Jobs of yesteryear

Unknown

Door to door photographers,,they would take pics of our children sitting on a pony(they brought with them), in front of your house, or how about the Fuller Brush man?, Watkins remedies?(he used a bicycle), good for anything that ails ya!<BR>Long before my time, I`m told there was DtD piano and record-player salesman,,could they now be known as "Victrolas"?<BR><BR>Dave

John R. Hall

Victims of technology

I was reminiscing about the days of Christmas shopping in the old Hudson's department store in downtown Detroit (now gone) and the job of the elevator operator. I doubt that any of these jobs exist any more. What other jobs have disappeared in the name of 'progress?'

Al Corelli_2

Coal?

Stoker.
Coal Driver.
Ice Man.
Crystaline man. (bleach delivery)
Roving fish monger (pushcart)
Seltzer service.
Potato chip delivery (I'm not kidding)
Knife sharpening man (pushcart)
Vegetable salesman (pushcart)



Ashcans are long gone as well. I.m sure some of you guys remember that ashcans were very different from garbage cans.

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Mark Hunt_3

Here are a few


The Friehoffer wagon that brought the donuts fresh from the bakery. (Later became a truck, but that is gone too)

Milk men.

Gas station attendants that checked EVERYTHING and topped off the fluids.

House calls by doctors.

Mark H

bob_46

What goes around

The knife sharpener man with the push cart still comes around. What I can't figure out is he looked so old 65 years ago and he hasen't changed. The cart still goes ding dong when he pushes it, it still has all the rags hanging from it and he still fixes umbrellas. How about the horse drawn wagon that used to come down the alley with the driver holler'n "old rags old iron" we used to sell him tin foil from gum and cigarette wrapers.

Leo

Past Jobs

Dry Cleaners picking up and dropping off at the house.

Bread delivery to the house.

Life insurance men that came to the house for payment and to service the account.

Door to door encyclopedia salesmen.

Leo

Ron Gillen

Apprentices

Apprentices that get enough practice soldering, threading and working with cast to be any good at it.

Robert O'Brien

TV repair shops

and shoe repair shops

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Bob Vennerbeck

in a similar vein

Just a couple days ago a friend and I got to wondering about how to preserve jokes depending on obsolete technology - things like skipping records; 'the other side of the record'; jumping frame lines, sprocket holes and burned frames in film - and then we just got silly-

What kind of practical jokes were played with buggy whips?
What did the guys call that rusty rash you got from sitting around in chain mail in the rain?
What was the first curse uttered when the hammerstone hit a thumb instead of the nodule of flint?

And a very merry ho ho ho to you all!

Vbob

Frank Discussion

Its more like \"what jobs CAN'T be replaced by new technology?\"

In the old day they were much more honest about what lay ahead in the future. They honestly said that someday people would not have to work, that machines would do almost everything. Now, with that day much closer to the present, people are in denial about what is happening or why.

If you do a search on the Internet for what is known as "Moore's Law" you will see that the amount of computing power available for given cost is doubling approximately every eighteen months. That means that the cost of a computer necessary to do any given job is being divided in half in roughly the same time.

Many human jobs require quite a bit of brainpower. That is why people are still the cheapest computers available for those jobs. However, the rate of development of new technologies is very fast, and the time between a technology is developed and its widespread adoption and then, commoditization is shortening. What this means is obvious, we are headed towards a workless society. That is an apolitical imperative that presents a hige challenge to society in how we deal with it Obviously, businesses will be very profitable without the costs of labor that they have now. Total economic output will still be the same.

However, who will buy the products of industry if almost all wealth is inherited or derived through investment, not wages? Will we see a coming together to face this challenge or widespread economic stratification and disinvestment?

I think that we are in denial about the true cost of many industrial activities. It will cost a lot to clean up the aftermath of industrial society. Huge areas are still polluted from America's industrial heyday. Perhaps we could funnel some of the profits that are being made by increasingly automated industry to an increased investment in education and environmental stewardship so that we don't become a wasteland?

