Folks have already beat me to the punchline. I too would have been dead before the age of 4 without modern antibiotics. My mother and father would have both died as well.
Grandpa survived a burst appendix at age 12. This was in Brecksville, Ohio before WWI. They cut him open on the dining room table. He spent the summer rolled up in a hammock unable to move.
All that aside, I think I'd like to see America in the early 1900's and perhaps a bit earlier-- just for a visit, mind you. I'd like to go to Brecksville and meet Elmer Ellsworth, my great-grandfather and have dinner at their table.
Other places and times?
I once had a dream of visiting a tavern and bumping into a young Benjamin Franklin. He could tell I wasn't playing straight with him when he asked where I was from. Without spilling everything, I got to tell him that he would succeed beyond his wildest imagination. I'd like to have that talk for real.
I'd like to visit my Grandfather as he was building his first million, perhaps as he was working on one of the home show houses he built inside Music Hall back in the 20's. They say he was a grand specimen. I only remember sitting on his belly shortly before he died when I was 3. They say he was a human mountain and a force of nature. I'd like to see it for real.
I'd like to see Cincinnati when it was still called Losantiville and it was just cabins in the woods with big oaks, beeches, and poplars all around.
Henry Miller Shreve built the first steamboat that went up the Mississippi all the way to Pittsburgh. He's one of my forebears. I hear he wasn't a pleasant man, but I would dearly love to shake his hand on the deck of the George Washington, going up the Mississippi and Ohio in 1817. I'd also certainly love to make the run from Louisville upriver and put in at Cincinnati for a few days.
I'd like to visit Great Grandpa Claude and go Muskie fishing with him on the Cuyahoga (before it burned) . He had an old door covered with heads. Some were big enough to fit your head in. I'd also like to spend some time bird hunting with him and Grandpa Whitey.
I'd like to be around for the VJ day celebration on Fountain Square.
I'd like to see a few Red's games during Frank Robinson's rookie year in '56.
I'd like to follow my Dad around Miami Beach, meeting up with Jackie Gleason for a drink or whoever.
I'd like to have been able to see Starfish Prime-- the biggest fireworks show ever.
