# Need help reading some 1860s penmanship

**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-reading-some-1860s-penmanship/958327
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [January 24, 2022, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-reading-some-1860s-penmanship/958327 "2022-01-24T21:05:53Z")
**Posts on this page:** 6
**Page:** 2

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### Author: ![simster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/simster/32/1047_2.png) [@simster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simster)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2022, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-reading-some-1860s-penmanship/958327/21 "2022-01-26T21:13:47Z")

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in 1866 - that was old age.

> **[United States: life expectancy 1860-2020 | Statista](https://www.statista.com/statistics/1040079/life-expectancy-united-states-all-time/)**
>
> Over the past 160 years, life expectancy (from birth) in the United States has risen from 39.4 years in 1860, to 78.9 years in 2020.

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### Author: ![Folly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/folly/32/3219_2.png) [@Folly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Folly)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2022, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-reading-some-1860s-penmanship/958327/22 "2022-01-26T21:23:05Z")

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Kind of. The average life expectancy was mid 40s because of high child mortality rates. But if you managed to live until 60, you had a decent chance of making it to 80.

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### Author: ![FlikTheBlue](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fliktheblue/32/10972_2.png) [@FlikTheBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlikTheBlue)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2022, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-reading-some-1860s-penmanship/958327/23 "2022-01-26T21:27:54Z")

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Right. They didn’t have modern medicine, but they also didn’t have a McDonald’s or KFC on every corner or live in a world where every third adult was obese.

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### Author: ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2022, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-reading-some-1860s-penmanship/958327/24 "2022-01-26T22:50:59Z")

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So, doctors have always written illegibly?

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### Author: ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)
#### Post date: [January 27, 2022, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-reading-some-1860s-penmanship/958327/25 "2022-01-27T02:45:48Z")

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Note, if you look at the death certificate, “Exhaustion of vital power(s)” is listed as the _ **direct** _ cause of death, the apoplexy merely being indirect. We should dig into old medical encyclopediae to see what they have to say, otherwise, if you interpret the words too literally, it sounds a little like the direct cause of death was that he stopped living!

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### Author: ![batsto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b2d939/32.png) [@batsto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/batsto)
#### Post date: [January 27, 2022, 1:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-reading-some-1860s-penmanship/958327/26 "2022-01-27T13:13:33Z")

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> [@Folly](#):
>
> Kind of. The average life expectancy was mid 40s because of high child mortality rates. But if you managed to live until 60, you had a decent chance of making it to 80.

I know three of his children died in their seventies, and one lived to 82. One died at 37, and his obituary makes no mention of why. Haven’t gotten his death certificate yet.

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