Prelinger Archives: Our Shrinking World (1946)

https://archive.org/details/0119_Our_Shrinking_World_E00960_09_22_46_18-0019

This 11-minute-long video recaps a history of transportation and communication, from the dawn of man to the mid-twentieth century. At the time the video was made, television was the newest information technology, but the video delves into the postal service, telegraph and television, relating all to the complementary transportation methods that enabled the communication. The video argues that with international content able to be transported around the world quicker, "all the people in the world are neighbors, with new benefits, new relationships, and new responsibilities." The video also has high hopes that modern communications will foster a "friendly world community," which is being developed on the web today.

Although the video has a large focus on human transportation, it is necessary to remember that people themselves carry information and relay it. When humans developed sailing, it not only enabled faster human travel, but also faster travel of information and knowledge from other areas of the globe. When the transcontinental railroad was completed in the 1800s, not only could people and goods easily traverse the vastness of America, but also newspapers and books could reach different states faster. "Through the sciences of transportation and communication, we are able to exchange, not only our ideas and achievements, but the material treasures of the world as well."

Transportation and communication up to 1946 had been hand-in-hand, and "Our Shrinking World" describes the interconnectivity between the two sectors. It was correct in assuming that the world was still shrinking, as the onset of online networks and the web has shrunk the world to the size of a computer screen.