comment: >
  
  Just thinking that it was less than 60 years between the Wright Brothers and the first American space flight absolutely blows my mind.
context: This is a friendly reminder to read our rules.
  Remember, /r/Showerthoughts is for showerthoughts, not "thoughts had in the shower!"
  (For an explanation of what a "showerthought" is, please read this page.)
  Rule-breaking posts may result in bans. >
  
  My great uncle was born in 1896 and passed in 1994 when I was 14. Radio had just been invented, automobiles were a curiosity, it'd be almost a decade before the Wright brothers made their first flight and television was several decades beyond that. By the time he passed he'd been through two world wars, helped wire our town for electricity and phones, seen planes evolve into 747s and horse-less carriages become luxury cars. In his lifetime we went from "man could never fly" to the space race and using Morse code on telegraphs to the nascent days of the internet. Blows my mind whenever I think about him and the fact I grew up around someone from the 19th century. >
  
  The 20th century was astounding when you really think about it. I watch a lot of classic films from the 30s 40s 50s and when you see old people In those films you can't help but think how they were born in the mid 19th century and went from steam boats, locomotives, horse and carriage, telegraph to automobiles, phones, planes, nuclear energy, television. Can you imagine explaining to the average person in 1850 that a rock is capable of wiping out an entire city. >
  
  It took 2100 years for humans to move from bronze to iron tools. It took us just over 50 years from us inventing the airplane to us going to space >
  
  I'm a classics major and I minor in history. The progress we make through time is mind-blowing. And like some other redditor on here said, we don't always move forward. The medieval era was pretty stagnant. >
  
  I too was a classics major. And I’m fascinated by how the changes in technology do not mean that we humans have changed that much. The average person today and the average citizen of Rome have much in common. >
  
  Yeah reading roman and greek comedies showed me how similar their humor is to ours. >
  
  Jack Marston could have played Pac-Man with his great grandchildren at the ripe old age of 85. >
  
  Yeah he's a great example. He grew up with outlaws and ragtime and likely witnessed disco and MTV >
  
  So when did the wild west end? It sounds medieval from TV (as it it was that long ago) >
  
  My home town, Bakersfield, boast to have had the last Wild West shootout. The bad guys and good guys dueled in the streets in 1903. PacMan debuted in 1980. So, someone born in 1900 would be 80yo and play? >
  
  My favorite example is that one of the wright brothers lived to see the first supersonic flight. >
  
  That might be one of the coolest things ever >
  
  My great grandmother was born a year before the Wright Brothers first flew a plane, she died 2 years after 9/11. Pretty wild to think about the things she saw in her lifetime. She nearly died of pneumonia when she was 5 or 6, then nearly died again of Spanish flu, she started a basketball team at the school she taught at, had to learn it from a book because she had only heard about it from newspapers. Her husband fought during the First World War. Her son, the Second World War. Her husband died of old age in the late 70’s and she lived another 25ish years. >
  
  It must have been hard seeing her husband go off to fight in WW1 and then her son fight in WW2. worst part is her grandson could have very well fought in Vietnam. >
  
  Yep. 100 years ago majority of North Americans homes didn’t have electricity. 
  Won’t be too long now that you kids will be posting shower thoughts about being surprised that there’s people alive who were around before the internet. >
  
  My grandmother was born in 1901.  Family had a horse and buggy in those days.  Gram and Grandpa had a car in the early 1930's.  She died in 1984.  Nobody in our family played it, but ...  she could have. >
  
  The oldest person to have lived whose age has been verified was Jeanne Louise Calment (1875 - 1997). Her life intersected with:   
  
  Wild Bill Hickok - gunfighter killed in Deadwood.  
  George Custer - cavalry commander.  
  George Sand - novelist and girlfriend of Frederic Chopin.  
  
  As well as. 
  
  Maisie Williams - Game of Thrones actor. 
  Jake Paul - YouTuber and mixed martial artist. 
  Simone Biles - gymnast. >
  
  Jeanne Calment also met Vincent Van Gogh.  She said the meeting was a disappointment, and described him as ugly and "very disagreeable," adding that he "reeked of alcohol." >
  
  Technology has advanced so fucking far. It's crazy to think where humanity will be in 3023, when you think of where it was in 1923 compared to 2023. I imagine we will keep innovating and make life easier for later generations, or we will somehow manage to wipe ourselves out altogether within the next century. >
  
  I can never believe how close the wild west was. Like kids in the 50s (people alive today) probably spent all day playing Cowboys outside and then spoke to someone who lived that life from that era. I was thinking how cool 3d games must have been when they were first introduced to people who grew up on pac-mn and pong and it got me thinking that if they came out in the 70s and 80s then people from the wild west could have played them. Could you imagine going from horse and cart, reading about Billy the kid in the newspaper to playing pac-man?