I suppose it would be mostly practical skills, cooking, fixing things. Usually had to be done by people themselves.
Maybe also mental things like navigating (with or without paper map) and remembering their daily and weekly agendas.
What other things would be a big difference with the people today?
I wonder if it took quite a bit longer for people to reach their destination. Because not everyone would be as good at reading maps (compared to simply following gps instructions) Maybe that made it more common for people to arrive at different times. or plan longer trips because the driving would take up a bigger part of it.
Also, when driving alone, I can’t imagine holding your map. So you would still have to stop from time to time for long trips. And actually memorize the big lines of how to get to your destination.
Oh it absolutely did. You would regularly have to stop (often after a turn or if you felt like you missed one) and reconsult the map. You just accounted for that additional time. Longer trips are often less of an issue, because its usually, you get to a big main highway and its cruise most of the rest of the way.
And plenty of times, you might get lost/ not be able to find yourself on the map. You’d have to pull over and ask for help/ directions. You might write the directions down on a piece of paper, but that doesn’t do you much good if you missed a turn and didn’t know it.
Depends on the area and how familiar it is and how hostile it is to navigation. I can beat the Google maps time 9 out if 10 times in Seattle because Google sends you through some seriously dumb intersections.
In Minneapolis, Google maps almost always tells me to leave the parking lot from work, go down the road, and turn left onto a highway during rush hour. No lights.
The way I actually go is to turn 1 block “early” and wait at the stoplight.
Sure, in theory it would be faster to take Google’s way if there’s no traffic, but again – this is when I’m leaving work!
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As someone who travelled for work before and after smartphones, absolutely. You couldn’t just open Google Maps, search a business and go there, the problem wasn’t going city to city, but finding a specific place in or outside a city. If you got a request to go to X business either you already knew how to get there, or it would take some planning.
Nowadays my company can receive a request from a customer in another country, and in 1 hour they can plan the trip, reserve the rental car, book a plane, book an hotel for the night. That just wasn’t possible in the past.
The main maps I used for driving (back in the day, UK, 1986) were ‘books’ rather than large fold out maps. At local level, an A to Z. At national level, an AA road map, this has the format of a small newspaper, however in thicker paper.