“The O. W. R. & N. Company now occupy a building of their own, 20 stories high, and I notice the names of Cotton, Sutherland, O’Brien, Campbell, Buckley, Klippel, are still on the official list, all of whom are descendants of the officials who served the company earlier in the century.
“The old Wells, Fargo & Company’s building still stands and that express company occupies the entire structure with no rooms to spare.
“The Hasty Messenger & Express Company, founded in 1899, is celebrating its 100th anniversary, its manager being Napoleon Traverso, whose progenitor was connected with the company in 1910.
“There has been a wonderful improvement in the present-day typewriters. As I mentioned earlier in my story, there is now a universal language with but 8,000 words. Of this number about 1,000 is all sufficient for an ordinary person and the genius of the inventor has reduced to a combination these 1,000 words in such a manner, that it is possible for a good operator to copy a sermon, or lecture, with ease, on the typewriter, from the most rapid talking orator.
“The sphere of usefulness of the phonograph has widened and it is now ‘A thing of joy forever.’ It seems that this splendid instrument is now gifted with almost human intelligence. Take for instance, an item cut from a daily paper and paste it on the cylinder, or disc, and without further preparation, a voice will read off the item to you in a plain, clear tone. Paste on the disc, the ‘Index of today’s news’ from your morning paper and start it going and the items are read off to you correctly and in good voice. Do you wonder then that I call this a great age?” and a pleased smile came to the old lady’s countenance.
“Many splendid brains have been working to better the methods and increase the value and usage of the telephone, and one must ‘hit the ball and hit it all the time’ to be able to hold an official position with a telephone company. The result of these efforts have put the telephone to varied uses. You can now, not only talk to a person over a wire, but you can actually see them, life size and just as they are, exactly as if you were talking to them face to face.
“Telephones are everywhere, but there are no longer any ‘Centrals’ and no more ‘Number, please,’ is heard, that system becoming unpopular about 1925. Public telephones are established on each street corner, where one may call up, talk to and see the person who answers the phone.
“Much telephoning is now being done by wireless and that branch of the service has developed greatly and is used to communicate with aerial vehicles. This service has been perfected, many former objectionable features being eliminated or overcome.
“I am about to relate an occurrence which is by far the most wonderful I have yet told and it is a phenomena which startled the world, making the superstitious quake, and bringing alarm to many nervous people.
“You know that it was in 1912 that the ill-fated Captain Scott planted the flag at the South Pole, losing his valuable life in the ‘get away.’