[WilliamWallace1999]

Makes you wonder.

[Boxsford]

haha, it works with women and their funky traditional recipes too. We truly are creatures of habit. Thanks for the fun post.

[Armando Guerra]

Fun post and it does make you think. I only wonder how true it is because I know there were competing railroad gauges in the early days before it was standardized. I'll let my fellow freepers more knowledgeable on the matter verify it.

[untenured]

I recall reading once about an economic phenomenon called "path dependence" that used this example. Path dependence happens when a first mover has obtained widespread market share, so that entry costs prohibit a superior alternative from being adopted. Microsoft Windows is often cited as an example, although people dispute whether it really qualifies. Ditto for the QWERTY typewriter.

[Henrietta]

ping

[nhoward14]

As an engineer, I can appreciate how horse rear ends can affect the design process... Thanks!

[elbucko]

"world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's ass.

As a horse lover and owner I have seen this humorous "dis" of the horse and its influence before. May I offer the following in good natured rebuttal.

Look back at our struggle for freedom,
Trace our present days strength to its source,
And you'll find that man's pathway to glory
Is strewn with the bones of the horse.

Or:

Memorial at the church of St. Jude, Hampstead, England.

"In grateful and reverent memory to the Empire horses (some 375,000) who fell in the Great War (1914-1918). Most obediently, and often most painfully, they died

"Faithful unto death not one of them is forgotten before God".

Or:

"I pity the man or woman that mistreats a horse in front of me. They will be more sorry than they think they made the horse"......"elBUCKo".

[Our man in washington]

Cecil Adams, the answerman columnist, wrote a column explaining the facts behind this article. This article has been bouncing around the Internet for a while.

Cecil basically said the article was one part fact to two parts fiction.

[Slainte]

Snopes talks about it-
http://www.snopes2.com/history/american/gauge.htm