I got to thinking the other day, about what kind of job I would have had 100 years ago. There were no computers then, barely any telephones or electricity, most Americans lived in the country instead of the city, and none of my grandparents had even been born yet but Mark Twain was still alive. Teddy Roosevelt had been busting trusts and Taft had just taken over for him. It was the era of Progressivism, oddly coincident with the worst of the Jim Crow legislation in the South. Crazy times.
What would I have been most suited to do? I like to think I would have had one of these jobs:
Robber Baron
Muckraking Journalist
Crazy Inventor
Union Organizer
Colorful Huckster
Visionary Author
Given my luck, though, it's probably safer to assume I would have had one of these jobs:
meat packer
coal shoveler
horsewhip maker
wretched laborer
disease carrier
hobo
Maybe it's best that I'm alive now, I'm not sure I could have made a go of it without refrigeration, automobiles, or vaccinations.
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