Prophets and Losses

In ancient cultures, the sibyl had power and autonomy often greater than even the king’s. And it remains human nature to prognosticate, especially at the turn of a century. It can be a perilous pastime, however; last time around, it led to such egg-on-the-face statements as:

* “Everything that can be invented has been invented.” Charles H. Duell, director of Office of Patents, 1899.

* “This telephone has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communications.” Western Union memo, 1876.

* “Radio has no future. Heavier air-flying machines are impossible. X-rays will prove to be a hoax.” William Thomson, English scientist, 1899.

A group of “America’s Best Minds,” looking 100 years into the future on the occasion of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition, made a few bloopers as well: John Clark Ridpath believed that “the age of power and conquest shall yield to an age of glory and enlightenment. Aluminum will be the shining symbol of that age.” A sensible supposition compared with John Habberton’s prediction that “all marriages will be happy--for law will put to death any man or woman who assumes conjugal position without the proper physical, mental and financial qualifications.”

Yet many developments--women’s rights, the two-party system, universal electricity, the computer age, even the everlasting popularity of Shakespeare and the death of vaudeville--were also foreseen.

The turn of the last century provided an irresistible forum for the oracular tendencies of the media. One example was the Christmas 1900 issue of Ladies Home Journal, which consulted “the wisest and most careful men in our greatest institutions of science and learning” to help divine the future. A few of those predictions, followed by present-day realities:

* “There will probably be 350 million to 500 million people in America and its possessions. . . . Nicaragua will ask for admission to our Union after the completion of the great canal. Mexico will be next.” If those two countries had, indeed, become part of the United States, such population estimates would have been fairly close. But neither country has, or seemingly ever will, become part of the United States, and the U.S. population stands at about 270 million.

* “There will be no C, X or Q in our everyday alphabet. Spelling by sound will have been adopted, first by the newspapers. English will be a language of condensed words expressing condensed ideas and will be more extensively spoken than any other. Russian will be second.” Our alphabet remains intact. English is only the fourth most-spoken language in the world, preceded by Mandarin, Hindi and Spanish. Russian ranks eighth.

* “Automobiles will be cheaper than horses are today. Automobiles will have been substituted for every horse vehicle now known.” In 1900, there were 8,000 cars registered in the United States; in 1997, 129,748,704.

* “Everybody will walk 10 miles. Gymnastics will begin in the nursery. Exercise will be compulsory in the schools. . . . A man or woman unable to walk 10 miles at a stretch will be regarded as a weakling.” Physical education has become the norm in public schools, although budget cuts threaten such programs. There are gymnastics classes for toddlers and preschoolers. (Gymboree, anyone?). But according to the Journal of the American Medical Assn., 40% of American adults engage in no sustained exercise.

* “Giant guns will shoot 25 miles or more and will hurl anywhere within such a radius shells exploding and destroying whole cities. Fleets of airships . . . will surprise foes below by hurling upon them deadly thunderbolts. . . . Submarine boats submerged for days will be capable of wiping a whole navy off the face of the deep. Balloons and flying machines will carry telescopes of 100-mile vision with camera attachments, photographing an enemy within that radius.” No one at the time could have envisioned the nuclear age of warfare, including Albert Einstein, who remarked as late as 1932 that “there is not the slightest indication that nuclear energy will ever be obtainable.”

* “Persons 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 . . . the guns of a distant battle will be heard to boom when seen to blaze and the lips of a remote actor or singer will be heard to utter words or music when seen to move.” Sounds remarkably like television sets, of which there are now 100 million in the United States.

* “Strawberries as large as apples will be eaten by our great-great-grandchildren for their Christmas dinners. . . . Raspberries and blackberries will be as large. One will suffice for the fruit course of each person.” Brobdingnagian berries are not yet available in your grocer’s freezer, but genetically altered food has become an increasingly possible solution to world hunger--although many are now questioning the long-term effects of tinkering with DNA.

* “Mosquitoes, houseflies and roaches will have been practically exterminated. . . . There will be no wild animals except in menageries. Rats and mice will have been exterminated.” While refrigeration has decreased the problem of houseflies and roaches in many homes, and malaria-bearing mosquitoes are no longer considered a health threat, neither they nor rats and mice have vanished. Almost 1,200 other animal and insect species, however, are currently on the endangered list.

Ladies Home Journal was not the only publication to make such a list. The Dec. 30, 1900, edition of the Brooklyn Eagle included “Hits and Misses in a Forecast for the 1900s: Grandiose Predictions for the 20th Century.” Among their predictions:

* “Compressed air and electricity will revolutionize present modes of transportation. Trains will travel at more than 100 mph.” High-speed trains, more prevalent in Europe than in the U.S., currently travel at speeds of 125 mph plus. The next generation of VHS (very high speed) trains will ratchet that up to between 250 and 300 mph within the next few years.

* “Mail will be delivered to homes in pneumatic tubes.” A premonition of e-mail?

* “Suburban life will expand due to growth of rapid transit, houseflies will disappear and the telephone and telegraph will become commonplace.” Again with the houseflies! The personal telegraph never did catch on, though the fax machine certainly did.

* “The journal of the 20th century will not be the newspaper; instead, information will be passed along by applied electricity.” Daily newspapers survived the 20th century, although their numbers have decreased--from 2,226 nationwide in 1900 to 1,489 this year. Many of these papers, however, do have Web sites and other online services, and online publications are considered by many to be the information venues of the future.

* “All business will be done at home.” Not yet, though the number of home offices has increased tremendously in the last decade. According to Pacific Bell, almost 2 million Californians now work from their homes.

* “Man will live longer and be happier, owing to use of plant foods only.” More than 12 million Americans are vegetarians, double the number 15 years ago. And the average life expectancy in 1900 of 47 years has also increased significantly, to 77 years. Coincidence?

* “Science will find the means to bring the dead back to life.” Maybe not in the Frankenstein sense, but current resuscitation techniques would appear to our predecessors as nothing short of miraculous.

A year earlier, the Dec. 31, 1899, Portland Sunday Telegram ran an article titled “What Man Will Be,” in which scientists and professors offered a few of the quirkier visions of the future (none of which, apparently, included the disappearance of the word “man” as a synonym for “human”):

* “The entire race will be brunet.”

* “Labor-saving machinery will reduce physical labor, but an increase of athletics will make the race stronger.”

* “The large city will have ceased to exist. The number of villages will increase, and perfected aerial navigation will allow men to live hundreds of miles from their daily occupations.”

* “ 1/8Man 3/8 will be rid of depressing, evil and malicious emotions and, because of an introspective knowledge of his own mind, will be able to control himself in a manner now apparently impossible.”

* “The hat will vanish, and hair will improve.”

As for the 21st century, here’s to the reappearance of the hat.

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Mary McNamara can be reached by e-mail at mary.mcnamara@latimes.com.