Better Living Through Steel -

Better Living Through Steel - Sometimes, I think I could dive into the study of American culture from 1945 to 1955 with a Lileks-like devotion. It's a period that fascinates me; for all everone talks about the way the world is changing today, there is really no period in our history that compares with the post-war period for pure social upheaval. Before WWII, maybe a quarter of Americans graduated from high school, and a tiny minority went to college; a huge percentage of American still lived in rural areas; there was no "youth culture". The computer, the TV, the suburb, the mushroom cloud, and that most unfortunate artifact abused today by inferior irononicist cartoonists, the Modern Guy.

This screed was brought on by finding this website, a page on Lustron Homes - a post-war line of prefab houses made of porcelain-clad steel that were billed as completely maintenance-free (and, according to their owners, still are).

So amazing - and so forgotten.

Hm. Another project in the "someday when I have time' hopper.