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The year will end in 26 days, and it falls upon columnists to summarize another passage around the sun. This time around, many commentators are also attempting to put some kind of meaning on the decade, although the decade won't end for more than a year.
The decade does not end on Dec. 31, 1989, but on Dec. 31, 1990, and the third millennium arrives not on Jan. 1, 2000, but on Jan. 1, 2001, which also coincides with the demise of the 20th century.
To understand why, look at the start of the sequence of years. There was no year 0, so the first decade had to gather its ten years from year 1 through year 10. The second decade would therefore extend from 11 to 20, and the first century could not have gone from 0 to 99; instead it comprised 1 through 100, and the second century 101 through 200.
By now, the logic should be clear. The 20th century had to start on Jan. 1, 1901, and it won't end until Dec. 31, 2000. The 198th decade began on Jan. 1, 1981, and we're stuck with it until Dec. 31, 1990.
This is one case where computer programmers have a more convenient system. They start counting at 0, rather than 1. If civilization had reckoned years that way, then the decades, centuries and millennia would conform to our numeric expectations.
That said, our fixation on decades is merely a convenience, a short way of producing inaccurate history.
The Gay 90s
(gay
had a different meaning
in those days, even though Oscar Wilde was prominent then)
evoke an image of prosperity with gaslights and
gingerbread. The reality was much different. After the
federal government halted silver subsidies in 1893,
Colorado was anything but prosperous. Mines, mills and
smelters closed; thousands of men were thrown out of work;
fortunes like Horace Tabor's evaporated overnight.
It was the only time that Colorado, otherwise rather
traditional in its politics, elected a genuine radical to
high office -- Gov. Davis H. Bloody Bridles
Waite.
Our Populist governor got his nickname from this speech:
And if the money power shall attempt to sustain its
usurpations by the strong hand, we will meet that issue
when it is forced upon us, for it is better, infinitely
better, that blood should flow to the horses' bridles
rather than our national liberties should be destroyed.
Those are not the words of a contented Victorian
gentleman.
The Roaring 20s
were an urban phenomenon. In
rural areas, the Great Depression didn't wait until the
stock market crashed in 1929; it started years earlier when
wheat fell from $2.19 a bushel in 1919 to 93 cents in
1923.
With those prominent falsehoods in mind, we know that
the 1980s will be categorized as a time of growth and
prosperity throughout America -- the exciting 80s
or
the like.
The Colorado reality of the 80s, which will be overlooked, is that for the first time in history, more people moved out of Colorado than moved in. Dozens of financial institutions collapsed. Mining, logging and other forms of resource extraction almost vanished as a source of employment. Every rural area is worse off than it was a decade ago, and every city is overstocked with vacant houses and commercial buildings. The only exceptions are a few resort towns.
The same probably holds true for all of inland America. But books come from New York, movies from Los Angeles, and political announcements from Washington. Those cities all flourished during the 1980s, and those cities define American culture -- i.e., the Great Depression didn't happen until it moved from Manhattan, Kan., to Manhattan Island.
Thus these years of layoffs and foreclosure will be described in glowing terms. Your grandchildren, presuming that they read their schoolbooks, will be sure that you're lying when you tell them that times were tough during the 80s.
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