[78-L] fwd: 1906 film of a cable car ride-Gaylord Carter & San Gabriel "Railroad Show"

[victrola78s at aol.com]

This film isn't "new" to me. In the late 1980s through the 1990s the San Gabriel Mission Playhouse used to run a "railroad show" every year.  Theatre organist Gaylord Carter would accompany various silent films that included trains, trolleys, & anything else that rolled on the tracks. The shows always started with "A Trip Down Market Street"-the one being shown on YouTube, & Gaylord always made a big point out of the film being made in 1905. "That was a GREAT year, because that's the year I was born!", he would tell the audience. Now the film is said to be from 1906-ah, well. Gaylord would do his usual musical improvisations on the action onscreen, including the songs "Horses, Horses, Horses", "Daisy Bell", & "In My Merry Oldsmobile". There were always loud gasps of amazement from the audience at all that moving chaos all over the screen. Nobody could get over how reckless or stupid or oblivious people were on that street, both drivers & pedestrians. It is mind boggling that the cameraman didn't capture an actual wreck or collision while the film was rolling. When you look at this scene today(and there must have been similar ones in Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, etc.), you wonder why "danger!" didn't register on the faces of the pedestrians at least. Street kids running around & back & forth in front of the cable car, grown men who can't seem to decide which side of the street they should walk to, & the one driver who pulls his wagon out into traffic without one single look around him! Say what you will about modern drivers(and most are still pretty ignorant or impatient), but most of 'em have a strong enough sense of self preservation to avoid getting killed-most of the time. Decades of traffic laws have conditioned the average slug on four wheels enough to at least look around before gunning the engine to beat that yellow light. I still lift out of my seat a little every time I see this footage. Incredible!