Wednesday, April 4, 2007

Collier's Illustrated Future of 2001 (1901)

[Update: The Paleo-Future blog has moved. You can read and comment on this entry here.]

Today we have a follow-up to Monday's post about Arthur Palm, the 14-year-old from Milwaukee, Wisconsin who in 1901 made predictions about what the world of 2001 might look like.

The editors of the book Yesterday's Future: The Twentieth Century Begins (Voices of the Wisconsin Past) suggest that Arthur Palm's article in his school newspaper was taking many ideas about the future from the image above, which was printed in Collier's Weekly on January 12, 1901.

This seems quite likely given the specific mention of a sign reading, "Old People Restored to Youth by Electricity, While You Wait." In the upper left corner we can see a sign in the Collier's illustration reading, "Youth Restored by Electricity While You Wait." Palm also mentioned a "Manhattan Air Line" which is visible on a sign in the Collier's illustration as well.

See also:
The Predictions of a 14 Year Old (Milwaukee Excelsior, 1901)

3 comments:

Unknown said...

I like the Babel Building in the background

Anonymous said...

I, too, noticed and chuckled over the 'Babel Building' - the artist obviously had a sense of humor! Great site!

Anonymous said...

He also stole "The Submarine Line" and “The Wireless Telephone Local and European” mentioned in “More Predictions of a 14-Year-Old” from that same picture. Little plagiarist.