American Decoration in the Middle of the 20th Century

Home decorating has come a long way over the decades. Certain elements that began as     1    for survival—like fireplaces—have transformed into decorative elements in the modern age. Some styles are still massively popular, inspiring copycat furniture that sells for thousands. Other     2    are ignored or even ridiculed.

No one knows what home decoration of the future will look like. But if we look back through history, we can guess which design elements will come back—and which will disappear forever.

The Great Depression affected every aspect of American life—including decoration.   People were just trying to     3    during the 1930s, which didn’t leave a lot of room for non-essentials. But that doesn’t mean everyone gave up on making their homes look beautiful. A     4    living room would have a few throw rugs in interesting patterns, too. There was no one type of furniture that     5    the 1930s—curved and straight line furniture still     6    as the Art Deco style from the previous era was still popular. Plastic chairs and wingback chairs all had a place in the 1930s home. People were also likely to use what they had and not care so much about matching a certain taste.

It’s impossible to describe the 1940s without mentioning World War II. During the first half of the decade, home design took a backseat to     7    the war effort. The second half was much different. Returning soldiers had something new to look forward to: new kitchens with     8    such as refrigerators, freezers, and dishwashers. Traditional wood furniture in dark or blonde tones graced every room of the home.

Post-war America was a lot happier and shinier than recent decades. With a prospering middle class and a healthy economy, people had more time and money to devote to new pursuits—like decorating their houses.

The unfussy furniture made popular by Charles Eames started to     9    the American household. Everything was simple and uncomplicated. Wall to wall carpeting became the most desirable type of flooring, especially in unique colours.

The 60s brought about many changes to American culture and home design was no exception. People wanted to show off their unique sense of style more than ever before. Homes weren’t just seen as a     10    of how successful you were—they were also a chance to let your personality shine through home decoration.

Sticky notes

This invention, commonly used in offices and households throughout the world, came about as a result of a series of accidents. In 1968, Spencer Silver, who was working for a company then called 3M, was     1     to produce a super-strong adhesive (黏合剂), something that makes things stick together, to be used in the building of planes. This, however, wasn’t successful and instead he succeeded in creating an extremely weak adhesive that was     2     to pressure. The new adhesive had two advantages: it could be removed from surfaces easily and reused. Despite these two     3     properties, nobody could see any practical use for it. In the end, the invention was     4    .

A few years later, Art Fry, a product development engineer working for 3M, decided to use this adhesive for     5     use. He stuck strips of paper in a book as bookmarks and a whole new concept was born. However, the idea still wasn’t without     6    . The challenge was to make the glue stay on the sticky note itself, rather than peeling off and staying on the surface it was     7     to. Two more 3M employees were then brought in for the task of     8     a coating for the note’s paper so that the adhesive wouldn’t come off, and they managed that eventually. However, 3M bosses still believed that this invention wasn’t going to be     9     successful and people would continue to use scrap paper (散的便条纸) for their notes. That is why sticky notes were only tested within the company, where they became extremely popular. It wasn’t until many years later that 3M bosses finally decided to give out a vast number of free samples to other companies to see if anyone would be interested. To their surprise, 90% of the companies went on to order more. This went beyond anybody’s     10    . Nowadays, sticky notes come in a variety of shapes and colours and are sold in more than 100 countries.

Some of the most quoted quotes by experts in IT history have turned out to be ironic (讽刺的).

1899

“Everything that can be invented has already been invented.” Charles H. Duell, director of the U.S. Patent Office believed it     1     (would be, will be) a future with no more inventions. A century later, the world is telling us that there     2     (are, were) still many things to be invented, and many things that were once thought impossible are becoming true.

1943

“I think there is a world market for maybe five computers,” said Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM. Thomas Watson, referring to a time when the world needed only five mainframe computers to satisfy all computing requirements,     3     (had, would have) no idea that the demands on data processing (数据处理)     4     (became, would become) so great. Time has changed, and now is the age of the PC. For the world market capacity (容量) for PCs, we now have to use “billion” after numbers.

1949

“Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons.” This was from Popular Mechanics, talking about the future of science.

The technology has completely been beyond people’s imagination, and the computer     5     (had long said, has long said) goodbye to its huge weight. Today’s microprocessor chips (微处理器芯片) are used in mobile phones, digital cameras and other hand-held electronic devices. Some experts predicted that one day nanotechnology     6     (would make, will make) chips as thin as a hair.

The surprising history of computing over the past years has taught us not to take experts’ comments too seriously. Anyone can make mistakes, and our lives will eventually become a history of limitations. When humans predicted confidently that something     7     (would happen, was happening) in the future, they tended to forget they     8     (would fail, have failed) to learn the lessons of history.

For centuries, two of the most intriguing question about Leonardo da Vinci’s “Mona Lisa” were “Who?” and “When?” A discovery made at Heidelberg University in 2005 pretty much answered both. A note written in a manuscript in the library confirmed the     1     of da Vinci’s first biographer, Giorgio Vasari: that the sitter was a merchant’s wife, Lisa Gherardini. The note also helped     2     the masterpiece to between 1503 and 1506.

A third mystery—“Where?”—is still in dispute, But on June 3rd a French engineer, Pascal Cotte, declared that he and a collaborator had identified the landscape in the background of the painting. Arguments had once been made for     3     of countryside in the Marche region and between Milan and Genoa. During a presentation in Vinci, near Florence, Mr. Cotte argued that the artist was more     4     depicting a part of his native Tuscany-one that much interested him at the time. According to this theory, da Vinci     5     the area not as it was, but as, in an unrealized scheme, he intended it to be.

Mr. Cotte, who was asked by the Louvre (where the “Mona Lisa” hangs) to create a digital image of the painting, is the inventor of the multispectral (多光谱的) camera: a device that can detect not only the drawing below the surface of an oil painting, but also, where they exist, intermediate layers of work. It was among these, under what appears to be a     6     rock, that he found a preparatory sketch showing that da Vinci intended it to represent a castellated(城堡形的) tower.

The landscape of the “Mona Lisa” also includes a huge steep cliff. That is similar to one that da Vinci included in a sketch of a fortress(堡垒)     7     by Pisa and Florence in the war that broke out between them in 1503 (around the time he was painting Gherardini). The fortress with the nearby cliff—and a tower, known as the Caprona tower—all overlook the river Arno as it snakes from Florence to Pisa. All three also     8     in drawings made by da Vinci to illustrate a plan about which, says Mr. Cotte, he became “obsessive”.

Mr. Cotte argues that a channel that     9     through desolate countryside at the right of the “Mona Lisa” is too wide to be a road, as some have speculated, and is instead the dried-up bed of the Armo as da Vinci pictured it once his plan had been adopted.

It never was. But if Mr. Cotte’s theory is right, it might just explain why Gherardini, a Florentine, wears such a     10    , if mysterious, smile.