#69535
05/12/2002 3:00 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
There are more than a few former occupations made obsolete by changes in technology. Who can remember the name of the gentlemen who removed the pollution left behind by horses?
|
|
|
#69536
05/12/2002 4:12 PM
|
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400 |
wasn't it a street sweeper? in NYC, the first street sweepers, and all of the department of Sanitation, was a sub agency of the board of health.. Sanitation, (aka, san man or garbage man) is also the agency responsible for water-- supply side that is! and now days, they work closely with the Department of Parks, and compost fall leaves and summer grass clipping into compost (free for the hauling-- and container are availabel at a discount.)
the Ringling Br. Circus also markets "exotic manure" for your garden... you can get Elephant manure (at a premium price for manure) for your garden.
but continuing on the theme. Coleco, a toy manufacturer, (notably, Cabbage Patch kids dolls, ) used to be...?
|
|
|
#69537
05/12/2002 5:04 PM
|
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296 |
I must be mad to post what I'm gonna post, but here goes:
(I confess) I was a tour guide at Walt Disney World ages ago. We called the street sweepers on Main Street USA who swept up the huge droppings of the Percherons, Belgians, and Clydesdales pooper scoopers.
Snow White, at the time I worked in the Magic Kingdom, was rumored to be having an affair of the heart with one of the Seven Dwarfs.
Beast regards,
Walt'sWorld
|
|
|
#69538
05/12/2002 5:25 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
Dear of troy: those horse apple removers had a euphemistic designation based on color of their uniform. Can you recall that?
|
|
|
#69539
05/12/2002 5:30 PM
|
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400 |
its before my time! but NYC street sweepers wore white!, like nurses and other health profressionals.
|
|
|
#69540
05/12/2002 6:14 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
Right! And they were mockingly called "Whitewings" it's even in my dictionary. There were many jokes and cartoons about them.
|
|
|
#69541
05/12/2002 6:18 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
Then there was the low-paid functionary who took care of horses for people who needed that service. There was a famous doctor so named. Can you remember it?
|
|
|
#69542
05/12/2002 6:25 PM
|
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296 |
wwh writes:
Then there was the low-paid functionary who took care of horses for people who needed their services. There was a famous doctor so named. Can you remember it?
All I can think of is:
stable boy ... Nope, no Dr. Stable Boy
groom ... Nope, no Dr. Groom that I know of
ferrier ... Nope, no Dr. Ferrier that I know of
Hey! Define "low-paid"!
Beast regards,
Wordworried
|
|
|
#69543
05/12/2002 6:41 PM
|
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613 |
|
|
|
#69544
05/12/2002 7:15 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
Dear WW: Dr. Osler was a Canadian who taught at Johns Hopkins. In WWI, families of wounded Canadian soldiers were greatly relieved by a telegram saying their son had been seen by Dr. Osler. That was all they needed to be sure he was well cared for. But the name is a variant of "hostler". My grandfather kept four horses for making house visits. When my father was small, my grandfather had an hostler who lived in a small room in the attic. One of the mementos of his stay was a dozen or more phosphorus matches in a little ceramic saucer with an integral cup with millimetre raised ridges close set, with a second chemical to help phosphorus match ignite. Smokers who used the match sticks for toothpicks, and carried them in their mouths for extended periods developed a nasty lesion called "phossy" jaw. That was also fate of many workers who licked tiny brushes to put phosphorus on watch dial numerals to make them legible in dark.
|
|
|
#69545
05/12/2002 7:22 PM
|
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296 |
Dear wwh,
What a treasure trove of information is in your paragraph about matches! You've lit a flame or two in my brain...
My great grandfather was a country doctor, and, the classic ending to a country doctor's life, he died of pneumonia contracted after getting off his horse to cross a creek in Dinwiddie on a bad winter's day...Dr. John Chambers, buried out in the family graveyard beyond the grove. I've got his dictionary!!! And his grammar text, which has all kinds of clauses identified that we never heard about in school.
