Back from a virtual drive
Just got back from a drive in another city. Not really; we’re still cut off from the real world, but there are virtual ways to see the world, without any need to put on shoes and leave the house. Google Street View, there to feed my endless curiosity.
Anyhow, back in high school I had the great luck to take a course in Urban Geography. Taught by a brand new graduate of the discipline, with all of his enthusiasm intact. I believe he’s now retired from the school world, but back then, the idea that your course work might involve driving around with buddies and checking out the houses in a given neighbourhood was novel. We were in a public high school, after all. And the lecture material showed us that stuff doesn’t just happen. Every house is the result of someone having an idea and some money.
Where was I? Oh, right. I happened to be doing some family history (nothing unusual there), and one article contained a specific street address for a specific family. Of course I wanted to see if the house was still there (a century after the fact). Turns out, no. But the neighbourhood has been our travel destination for a couple of Xmas family get togethers. And someone we know had visited the various homes, decades ago. Good to go, virtually. I now understand the economics of the home we stayed in (very well off, then as now).
I can now go back to reading census extracts; I can visualize the area, and that’s worth a lot in keeping my interest piqued.
