selewis wrote:It is not always apparent to the casual observer but there are a lot of things lying just below the veneer of modernity, even in our big cities, that attest to how quickly we have moved from horse to horseless. When I first moved to New England in 1971 there was still an unused but un-refurbished stable in downtown Boston, not far from Beacon Hill. It was all boarded up but we managed to ,ahem, gain access and could see the remains of the tie stalls. Also, what surprises a lot of people is that most of the streets downtown were still bare cobblestone until the late 50's early 60's. Of course they still are, underneath the blacktop, as anyone who has driven on them will affirm.
Some years ago, many actually, when I visited Montreal I was impressed with the lively carriage trade there. Most large cities have some such thing comprised of fine reproductions of elegant broughams and the like but in Montreal they were old car chassis pulled by plow horses. This was in the touristy, old part of town but, still, it was neat to see the ingenuity- a sort of seamless blend of old and new without the pretense of recreating the past. (of course the highlight of the trip and my reason for going was to visit the home ice of the Canadiens: the Montreal Forum)
Sandy
That's really true.
There's a really neat old house here in town, owned by a relative of mine, that has a carriage house. It has to be one of the few ever built here, but it's still in really nice shape, now being used for a garage.
There's one place left, in that same neighborhood, where there's a ring in the sidewalk to tie up a horse. It's a unique, brick, sidewalk, which is probably why it's managed to last. There was a ring in a downtown sidewalk up until about two years ago, but they redid the sidewalk, and likely didn't know what it was for. So now it's gone. The prior sidewalk had been put in during the teens, when horses downtown still occurred.
Almost the entire human geography of the rural counties of the Mid West fits into this category also. If you travel the back highways, your kids always end up asking why there's a tiny town every few miles. Horse are the reason why. The towns tend to be spaced just evenly enough that the furthest out farmers could get there, and back home, in a day. That's not far really, if you have a wagon full of product to deliver.
The numerous abandoned farmsteads and homesteads also are mute testimony to the age of the horse. They were homesteaded when horsepower prevailed, and represented farming, or ranching, as it was when people had to depend on horses. A farmer could only farm so much. Internal combustion engines allowed them to farm much more.