ice in a designated area would gradually melt. The way would then be clear for conventional oil derricks to go to work.

See also:
Closer Than We Think! (1958-1963)
Closer Than We Think! Polar City (1959)

Spaceport of the Future (1957)

For those of you who haven't yet checked out Plan59, I highly recommend it. The site has some amazing images of the paleo-future such as this Spaceport of the Future, as well as other vintage ephemera.

I know I've seen this image somewhere but I can't place it. Any idea where this image was originally used? I almost want to say that it has a Ford Motor Company connection.

See also:
Space Colony Pirates (1981)
Mars and Beyond (1957)
Challenge of Outer Space (circa 1950s)
Welcome to Moonbase (1987)

Longer Honeymoons, Happier Wives (1923)

Margaret Sanger wrote a short piece about the year 2022 for the February 12, 1923 Bridgeport Telegram (Bridgeport, Connecticut).

Birth control will have become a part of education in health and hygiene. Women especially will be demanding it. They will realize that it is a foundation of freedom and intellectual development for them. Women cannot make real progress today so long as they are haunted by the fear of undesired pregnancy.

The results, in much shorter time than four or five generations, will be happier homes, greater mutual respect between husband and wife, honeymoons lasting two to three years before children arrive, with husband and wife thoroughly [unreadable] to one another, because there has been time for mutual understanding and development before parenthood is entered upon. There will be far more consideration for the mother and more understanding of her needs, with the result of better health and development for the infant as well as greater comfort for the mother. Four or five generations will develop new men and women with finer susceptibilities, nobler sentiments toward each other and a worthier sense of responsibility toward the race.

See also:
Thinking Men and Women Predict Problems of World Century Hence (1923)

Schools on the Move (1982)

You'd need one hell of a permission slip for this field trip.


Classes will never be boring on an airship traveling around the world! Imagine gliding over the Amazon River in South America or retracing Ulysses' journeys through the Greek Islands. Picture what it would be like to hover over the Great Pyramids in Egypt or follow a herd of elephants across the African plains. The University Blimp will turn geography lessons into exciting real-life adventures.


This image of the future can be found in the 1982 book The Kids' Whole Future Catalog.

See also:
The Kids' Whole Future Catalog (1982)
Homework in the Future (1981)
The Answer Machine (1964)
The Road Ahead: Future Classroom (1995)
Closer Than We Think! (1958-1963)
Connections: AT&T's Vision of the Future (Part 7, 1993)
Project 2000 - Apple Computer (1988)

Railroads on Parade (1939)

The play Railroads on Parade was featured at the 1939/40 New York World's Fair. It told the story of railroad transportation progress from the 1820s until 1939, and into the future. The photo below depicts a "woman of the future" from the cast and can be found in the book Dawn of a New Day, published in 1980.



See also:
All's Fair at the Fair (1938)
Memory of 'Tomorrow' (New York Times, 1941)
Donald Duck's "Modern Inventions" (1937)
Metal Man Comes to Life (1939)

Gyroscopic Rocket Car (1945)

Carl H. Renner painted this "Escacar" for General Motors in 1945. The Escacar is described as a "Unicycle Gyroscopic Rocket Car."

Like the painting of a commuter helicopter we looked at a few months ago, this image can be found in the Petersen Automotive Museum book, Driving Through Futures Past.


I couldn't find much information about Carl H. Renner online. If you have any information on Mr. Renner please add it to the newly created Paleo-Future Wiki.

See also:
Commuter Helicopter (1947)
Magic Highway, U.S.A. (1958)
GM Car of the Future (1962)
Word Origins: Imagineering (1940s)

Fruition of Ideals of Democracy (1923)

In a February 12, 1923 Bridgeport Telegram (Bridgeport, Connecticut) article Cordell Hull, Chairman of the Democratic National Committee, bet on the survival of the American two-party system. That wasn't a surprising prediction. What is somewhat surprising is that the assumed alternative was a one-party system.

The principle of democracy being eternal, they will necessarily exist a hundred years from now, and the achievements of government, through the application of those principles to changing conditions, will logically be greater than they have been in the last 100 years.

That there will be two political parties then as now seems almost inevitable, if progress is to continue. It is scarcely conceivable that human nature can change in one century sufficiently for all to think alike. In such an event there would also be danger of inertia - and inertia would mark the beginning of decadence.

Democratic government means a greater diffusion of power, less restriction of the individual and therefore less regulation by laws. With the development of intelligence class differences and distinctions should disappear, therefore the representative legislative bodies of the people, if there are more than one, would be truly representative bodies of all the people.

With a continuation of the discoveries of science, their uses and applications, and a more general acceptance of the fundamental moralities of Christianity I should say that the world, and the United States in particular will be a pretty good place to live in 2022.

See also:
Thinking Men and Women Predict Problems of World Century Hence (1923)
Governor Knight and the Videophone (Oakland Tribune, 1955)
Hubert H. Humphrey's Future (1967)
Hubert H. Humphrey's Year 2000 (1967)

Closer Than We Think! Robot Housemaid (1959)

This Closer Than We Think! strip ran in the September 13, 1959 Chicago Tribune. Unlike Rosie the Robot, this robotic housemaid floats on a cushion of air.

The last paragraph describing, "a device to take food automatically from storage and cook it on a preset schedule," sounds very similar to the food preparation system in the 1967 film, "1999 A.D."


There'll be no servant problem in your home of the future. Instead, employ a robot - to cook, set the table, clear it off, wash the dishes and put them away.

A firm of industrial designers, Sundberg, Ferar, Inc., has already projected an idea for such a "mechanical maid." A self-propelled serving cart would move linen, glasses, china and silver to the table. After dinner, it would wash them and store them away.

Meanwhile, Westinghouse is researching a device to take food automatically from storage and cook it on a preset schedule. All milady would have to do is preset her menu and table arrangements each morning.

See also:
1999 A.D. (1967)
Call a Serviceman (Chicago Tribune, 1959)
Monsanto House of the Future (1957-1967)
Closer Than We Think! (1958-1963)

The Comfort of the Paleo-Future

LiveJournalist Blayne has an interesting analysis of why we may long for yesterday's future. His take on paleo-futurism seems to be rooted in the comfort of the nostalgic.

After the romantic innocence of retro-futurism is stripped away, you can see what drives our contemporary longing for imagined past-futures: Nostalgia, and a sincere desire for a return to familiar images of our past. It is in these familiar icons that we cope with our uncertain future. In my idle moments, its this desire "to return to a world that never really existed" that puts me at ease, regardless of what the buildings look like.

Garbage Men of the Future (1989)

This image is from Isaac Asimov's book Space Garbage, published in 1989 as part of the Library of the Universe series. The caption to the image appears below.

Low orbits are the most littered with space junk. Perhaps one day orbiting "garbage collectors" will be used to clean up these trash-filled orbits.