The walking mania is at feverish height in this country to-day, and a very pretty dissertation might be written about the effects of legs upon the brain. As a psychological study we recommend it to the students in the university, and to all others who are fond of metaphysics. The effect of legs upon the American people at this time is marvelous. Play-houses all over the country are nightly filled with a motley crowd, who applaud and encore until the welkin rings the disgusting “acting” of the actress who lavishly displays her shapely limbs; and who would be hissed from the state if it were not for these substantial auxiliaries. So, too, in the legitimate drama, the occasional display of a pretty ankle enhances the attraction, and has more than once been the salvation of a piece. But it is not alone upon the stage that “legs draw.” Thousands of persons daily rush to see some phenomenal feat of walking, paying as much for the privilege of witnessing a pair of legs traveling a saw-dust path, as they would have to pay to see forty pairs of legs upon the stage, while at the same time enjoying the comfortable seats of the modern theatre. We do not mean to put O’Leary and Harriman and Mrs. Anderson upon a level with ballet dancers, nor to class walking with the can-can, for the latter is immeasurably more degrading. We simply ask what is there in legs that attracts thousands to the comique and Gilmore’s garden, while lecture halls, libraries and churches are deserted? Legs and not brains command attention to-day, and while the possessor of the former received a pittance for years of severe, menial labor, the owner of the latter earns a fortune in a few days. Why is it thus? Can Prof. Cocker tell us?
I think they perhaps meant the last bit to read the other way around. The tone of the article is familiar to anyone who’s read any article on the dumbing down of American culture. Seems to me we’ve been having this “slide” for quite a while now.
The most famous walker was “Weston the Pedestrian,” though the O’Leary mentioned in the story took the title “Champion Pedestrian of the World” from him in 1875.
Walking was quite the mania, though I imagine that it waned in popularity as manias do. The six-day walking events described in some of the articles survive as bicycle races.
Professor Cocker was Benjamin F. Cocker, a businessman turned adventurer turned Methodist Preacher turned Professsor of Mental Philosophy at the University of Michigan.