Technology in tension: horses, electric trucks, and the motorization of American cities, 1900-1925

摘要

Twenty-six years later, in October 1947, the Commonwealth Edison Com- pany of Chicago scrapped the last of its electric trucks. By 1950 the utility's transportation department owned and operated 824 vehicles, all of them gasoline-powered. For the preceding half century, however, the company had maintained a fleet that included a mix of horse-drawn, electric, and gasoline-powered vehicles. Nor was Commonwealth Edison unusual in employing a ranged of vehicle technologies.