From another equine handler/rider/driver, I’d have to say that even though horses were vitally important down through the ages, they also produced a lot of problems. Did you know Julius Ceaser banned horse drawn vehicles in ancient Rome from dawn till dusk in an attempt to curb accidents, congestion, noise and of course, that end product called horse sht! In London in 1894, town planners, as reported in the London Times, feared that by 1950 London’s streets would be nine feet deep in horse sht. In 1880 New York and Brooklyn had something like 160,000 horses that produced around 40,000 gallons of horse urine and maybe three million pounds of horse sh*t a day !!
Now in England in the 1880s it was reckoned that it took five acres to feed a horse. That’s a lot of land diverted from feeding people. Of course, yields were less because the farm work was done by horses, which covered less land a day than do modern tractors. Now consider how world’s people numbers have grown since the hors numbers peaked around 1915. How many horses would we need today? Imagine the waste problem! And the congestion! Imagine replacing every truck that carries goods with horse drawn wagons!!
If the automobile had not been invented (and of course it would have been and was) the entire transportation/economic/population situation of most of the world would be different from the way it is today. There’s really no way to say what would have happened because the automobile *was *invented and the invention took off and now some people have three or four cars. Maybe we would live as the Amish do, which would not necessarily be a bad way to live (I’ve always been impressed by the Amish although I think their dislike of anything modern is taken a bit too far). I would bet that there would not be as large a population as there is now. There is no way horses could be used with all the people alive today; in fact, I think the automobile is one (and maybe even the major) reason why there are so many people today. You’re right - how could horse-drawn carts replace semis hauling three trailers?
My Mom told me that cars were hailed as an end to the pollution problem when they were first becoming popular (the pollution problem being the end product of living horses, which needed to be cleaned up and caused a huge mess, not to mention a rather foul smell). My Mom is my source for this and I can ask her about it but I don’t think she’ll answer as she no longer lives on this earth. But I believe that what she said is true. There are stables north of my town and horses are rented and taken down to the beach in groups. They have to cross Highway 101. It amazes me to see the “road apples” (I think that’s what they’re called) all over the road. It must take about three minutes at the most for the group of horses to traverse the road but those road apples are there in abundance. Do horses defecate all the time? Sheesh, it seems so!!
Something which goes through my mind constantly is just how clogged todays legal system would be once the problems of horse ownsership and its attendant liabilities took over our societies!! People getting kicked, horses bolting, making a mess and causing the EPA to be in fits of apoplexy. And…oh boy, wouldn’t the traffic cops have nervous breakdowns. “No officer, I didn’t run the red light. Me 'orse is colour blind!”. I fear ‘tis too late to even dream of returning to those days of horse drawn conveniences. Unless, of course, we went all the way back to relying on Shanks’ Ponies!!
Some how, the motor car seems a Godsend.
I agree that it can seem that way, especially when one looks at the fact that a car can be stopped in one’s garage or driveway, the ignition turned off, and that’s it. You don’t need to have a minimum of one acre (or five as you have stated). It’s not necessary to feed a car on one’s property, although I suppose feeding stations for horses could have been put in place (but it would take much longer to feed a horse than to fill a car with gas). Can you imagine a “feed station” with a group of horses with feedbags on?
I used to know someone who lived on a very large ranch in Australia. He used a light plane to get around. I don’t know if he also had horses, but I wonder if people who have such large plots of land do use horses as transportation. There are areas in Oregon where cars cannot go; not even those with four-wheel drive. Law enforcement uses horses to get around. I know law enforcement uses horses in New York city, among other cities, because they can go places that cars just can’t go.
So - I guess my points are that we don’t know what would have happened if the automobile had not been invented, horses still have their uses (and they’re awfully nice animals; I’ve heard they are loyal and loving), and traffic congestion is horrendous in some places. This is weird, John, but I have a picture in my mind of a very crowded 91 freeway (it was horrible when I lived near it and had to use that freeway to commute to work and now I’ve heard from several people that it’s even worse, which I don’t think is possible unless people are now being forced to drive in reverse (sometimes the traffic was so bad that those of us who lived in the area literally could not get to work)…oops, sorry, going off on a tangent. It’s still early here and I’ve been up for hours)…anyway, I have this weird picture of you riding a horse on that freeway and bypassing all the cars that are either stopped or going backwards and you laughing as you just move between the cars…maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to have a horse as backup for the times when using a car just isn’t feasible.
I wonder why I have that picture in my mind…
