With such a powerful, respected woman as a possible presidential candidate for 2016–and of course I’m referring to Kim Kardashian here–it’s amazing to look back at the past, reflecting on the progress we’ve made in both women’s rights, and other areas.

From the days when people ate rocks and wore dirt for clothes, to modern day America where a drone will deliver Netflix to your house via a Cloud that you pay for in Bitcoins, we’ve come far.

Here are some other updates to old fashioned trends.

       1500’s

• The rich would pay money to have their portrait painted; which would take hours to paint and hours of standing still in the same pose

• Today: People take selfies (lots of selfies), but they only require seconds out of the day to pose for. Who’s vain now?

  1918

• Women, like fire hydrants, could not vote.
• Today: Thanks to the 19th amendment, ratified in 1920, women now have the right to vote (fire hydrants still don’t).

    1913

     • Henry Ford introduces the first moving assembly line.

     • Today: A similar idea inspired airports to install moving walkways- because what a shame if            we actually had to use legs to walk somewhere after sitting on a plane for hours.

     1917

     • 1917: The first Pulitzer Prize is awarded.

     • Today: The Carletonian received the Pulitzer Prize in every category in 2015 for its outstanding         reporting on life at Carleton.

      1933

     • 1933: Prohibition ends.
     • Today: Prohibition is still over.

      1960

     • The first Women’s Studies course in the nation is held at the University of Kansas

     • Today: Carleton has an entire department devoted to Women’s and Gender Studies. Fun fact:           there’s also a Men’s and Gender Studies department on campus- it’s called The History           Department.

With progress as vast and rapid as this, it’s hard not to be optimistic about the future.