SASKATCHEWAN AND ITS PEOPLE
1924
Volume II

         
EVOLUTION OF TOWNS AND VILLAGES.
  


COMING OF THE AUTOMOBILE AND THE MOVIES.


The irruption of the automobile commenced about twenty-three or
four years ago. The first that ever came into the west, was shown with
a circus, but, at any rate while it was in Regina, it was not used. Prob-
ably no one knew how to drive it. In 1891 on the boundary, an automo-
bile came panting into Carnduff one day about noon.  Two men were
with it. They parked their uncanny vehicle at the livery and had a meal
at the hotel. Meanwhile we gazed with some awe at the thing of mys-
tery. When it ultimately snorted on its way down the street the horses
nearly had a fit. The occupants were Americans who had come through
from Wisconsin on a vacation trip. We believe this was the first auto-
mobile that ever came into the Territories in an ordinary way, as a thing
of use. Our mechanical knowledge is negligible and we remember very
little about the make of this pioneer motor; but we do remember that it
was not very big, it had no cover and would only carry two. And now
we have gas traction.
         

         
EVOLUTION OF TOWNS AND VILLAGES.
  


PIONEER SPEAKING MACHINES, MOVIES, ETC.


My first acquaintance with the speaking machine was at Whitewood
in the nineties. A man was going around with one, exhibiting it in hotels.
He had it at Woodbine, and one could hear its tiny voice with the crowd
for 15 cents. If you gave the man a quarter you could put a receiver to
your ear and listen through a small rubber tube. It was a very wonder-
ful thing, for feeble as it was it actually spoke, and even sang in a thin
metallic voice.


Movies!  The first moving picture we saw was in that same burg,
shown by a travelling man. There was a fire shown on the screen. An
intoxicated man who had gone to sleep, woke up to see the fire blazng on
the stage and he jumped up to make a gallant rush to the platform to
put it out when he was restrained by a companion and remembered. The
first movie show in the metropolis, and probably in Saskatchewan was
in a tent on Broad Street, erected on a vacant lot which was covered with
grass. The seats were benches and there was a very venerable and metal-
lic piano. The pictures were crude, but very amazing.


The first knowledge of a penny in the slot machine was imparted to
me by one of our sheriffs who had gone over to the States to get a pris-
oner.  He saw one of these things and after carefully watching other
people to see he didn't make an exhibition of himself, he screwed up his
courage and dropped in a nickel. These little reminiscences are intended
chiefly for the benefit of those who have been used to electric light,
movies, gramophones, motor cars and street cars from childhood, and
who, perhaps, may find a difficulty in imagining a world in which they
were not.


Bibliography follows: