In BBCโs โThe Bombโ, a podcast we are currently listening to in class, a specific quote caught my attention. โWe view historical events with the knowledge of whatโs comingโ.
โWe view historical events with the knowledge of whatโs comingโ – BBCโs The Bomb
Why did this quote stand out to me? Well, it reminded me of one of the topics we are learning about, historical significance. We in the present look at historical events knowing what the consequences of that event will be, but the people who experienced the event at the time couldnโt fully know the future historical significance and consequences of what they were experiencing. Historical Significance is something an event from the past could have. A historically significant event is something thatโs caused great change.
In my last project I created a post about the Canadian Election. In this post Iโll be discussing an American Election, one from 1952. It was between Dwight D. Eisenhower and Adlai Stevenson, and with the more recent popularity of the television it was being broadcasted on the three channels. One of these channels was CBS, where along with the news following the election, was a huge computer called the Univac. This computer was going to do something that hadnโt been done before, it was going to be part of predicting the results of the election.
The computer was going to predict the election results, however peoples perspectives at the time on what computers could do and where they belonged in our lives was very different from today since it was only the beginning for this technology. The reason for featuring the computer on the news was mainly drawing attention to the station and advertising the computer itself. People had more faith in other forms of predicting the results than Univac, so much that when the computer gave the prediction they thought it was wrong, that it had made a huge mistake, so they didnโt air the results. It was only when the real results came in that they realized how accurate the prediction actually was, and just like that our perspectives were changed on what this technology could really do.
The Univac became a cultural symbol, gaining lots of popularity, and from that point on computers would play an important role in elections. It was a clear turning point for the way people perceived computers, and their place in society. A prediction that I donโt think could be made at the time, was the historical significance this event would have. This event changed how we see technology, which led to how heavily involved computers are with our lives today. Itโs also relevant today not only because itโs consequences continue today, but also because our perspectives on computers continue to change like current issues with social media and algorithms. This event changed the world, and all these things prove to me that this event was historically significant.