To return to the original subject of my post, almost all jobs can be replaced by technology. Any job that follows a script (and does not write it) can be replaced.

Many decisionmakers are realizing, as jobs and investment go elsewhere, 'for eficiency's sake' that'inefficiency' is part of economic prosperity, but we should CHOOSE where we decide to make things more 'inefficient'. Right now workers in low wage, high profit countries are subsidizing obscenely high profits with their health, just like Americans did in the past. Is that right? Should it be allowed?

Randy-Lee Braman

I Remember

The Hood milk man delivering our milk as a kid in glass bottles,and the garbage man who came and dumped your burn barrel in his old dump truck,and when your barrel was bad he brought you a new one,the noon whistle which ment the factory was at lunch.And doctors house calls.
Randy

joel_19

jobs

hey guys My milk still gets delivered in Glass from the local farm.

The dry cleaner does drop off and deliver it's called Zoots.

The Knife guy doesn't have a push cart he lives in the next town and drives a Sprinter..... seriously.

What is gone? How bout the buggy whip maker,

Scott Kneeland

past

How about most things CLOSED on Sunday. I wish they still were.

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Matt_67

job

I was a fireman shoveling coal into a bin then it was fed into the boiler by a stoker....everything manual on the boiler...regulate feedwater,regulated dampers for draft manually,dump ashes....a low water bell and relief valve...engineer sat on his duff.....years ago lots of fireman on steam ships,stationary plants,and railroads..none today....

Plumdog_2

Your absolutely right

It's an ugly road to travel. Working with your hands is discouraged. Art and Music are left out of the Curriculum. The technology feeds on itself and multiplies, while work for the sake of work suffers a lingering death. Humans that rely on investments and inheritance for thier survival might want to pick up a tool, or learn to play an instrument; as it seems the value of money is diminishing.

singh

The hot Rivet guy, and the guy who caught them with a cup.

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Mark Hunt_3

During WWII


women performed those jobs as well.

Just sayin'!

Mark H

singh

P.C.

The Rivet PERSON. aka Rosie the riveter.

HaHaHa.

Merry Christmas, Mark !!

Devan

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Ruthe Jubinville_2

housecalls

we have several doctors in our area that have gone back to making housecalls, particularly to some of our hospice clients. And one who even barters for his services. So they are not all gone.

John R. Hall

Bring back the gift bottle

I want to resume an old tradition that died out as holiday parties and drunk driving laws became stricter (which I am all in favor of). I remember my Dad always got a few dozen bottles of his favorite booze around Christmas from vendors and associates. I'm not sure that practice still goes on these days but I'd like to be a 'delivery boy' next holiday season and bring a little Christmas 'cheer' to people (while getting paid to deliver of course). So, I'll propose bringing back the 'gift bottle delivery guy.'

Ron Gillen

I'm all for the gift bottle

On a hot day my mom and her friends would run behind the ice man to his next stop and he would break a chunk of ice for them. I'm kinda, she's really old. Did you guys have the television tube tester at the grocery store?

bob_46

Pin Setter

When I was a kid I used to set pins at the bowling alley to make enough to shoot pool. You had to be fast those drunks would use you for target practice.

John_173

The ice man cometh

and goeth.

Ron, I'm 56. When I was growing up (in western SC), the ice man came through the neighborhood to deliver to that one last person down the street with an ice box. We also had a green grocer who drove through in a truck with drop down sides. At about the same time, I think, my grandmother (out in what was then the country, now suburbia) was one on the last few to receive milk deliveries.

Yeah, I remember the tube testers, but we got a bigger kick out of the x-ray machines in the shoe department of the 'big' department store!

Peace.

Unknown

How about,

the "lathe" crew and real "plasterers"?
I think most have been replaced by drywall contractors.
The mixing trough[hopper], can be seen in old 3 Stooges episodes LOL!