100 years ago, a man named John Watkins made a variety of predictions on how he thought the world would be in the year 2000 and beyond. Incredibly, some of his predictions were correct. Here are just a few of his predictions of an 'incredible' future, which to us is just normal daily life! Read through the article and try to fit the correct words in each gap. Make sure to come back tomorrow for part two of this lesson!
Average - normal
Envisaged - imagined
Published - made public in printed material e.g. newspapers or books
Foresight - to predict something accurately
Unheard - not thought of or mentioned before
Miracle - an incredible occurrence
Accurately - correctly
Watkins did not, of course, use the word "digital" or spell out precisely how digital cameras and computers would work, but he _1_ predicted how people would come to use new photographic technology.
"Photographs will be telegraphed from any distance. If there be a battle in China a hundred years hence, snapshots of its most striking events will be _2_ in the newspapers an hour later.... photographs will reproduce all of nature's colours."
This showed major _3_ , says Mr Nilsson. When Watkins was making his predictions, it would have taken a week for a picture of something happening in China to make its way into Western papers.
People thought photography itself was a _4_ , and colour photography was very experimental, he says.
"Americans will be taller by from one to two inches."
Watkins had unerring accuracy here, says Mr Nilsson - the _5_ American man in 1900 was about 66-67ins (1.68-1.70m) tall and by 2000, the average was 69ins (1.75m).
"Wireless telephone and telegraph circuits will span the world. A husband in the middle of the Atlantic will be able to converse with his wife sitting in her boudoir in Chicago. We will be able to telephone to China quite as readily as we now talk from New York to Brooklyn."
International phone calls were _6_ of in Watkins' day. It was another 15 years before the first call was made, by Alexander Bell, even from one coast of the US to the other. The idea of wireless telephony was truly revolutionary.
"Ready-cooked meals will be bought from establishments similar to our bakeries of today."
The popularity of ready meals in supermarkets and takeaway shops in High Streets suggests that Watkins was right, although he _7_ the meals would be delivered on plates which would be returned to the cooking establishments to be washed.
To read about more of Watkins predictions, visit http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16444966
Now add the missing word to the spaces below:
