This is an advertisement commissioned by the Wyoming Department of Health, and my gosh does it bring home a really overlooked point about the past. . . and today.
Very well done, and very much worth the watching.
Not all that long ago getting a simple infection, and tetanus is more than a simple infection, could kill you. Calvin Coolidge, Jr., the then Vice President's son, died from a staph infection resulting from a blister on a toe that he acquired playing tennis barefoot. The infection killed the poor boy within a week of its occurrence.
Infections acquired at barber shops, sometimes deadly, were such a problem that they were a major topic of local physician's organizations. Tetanus was only one of the killer diseases that lurked there. Even anthrax could be picked up from razor strop, if it had been made from a diseased animal. Bacteria lurking in barbers brushes, used all day long on multiple clients, posed another danger.
And of course, as the story of Calvin Coolidge, Jr. shows, infections could be picked up anywhere, and kill you.
Memories of such things remained strong in my parents' generation. My mother recalled that her father used to occasionally get a shave at the barbers, which was odd as this was well after the safety razor came about, and that he invariably developed "barber's cancer", a colloquial term meaning a bad rash from an infection. The family tried to prevent him from doing this, but he would occasionally anyhow, and given the line of work he was in, it was probably in order to engage with members of the local public. My father, for his part, never approved of going barefoot, regarding it as an invitation to infection.
Now, simple vaccinations eliminate the danger.