Book regards,
WW
|
|
|
#69546
05/12/2002 9:03 PM
|
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 3,409
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 3,409 |
|
|
|
#69547
05/12/2002 9:13 PM
|
Joined: Apr 2002
Posts: 200
enthusiast
|
|
enthusiast
Joined: Apr 2002
Posts: 200 |
A truly lovely story here:
The French found the odor of [the original fricton-matches] so repellent that in 1830 a Paris chemist, Charles Sauria, reformulated a combustion compound based on phosphorus. [But] Dr. Saura ... but unwittingly ushered in a near epidemic of a deadly disease known as "phossy jaw." Phosphorus was highly poisonous. Phosphorus matches were being manufactured in large quantitiles. Hundreds of factory workers developed phossy jaw, a necrosis that poisons the body's bones, especially those of the jaw. Babies sucking on match heads developed the syndrome, which caused infant skeletal deformities. And scraping the heads off a single pack of matches yield enough phosphorus to commit suicide or murder; both events were reported.
[Finally,] the first nonpoisonous match was introduced in 1911 by the Diamond Match Comapany. ... And as a humanitarian gesture, which won public commendation from President Taft, Diamond forfeited patent rights, allowing rival companies to introduce nonpoisonous matches. The company later won a prestigious for the elimination of an occupational disease.
Diamond simulateously solved another problem. The Sauria formula had a very low ignition point and lit at the slightest friction; many fires were ignited by rats gnawing on match heads at night. The new Diamond compound had a much higher ignition point and a taste entirely unattractive to rats.
|
|
|
#69548
05/12/2002 10:19 PM
|
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296 |
Isn't Ted going to write an amusing story about Phossy/Fosse and Matches?
Blazing regards,
WordWatcher
|
|
|
#69549
05/13/2002 12:20 AM
|
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467 |
Bill:
With all due respect, I don't think you're right about the phosphorus on the watch dials. If I correctly remember a parent's telling me during my childhood, the people w4ere painting radium onto the watch dials. The radium was causing cancers in the lips, tongue, jaw and perhaps esophagus.
TEd
TEd
|
|
|
#69550
05/13/2002 1:19 AM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 1,819
Pooh-Bah
|
|
Pooh-Bah
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 1,819 |
The radium was indeed radioactive and induced cancers of the mouth and lips, as well as other head and neck cancers in the women who painted the dials. Radium also can cause cancers of the bone because it is absorbed into the bone like calcium.
|
|
|
#69551
05/13/2002 1:23 AM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
Dear TEd:Besides radium, there are several other methods of making "glow in the dark" watch dials. There are various non-radioactive phosphorus compounds that will glow in the dark after being exposed to light. Some modern compounds can glow for 10 to 15 hours after a relatively short exposures to bright light.
Tritium, like radium, is radioactive, but it is much safer. Tritium, a form of hydrogen, has a reasonably
short 12 year half life so it doesn't have the long term dangers that radium has, and it decays into
harmless helium. The beta particles that tritium gives off can not even penetrate the outer layer of dead skin on your body, let alone the watch crystal and watch case.
|
|
|
#69552
05/13/2002 3:17 AM
|
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 1,289
veteran
|
|
veteran
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 1,289 |
Sir William Osler was not just a famous physician at Johns Hopkins. He was one of the original four members of the faculty of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine at its founding (the others being Drs. Halsted, Welch and Kelley). Osler was the chief and, along with the others, revolutionized the teaching of medicine. It was these four doctors who got medical training away from an apprenticeship program and into rigourous academic training with practical work with the patients in the hospital, to which the med. school was attached. They also developed the system of internship and residency. Osler was the author of a textbook which was a compendium of medical scholarship and practice at the time. Halstead, who taught and practiced surgery, was the inventor of many surgical procedures, most notably the radical mastectomy which, although a cruel procedure, saved many women from death by breast cancer. Kelley was a gynecologist and surgeon and the inventor of the Kelley clamp, among other things. Welch was the pathologist; JHU Med school library is named for him.
|
|
|
#69553
05/13/2002 3:49 AM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 618
addict
|
|
addict
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 618 |
It was these four doctors who got medical training away from an apprenticeship program and into rigourous academic training with practical work with the patients in the hospital, to which the med. school was attached. They also developed the system of internship and residency.
