#PennedPossibilities 136 — What modern technology (in your world) would your MC or SC have trouble living without?
Mrs Ashton has no fear of technology. Living in 1881 the telegraph and a splendid postal service (multiple deliveries per day in London) frequently, and photography. Gaslight is excellent, the new electric light is far too harsh for a woman of her age. Hansom cabs but not the Tube if she can help it. She will love the fountain pen, and buses with stairs allowing ladies up top
You need to research not what 'exists somewhere' but what an intelligent middle aged woman of middling class and some ingenuity could realistically have in 1881.
Arguments with my editor on the first book late 60s included
A college professor and a town sheriff might have had an answering machine
Cars sometimes had seatbelts but there wasn't social pressure to use them
Benzidrine (speed) was available over the counter.
@stephenwhq Reminds me of when an editor confidently told me that a character couldn't have taken the tram in Prague in 1922. There have been trams in the city since the 1890s. Had to send them a photograph eventually.
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