In the future of 1957, all things will be made of plastic
Sarah Lacy points to the house of plastic, or rather, the house of the future, circa 1957:
- Step up to the Monsanto House of the Future, with its four equal wings “floating” above the beautifully landscaped grounds and waterfalls.
- Enter the dining and family room, a comfortable place where the family of the future will play, rest, and dine on stylish plastic furniture.
- Look into the “Atoms for Living Kitchen” with its revolutionary microwave oven.
- Pass the two kid’s bedrooms—one for the boy of the future and one for the girl of the future—and the shared kids’ bathroom.
- Next, see the master bedroom and the main bathroom.
- Conclude your tour in the sleek living room, with its giant, non-operational, wall-mounted television screen.
Most forms of plastic are roughly 20 times more expensive than the cheapest kinds of steel. Plastic is expensive stuff. It is, however, cheap to mold, so if you are making something small – like a stereo or a laptop computer, the low cost of molding plastic will beat the high cost of the raw material. Steel is very expensive to mold – you have to heat it to 2000 degrees. Wood, as a raw material, is cheaper than both steel and plastic.
I have trouble putting myself back in the mindset that might have taken this house seriously. Health concerns about plastic were not yet on the radar. Environmental concerns were not yet on the radar. The finite, limited nature of petroleum was not yet on the radar. On the radar was the rapid rise in wages that the America people were enjoying at that time. There was the sense that in the future, the American people would be able to afford endless amounts of whatever was considered expensive and good in 1957.
It is a world as foreign to me as one in which sherrifs turn the police dogs loose on African-Americans simply because those African-Americans want their kids to go to good schools.