And I hold them personally responsible for all my pain.
|
|
|
#69554
05/13/2002 4:58 AM
|
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 819
old hand
|
|
old hand
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 819 |
Now, back on thread: Anybody know where I can find a decent slide rule maker? How abut a buggy whip shop? Blacksmiths are pretty well marginalized. Whalebone corset makers are hard to find. Even vacuum tubes for radios are now specialty items.
|
|
|
#69555
05/13/2002 5:41 AM
|
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 3,409
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 3,409 |
|
|
|
#69556
05/13/2002 9:55 AM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 1,819
Pooh-Bah
|
|
Pooh-Bah
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 1,819 |
In reply to:
most notably the radical mastectomy which, although a cruel procedure, saved many women from death by breast cancer
Cruel procedure? Are you saying that the physicians were sadists? It's the cancer that's cruel. The operation was merely the way to deal with the problem with the least overall pain and anguish. The radical mastectomy isn't used as widely now, but at the time they were certainly doing the best they could on the information they had. It's hardly cruel.
|
|
|
#69557
05/13/2002 10:07 AM
|
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 3,409
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 3,409 |
|
|
|
#69558
05/13/2002 11:10 AM
|
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296 |
Sorry, Max. I will try to do better--sure isn't intentional and have been trying to do better since you pointed out the problem in the first place.
Very humbly yours,
Wordwind
PS: I've gone through several threads now trying to find the one in which I messed up. Haven't found it so far. Please PM me if you get a chance, and I'll at least delete it.
|
|
|
#69559
05/13/2002 12:13 PM
|
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400 |
Iron works (custom wrought iron) is a still a curiously big business in NYC-- custom iron gates, window gates, decorative wrought iron elements.. results in several iron works in ever borough of NYC! (they don't call themselves blacksmith, but they do the same job, custom fabricating from raw iron. ) like coopers, they hang on.
and NYPD alone has enough horses to have a full time farrier on staff! there are stables uptown, and downtown, and in Queens, and Bronx.. there might be police stables else where (brooklyn/staten island)
there are plenty of public stables too, again, every borough has at least one, some several, riding academies, where you can stable your horse, or rent one to go riding. so i suspect there is a least one, or two private farriers -- not to mention the ones at the race tracks.
SUNY Westbury, has an equestian program,* and all of Long Island's north shore has horses.. (i live in queens on the north shore (of Long Island Sound)
the Long Island part of the North shore has a lot of money, new and old.. (see the movie Sabrina-either version) and lots of horses--and some farriers.
*but the only school(i know of) to train to be a farrier, is in Kentucky.
|
|
|
#69560
05/13/2002 4:31 PM
|
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439 |
It was these four doctors who got medical training away from an apprenticeship program and into rigourous academic training with practical work with the patients in the hospital, to which the med. school was attached. They also developed the system of internship and residency.
And I hold them personally responsible for all my pain.
Doc! Thanks for the best laugh in a week!
|
|
|
#69561
05/13/2002 4:37 PM
|
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439 |
How about corsetiere?
The woman who made corsets in early days and in later days knew enough about the intricacies of underwear to recommend a brand of girdle that fit you and also could measure you for a bra that did not ride up, bunch, or hurt after a work-day of wearing!
|
|
|
#69562
05/13/2002 4:49 PM
|
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467 |
Reminds me of the story of the little girl who walked into a drugstore in the early 1900s. She said to the druggist, "Do you fit trusses?"
He said, "Why, yes, I do. Why?"
"She answered, "Please wash your hands and make me a milk shake."
TEd
|
|
|
#69563
05/13/2002 5:20 PM
|
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400 |
Wow, large cities still have'm. (corsetiere) next time you plan a trip to boston, check a directory first..
my sisters (who all bear an anatomical resemblance to Dolly Parton, some thing i do not) all get custom bra's.. as does my neice. (my daughter had me for a mother, so she is only normally big busted..and goodness knows, even that didn't come from her fathers side of the family.. who are all small breasted. )
nothing is made in my sisters sizes, they have normal bra's altered to fit. they claim, though expensive, is worth it, because A) bra's are comfortable, B) they don't stretch out of shape, and they last longer.
|
|
|
#69564
05/13/2002 5:21 PM
|
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803 |
The person who rode in the back of an early steam automobile and kept the fire going had a title that is in common use today but who has a distinctly different job although it is still done in automobiles.
|
|
|
#69565
05/13/2002 5:22 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
Dear TEd: the specialty of making trusses must at best be obsolescent. Most hernias get surgically
repaired.
|
|
|
#69566
05/13/2002 5:37 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
Dear Faldage: I was sure the word "chauffeur" had something to do with making something hot.
