The House that Came in the Mail

99% Invisible

SiriusXM Podcasts and Roman Mars

Design, Arts

4.8 • 27.5K Ratings

🗓️ 11 September 2018

⏱️ 32 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The Sears catalog tells the tale of a world -- itemized. And starting in 1908, the company that offered America everything began offering what just might be its most audacious product line ever: houses.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	This is 99% invisible.
0:02.0	I'm Roman Mars.
0:04.0	About eight weeks ago, one of the producers here at 99PI ordered a book.
0:10.0	Our office receives a lot of books, but this one, this one was special.
0:15.0	Everyone wanted to read it.
0:17.0	Okay, so first of all, this book is beautiful.
0:20.0	I know.
0:21.0	Only it wasn't just any book.
0:22.8	That's the producer Joe Rosenberg.
0:24.8	It was a catalog.
0:25.9	Oh my God, it's from 1908.
0:27.7	Catalog number 177 of The Great Pricemaker. Oh, Order Catalog was nearly omnipresent in early 20th century
0:39.6	American life.
0:40.9	In 1908, when this particular issue came out, one out of every five Americans were already
0:46.1	subscribers.
0:47.1	So is this kind of like the Amazon warehouse before the Amazon warehouse?
0:50.9	Yes.
0:51.9	Anyone, anywhere in the country, could order this catalog for free.
0:55.5	Look through it and then have anything their heart desired delivered directly to their doorstep.
1:00.2	Like seriously, anything.
1:01.9	Parasols and pipes.
1:03.0	Really fancy looking belts.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from SiriusXM Podcasts and Roman Mars, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of SiriusXM Podcasts and Roman Mars and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.