Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 261, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 31 October 1912 — OWE MUCH TO LOCOMOTIVE [ARTICLE]

OWE MUCH TO LOCOMOTIVE

_ I Progress of the World Mdy Be Distinctly Traced to the Spreading Lines of Steel. If one pauses and thinks what It Is that most distinguishes the world civilization of this year 1912 from, say, the civilization of 1812, one will probably work out to the conclusion that it is the accelerated mobility of humaq kind. A century ago human beings were for the most part fixtures. Very few of them traveled 20 miles away from the smoke of their natal place chimneys. Even Ulysses, the mighty wanderer of the Homeric period, probably did not move over a range as big as the state of Pennsylvania. — During this year 1912 there will be more than one million of Americans who will cover more ground space within a 60-day period than Ulysses tramped over in all the years he was away from his Grecian farm, comments the Baltimore American. Two hundred and fifty thousand Americans will cross the Atlantic and explore every nook and corner of Europe. A half million will invade Canada. A half million from the west will come to the esatern seaside and mountain resorts. A hundred thousand from the east will see the Yosemlte and several thousands will travel up into Alaska. A hundred years ago the travel habit was confined to the very few. Now, Europe and North America are spider webbed with railroads, palatial steamboats rush across every ocean and plow up and down all the - rivers of the earth, and traveling around the world is now an affair of less difficulty than a trip to Boston a hundred years ago. Even a hundred years ago they were accustomed to say that travel broadens a man — diversifies his ideas. If that were so a century ago it is, of course, true today; only now we should say that travel broadens men and women —It diversifies their ideas.