Whether it's broadband or telegraph, it's too expensive (a century apart)

The front page of the Jan. 29, 1914, edition of the Bemidji Daily Pioneer.

It’s not a secret that Internet prices in the United States are out of line with those in other developed countries. In fact, Americans pay more per megabyte than anyone else in the world with access to broadband.

This is on top of having our Netflix stream slower than elsewhere; in 2012 the average download speed for American connections was just 12th in the world.

(It should be noted here that the United States' speed problem is one of having some areas with great speeds, but low performers dragging the rest of the country down.  For example, if Vermont and New Hampshire were countries, they would have the second and third-highest average download speeds in the world. California, home of Silicon Valley, also suffers from this diffusion on a micro scale, having fast service in urban cores while most of the state’s land area remains unserved or underserved.)

Wow. It must be completely unprecedented that the country where a revolutionary new telecommunications technology was invented trails the rest of the world in terms of costs and efficiency. Right?

Nope. A century ago, people were complaining that US telephone and telegraph rates were too high. It seems that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

One-hundred years ago today, the Bemidji Daily Pioneer in Minnesota ran a column one article by Illinois Congressman Clyde Tavenner noting several areas where the United States trailed significantly in terms of costs compared to what was then the "developed" world.

As examples, the United States ranked:

• Last of 16 countries in average cost to send a telegram (44 cents vs. 9 cents in top-ranked Luxembourg);
• Only 14th lowest in terms of costs per local phone call (2.1 cents vs. 0.4 cents in Norway);
• Last in average costs of a long-distance call (60 cents vs. 8 cents in Sweden for a call to a place 100 miles distant [in 15th place was Hungary, with 39 cents for that same call]).

The whole screed was apparently a call from the Congressman to nationalize the home phone service, then (as now -- what breakup?) dominated by American Telephone & Telegraph. Apparently, per Tavenner, Ma Bell was engaged in an "evident attempt to stave off government ownership by its willingness to submit to every government demand" (wire-tapping included?).

Tavenner was obviously a proponent of government ownership of the telephone system, noting that the one place where American service was superior than most of its contemporaries (other than Japan) was in its government-owned postal service.

"Our privately owner telegraphs and telephones fall far below the standard of efficiency and cheapness set by the European government service," Tavenner wrote.

The government never did buy AT&T, although it did cause it to break up in the 1980s -- before the telecommunications giant reformed like a melted T-1000.

Why women don't belong in college ...

... Their fragile compositions just can't handle the pressure.

From the Dec. 30, 1913 edition (100 years ago today) edition of the Logan Republican:

From page 1 of the Dec. 30, 1913, edition of the Logan Republican.

One of the interesting things you notice in old newspapers is the way they reported things that are no longer covered in the current media -- in this case, a suicide. (For example, I once mentioned on this blog how the New York Times covered the suicide of someone named John Baker.)

But why would a newspaper in Logan, Utah, cover the self-inflicted death of a young woman more than 750 miles away in Long Beach, Calif.? Was there a local angle? Apparently not, as the victim was from Illinois, had gone to Northwestern University and now lived in California.

I think the comment that Ms. Pritchard "suffered a mental and physical breakdown as a result of her hard study" leads to the real answer. Utah, of course, is a stronghold of the Church of Latter Day Saints, and Mormon Doctrine, at least as late as 1966, indicated that a "woman's primary place is in the home, where she is to rear children and abide by the righteous counsel of her husband." Certainly the tone of this article serves that doctrine -- and a woman going to college does not.

You've come a long way, baby.

He will die

Newspapers of old were a bit more blunt. From the Dec. 3, 1913, edition of The Tacoma Times:

The game ended in a 6-6 tie, in case you were wondering.