So your steam car could have two chauffeurs, one to steer, and one to keep boiler going.
chauffeur
SYLLABICATION:
chauf·feur
PRONUNCIATION:
shfr, sh-fûr
NOUN:
One employed to drive a private automobile.
VERB:
Inflected forms: chauf·feured, chauf·feur·ing, chauf·feurs
TRANSITIVE
VERB:
1. To serve as a driver for (another). 2. To transport in (a motor vehicle); drive:
chauffeured the guests around town.
INTRANSITIVE
VERB:
To serve as a driver for another.
ETYMOLOGY:
French, stoker, from chauffer, to heat, stoke, from Old French chaufer. See
chafe.
|
|
|
#69567
05/13/2002 6:56 PM
|
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 544
addict
|
|
addict
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 544 |
So your steam car could have two chauffeursThat it could, but the word he's thinking of is "fireman." Edit: uh, no it's not.  I just read the whole sentence, rather than just part of it, and he was thinking of chauffeur, which has allowed him and Dr. Bill to have a nice lil' ol' fight agin' - jist like old times.
|
|
|
#69568
05/13/2002 6:57 PM
|
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803 |
your steam car could have two chauffeurs
Nope. It just had the one, the one in back that stoked the firebox. The guy up front was called the driver or something like that.
|
|
|
#69569
05/13/2002 7:53 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
I just thought of a dandy. When street lighting lamps burned oil, the lamps on the poles
had to have a guy come with a ladder climb up,put in the oil, and light it. The old lamplighter.
Hey Faldage: you're being more unobliging than usual.
|
|
|
#69570
05/13/2002 8:08 PM
|
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803 |
more unobliging than usual
What? The guy in back stoked the fire. You supplied the etymology your own se'f. The guy in front had nothing to do with the heat so no reason to call him a chauffeur. The job title got transferred when the original job disappeared.
|
|
|
#69571
05/13/2002 8:12 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
There was a popular song about "The Old Lamplighter" (but I like Tom Lehrer's parody better.
Alfonso was the towns' LampLighter. Every evening, just before it
got dark, he had to take his ladder, and his matches, and his lamp
oil, and light every street lamp in Villa Macaroni. It was a very
important job, because if he didn't get the lamps lit, then all the
people would not know which way to walk, and the horses would
pull their buggys down the wrong streets. It would be very dark!
|
|
|
#69572
05/13/2002 8:49 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
Dear Faldage: your glasses need cleaning. The etymology of "chauffeur" says it was early
applied to stokers. So your steam powered vehicle, for instance one of the early fire engines,
could have two chauffeurs, one to drive, and one to stoke. Stoke that up your back door.
|
|
|
#69573
05/13/2002 9:02 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
When I was a small, every spring a horse drawn haywagon stacked high with wooden chairs and ladders would come into our driveway. The driver had spent all winter up in New Hampshire making them, and kept going south through MA until he had sold them all. I still remember seeing a child's rocking chair way up top, and teasing my father until he bought it for me. I'd still have it, except that my wife gave it away. One of the few times I really resented her being generous. That old guy worked hard for a living. Damned few craftsmen
willing to work that hard for so little money. I marvel that his horses were equal to it.
|
|
|
#69574
05/13/2002 10:17 PM
|
Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 320
enthusiast
|
|
enthusiast
Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 320 |
In our neighborhood, up through the World War II era, electric refrigerators were few and far between. Most families had an icebox in the kitchen. Twice a week the iceman cometh. Each house would place a card in the front window to signal the ice truck crew to deliver a block of ice. Ice from the river was cut into blocks during the winter and taken to the icehouse, where it was insulated with sawdust, thereby lasting all summer.
|
|
|
|
|
