Maybe this will boggle your mind, I know it did mine! The year is 1904 . Just a little over a hundred years ago. What a difference a century makes!

In 1904:

• The average life expectancy in the U.S. was 47 years.
• Only 14 percent of the homes in the U.S. had a bathtub.
• Only 8 percent of the homes had a telephone.
• A three-minute call from Denver to New York City cost eleven dollars.
• There were only 8,000 cars in the U.S., and only 144 miles of paved roads.
• The maximum speed limit in most cities was 10 mph.
• Alabama, Mississippi, Iowa, and Tennessee were each more heavily populated than California, which was ranked 21st in population.
• The tallest structure in the world was the Eiffel Tower.
• The average wage in the U.S. was 22 cents an hour.
• The average U.S. worker made between $200 and $400 per year.
• A competent accountant could expect to earn $2000 per year, a dentist $2,500, a veterinarian $2,000, and a mechanical engineer about $5,000.
• More than 95 percent of all births in the U.S. took place at home.
• Ninety percent of all U.S. physicians had no college education. Instead, they attended medical "schools", many of which were condemned in the press and by the government as "substandard."
• Sugar cost four cents a pound, eggs were fourteen cents a dozen, and coffee was fifteen cents a pound.
• Most women only washed their hair once a month, and used borax or egg yolks for shampoo.
• Canada passed a law prohibiting poor people from entering the country for any reason.
• The five leading causes of death in the U.S. were pneumonia and influenza, tuberculosis, diarrhea, heart disease, and stroke.
• The American flag had 45 stars. Arizona, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Hawaii, and Alaska hadn't been admitted to the Union yet.
• The population of Las Vegas, Nevada, was 30.
• Crossword puzzles, canned beer, and iced tea hadn't been invented.
• There was no Mother's Day or Father's Day.
• Two of 10 U.S. adults couldn't read or write.
• Only 6 percent of all Americans had graduated high school.
• Eighteen percent of households in the U.S had at least one full-time servant or domestic.
• There were only about 230 reported murders in the entire U.S.

(And a mere 100 years later, I just put this information on a web site for anyone in the world to see within 10 minutes of receiving it by email from a retiree half way across the country.)