WALKERS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXII, Issue 19478, 23 December 1925, Page 7

WALKERS

BECOMING EXTINCT CHANGE BROUGHT ABOUT BY MOTOR-CAR. According to statistics compiled by the American National Automobile Chamber of Commerce there are 21,264,752 motor vehicles in the world, of which 83 per cent, are in the United States. The output of cars and commercial vehicles in the United States last year, including vehicles of American design made in Canada, was 3,617,602. France comes second on the list with 145,000, Canada. 134,000. Great Britain 80,000, Italy 35,000, Germany .18.000, Austria 6GOO, Belgium 4000, Czecho-Slovakia 2000, and Spain 900. The world’s production of motor-cars exceeds 4,000,000 a year, and is increasing each year. It is a startling fact that in the United States, where one in every nine persons owns a motor-car, there are more cars than telephones. Statistics covering the rural districts of the State of lowa showed that among 45.1 families whose household possessions were examined, there were 410 cars, 383 telephones, 215 pianos, 192 phonographs, 183 kitchen sinks, 86 bathrooms and 20 vacuum cleaners. These figures show that in rural America, the car has become the most necessary adjunct of the household. We live in a motorised world, but this enormous development has taken place within the past thirty I years. Tn 1895, America’s total production of cars was four, and one of these belonged to Barnum and Bailey, lof circus fame. Next year the total output reached, twenty-five cars, and two years later the 1000 mark was reached.

It was inevitable that the enormoua production of cars should produce many changes in the habits of the community. The most pronounced of these changes is the abandonment of walking. In these days no one walks when he can ride, and if he cannot afford to ride in a motor-car he takes a motor ’bus or a tram-car. But thirty years ago most people walked several miles a day in getting to work and returning home. People who lived in country towns where there were no trams or horse 'buses, thought nothing of walking several miles to and from work each day, and they spent much of their leisure on Saturday and Sunday afternoons in going for long walks. Thirty years ago the late Mr Joseph Chamberlain was regarded as a man of marked characteristics, because he wore a monocle, displayed on orchid in his buttonhole, and never walked a step if he could avoid doing so. Whenever he had to go anywlyrc in London he used a hansom cab. But in these days there are thousands of men in every big city who can claim they never walk a step when they can ride. Motor-cars, tramcars, trains and motor ’buses are extinguishing the pedestrion. )

Sir Arthur Keith, the famous anthropologist, has expressed the view that the root cause ot most of the ills which flesh is heir to is to be found in men’s 'adoption of an erect posture, although his body was built for progression on all fours. For millions of years nan has been T alking on his hind legs, but biologically speaking, his body hasn’t got used to this method of progression. Nevertheless, man’s body, in the process of evolution extending over millions of years, has undergone considerable change as the result of getting up on his hind legs, instead of remaining on all fours. It is equally true that if, in this motorised world, man gives up using his hind legs for progression, his body will undergo further changes. He lost his tail thousands of years ago, because it had become superfluous, and all that remains of it to-day is an appendix, which surgeons charge 50 to 2000 guineas to remove. In the course of time man will lose his legs if he ceases to use them. In the far-distant future man will consist of body and head—the latter entirely toothless as the result of eating soft foods for centuries, instead of hard foods that require mastication.

The popularity of motoring and the popularity of golf are co-related. The motorist who drives out to the links in order to play a round gives his legs the exercise on the links that he deprived them of in the car. His legs want exorcise, aud in this way they assert their claim to consideration; in this way they triumph over man’s neglect. The growth in the popularity of dancing can also be described as the triumphant protest of the legs over the abondonment of the habit of walking. There are many young men and women who hate walking, but can dance for hours every night, of the week, and enjoy every minute of such healthy exercise.

Which sex does the least walking in these modern days? A superficial answer would suggest that the softer sex does far less walking than the energetic male, who has to cover a quarter of a mile each morning to catch his train, and undertake a similar degree of exertion on his return in the evening. But a speedometer tied to the ankle of the average housewife would show that in the course of her domestic duties she covers a great deal of ground each day. She goes backwards and forwards from the kitchen to the dining-room and bedrooms scores of times throughout the day, and adds to this exercise by repeated trips to the front door to" answer the bell. Her perambulation round the kitchen while cooking the dinner total up to a considerable figure in yards. It has been estimated chat the average housewife covers about six miles a day, without once going outside, her own door.

But walking for the pleasure of walking, which was such a general habit in previous generations, has quite gone out of fashion. In these hectic days, vhen there is so much variety ’n the form of popular entertainment, few people are attracted by the quiet joys of a walk in the country. In London there are clubs formed for the purpose of preserving the ancient custom of walking. The members of these flubs meet on Saturday afternoons, take a short journey by train into the country, and then set out on a ten or, twelve miles’ walk along rural lanes and right-of-ways over the fields. But in the aggregate these adherents of the decaying custom of walking number a few hundreds compared with the scores of thousaTi ls who travel by tube, train, ’bus and tram to watch the football matches on Saturday afternoons.

But there is some hope for a revival of the habit of walking when Mr Jlc-nrv Ford’s newspaper, the “Dearborn Independent,” publishes an article regretting the lost art of walking. That the man who has done more than anyone in the world to induce people to become motorists should advocate a return to the healthy practice of walking is indeed remarkable. “Walking is indeed the best all-round exercise,” says this article. “It develops health, grace, beauty of rhythm. It brings one out in the open air. It increases rcspira-

| tion, thereby bringing pure oxygen to | the tissues, which stimulates every organ of the body. It increases the action of the skin, which tends to clear the body of its waste material firmer. It clears the mind. Thoughts come more readily. One’s thinking power is increased. There'is a feeling of exhilara-

) tion, a sense of well-being, which is - only appreciated by the habitual walk- - er. A young woman, once asked a docr tor for a reeipo for a good complexion. . He replied: ( Get one pot of rouge (any ? kind of rouge) and one rabbit’s foot, - not necessarily a left hind foot. Bury - them two miles from home, and walk

out and back every day In every kins of weather, so as to be sure these artii clcs are still where you buried them.”