Vintage work crew photos

[PJs]

Ironically, the internet's two favorite topics of heated debate (slavery and Nazis) are actually perfectly relevant to a thread about vintage work crews. Even a strong familiarity with Godwin's Law will not help us here.

I'll look through my work crews photo file so we can move our conversation forward. The Chinese boat haulers may simply have to remain a mystery.

Yes, Godwin's law to memetics to Metamagical Themas to its final resting place as a memoid joining the memepool with a dose of hyperbole, add some math and AI we are off to the holy trinity of rabbit hole races and Me...me....I am a Horse of Course and I am calling it Mr. Ed.

There used to be a word called Portage...rings a bell anyway...could this be sidesaddle portage?

[MeJasonT]

A man is surly cheaper than a horse, If you buy a horse you have to feed it and see to its needs but if you throw a man 5 cents he has to care for himself. If he kicks the bucket his cousins Ruben or Jasper are always looking for work, The Horse will not be forthcoming with names for his replacement, you would have to go through all the hassle of finding another horse. This is why i think Technology is not the future, If a company replaces me with a robot, even working 24 Hours it will never be cheaper to operate than a mere soul such as myself would be in my lifetime. My life expectancy to that of a robots serviceability would be relatively similar. is an employer likely to pay me 6 million in my working life - NO. But they can find that sort of cash to replace me with a robot? It will take 50 years before someone does the math and works out that making a quick profit now will not produce dividend in the future. The soothsayers will say nee, do we not have lathes and millers which replaceth man - not quite they are tools, the man is still there employed. The robot will still require a maintenance man and human interacting to feed its needs unless its HAL of course. If you take away the canal drawn long boat being hauled by man then he does not get paid, his family starve and no taxes are paid. You cant beat man power (or woman power if you believe in me too, burning Bra's etc). Just saying.

[Jon]

Tunneling crew on London's Central Line. 1898.

Fullsize image: https://diqn32j8nouaz.cloudfront.net...w_fullsize.jpg

[PJs]

Wow 1898 and got to be 25' in diameter with some somber workers. Looks ripe for a touch up but tough on a postcard type. Great pic Jon. I'm thinkin' this thread may reach mach and the 25 page barrier. I think second only, so far to Shop Truths, Phrases, Tales; and Outright Lies which may have temporarily stumbled into the effervescent Godwins law.

Thanks!

[ranald]

Tunneling crew on London's Central Line. 1898.

Fullsize image: https://diqn32j8nouaz.cloudfront.net...w_fullsize.jpg

Hope those "TUBEs" were/are above the ancient sewers there. The odour of sweat & persperation would have been bad enough down there. It's hot enough digging a grave 5ft or 6 ft under let alone in a kind of mine shaft. I'm sweary enough thinking about it.

[Frank S]

Wow 1898 and got to be 25' in diameter with some somber workers. Looks ripe for a touch up but tough on a postcard type. Great pic Jon. I'm thinkin' this thread may reach mach and the 25 page barrier. I think second only, so far to Shop Truths, Phrases, Tales; and Outright Lies which may have temporarily stumbled into the effervescent Godwins law.

Thanks!

New post in http://www.homemadetools.net/forum/s...ght-lies-42152 Am I retired or an indentured servant

[Frank S]

Tunneling crew on London's Central Line. 1898.

Fullsize image: https://diqn32j8nouaz.cloudfront.net...w_fullsize.jpg

How would you like to have to stand shoulder to shoulder 3 or 4 levels high while swinging a pick all day in a dimly lit tunnel

[ranald]

Frank, I thought you were WW or WW.(walt whitman or william wordsworth). Thanks = very entertaining.

[Frank S]

Frank, I thought you were WW or WW.(walt whitman or william wordsworth). Thanks = very entertaining.

I fail to see any correlation hidden within the ramblings of my often ludicrous posts of events past present or future, of the literary poetical genius of 2 IMHO greats like WW&WW. I appreciate your comment none the less.

[PJs]

I get inspired by some of these photos and find the trials and work of these people who preceded use of great cultural value to us and future generation. Much like Walt Whitman and Wordsworth inspired many a thought with great words about mankind and important concepts. There faces, postures, clothing and such along with the industrial age inventiveness are beacons of core principles, work ethic and a daily grind, perseverance for us all to ponder, now and in future generations.

I've been doing a lot of graphic/web/video work lately and as a respite to the grind of it, sometimes I like to "Clean up" some of these so I may better see what was happening in the picture and the people in them. This is one of them and here are a "cleaned" version and a zoomed in crop of some of these hard working folks.






This one in particular brought up a PBS special I saw a while back about tunnel building in Boston and how generations of "Tunnelers" have worked on them, what kind of people they are and what they are doing with the new one. It also comes full forward to today to what Elon Musk is doing in LA with his high-speed underground rail system, which is pretty impressive tech wise without getting into the values or rightness of it...Inspired visionary action, imho.

Hope this adds some inspiration to others here on this great forum.

PJ