#125 A LIFETIME OF CHANGES

                                                        FREDERICK FERDINAND HOMUTH

My Grandfather lived from 1889 to 1983. I think of all the changes he witnessed over his 94 years.

He lived through 15 Canadian Prime Ministers, 18 US Presidents and 5 British monarchs. He experienced  the end of the horse-drawn world, the movement of Canadians from farms to towns and cities, immigration shaping communities, unprecedented changes in political values, shifts in social norms from Victorian morality to the 1960s cultural revolution, post-war suburban expansion and the Baby Boom; changing roles for women at home and work and massive changes in technology, medicine, communication, work, family life and social values.

WORLD EVENTS: Decline of British Empire and rise of the USA; World War I; World War II, the Holocaust and the nuclear age; The Russian Revolution and Cold War; Spanish flu pandemic; The Great Depression; the United Nations & Peacekeeping: Civil Rights Movements; the Space Age, Sputnik and the Moon landing.

CANADA: Canadian Autonomy from Britain; Womens' suffrage; the Maple Leaf Flag; the Quiet Revolution in Quebec; Patriation of the Constitution and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

POLITICAL: Pensions & Social Security; end of Capital Punishment; expansion of Civil Rights protection

COMMUNICATION & MEDIA: from Telegraph to Telephone to Long-distance calling; Radios in almost every home; Silent then Talking Movies;  Television--black and white, colour; very early Computers.

TRANSPORTATION: from Horse-drawn wagons to Automobiles and paved highways; Steam rail gives way to Diesel and Electric trains; Construction of major infrastructure like the 401;   Commercial flight is normalized; the Space Age. (Interestingly, Grandpa never flew in an airplane...he drove his car or took the train.)

TECHNOLOGY & HOME LIFE: Indoor plumbing, Electricity and Central heating; Refrigerators, Electric stoves, Washing machines 

ECONOMIC & WORK-LIFE CHANGES: Transition from agricultural and industrial work to a service economy. Mechanization of farms and factories; Income tax becomes permanent; introduction of Pensions, Old Age Security and Universal Healthcare; a post-war economy, then inflation and an energy crisis.

HEALTH CARE: Penicillin, Insulin, Antibiotics and Vaccinations revolutionize medicine, Universal healthcare; Public Hospitals

FAMILY & GENDER ROLES: a shift from families with 6-10 children to families of 2-3; Divorce more acceptable; Women in the Workforce; women more common in professions like medicine, teaching, law and public office.

WORK & LEISURE: shift from 6-day to 5-day workweek; Sunday shopping; growth of organized sports; the Baby Boom and rise of teenage culture,

FOOD, CLOTHING & THE HOME: Refrigeration and Supermarkets replacing iceboxes and small-town general stores; Rrocessed and Packaged foods; Mass-produced clothing, shift from formal dress like hats to gloves to casual attire. 

EDUCATION: shift from one-room schoolhouses to consolidated Public schools; a High School education becomes normal; University expansion with new professions

MEDIA & POPULAR CULTURE:  the birth of Mass Media; silent movies, talkies, technicolour movies; the change from radio to movies to television; the development in music from ragtime and jazz to swing to rock n roll; the rise of a celebrity culture

My Grandpa Fred's life bridged two eras of human history. When he was born, the world still moved at a pace much as it had for centuries before him. By the time he died, man had walked on the Moon, mastered the atom, conquered many once-fatal diseases, and reshaped daily life through machines, mass communication, and modern social institutions. In the span of a single lifetime, he witnessed a degree of economic, political, and technological change that would once have taken thousands of years to unfold.