Friday OT #1 - I’m Going BACK In Time

[Angie]

Thanks to @MeanDean for this idea! Here it goes - I will copy and paste for ease:

You have access to a time machine and can go back in time to one event anywhere in the world.

You can take $1,000 (or foreign/ancient equivalency) with you - and your current level of knowledge (no books, etc) but cannot change your age - if you're 40 now, you're 40 then.)

You can be gone for exactly three days.

You can't change history unless it directly affects you or your family's future. So you can buy a 1953 Corvette or a Mickey Mantle baseball card if you pick that time. You can't stop 9/11 or the Kennedy assassination.

What would you do?

 

[SCNCY]

This is a good one. There are so many things to choose from. For me, it would probably be some historical event to witness. Like, what happened to Hitler and his body (did he flee to Argentina?). how and why did Caesar get stabbed, watch the battle at Thermopylae, what happened to price Edward and Richard when they disappeared from the tower of London in 1483?

But for me, it'd probably be find a stock that had outrageous returns, like Apple, and invest that $1,000 on the lowest point of the stocks history.

 

[Cyclones_R_GR8]

1911, buy $1000 worth of IBM

 

[SCNCY]

1911, buy $1000 worth of IBM

Just curious, what kind of return would that have made?

 

[diaclone]

1. I'd attend MLK's "I have a dream" speech

2. I'd meet my paternal grandfather. My dad knew his dad's name but had never met him. He just disappeared in the 1930's. My sister and niece did some sleuthing and research and finally this year they found were he was buried and a picture of him too. Unbelievable after all of these years......

 

[KnappShack]

Too many to choose from, but the first one that pops into my mind with be the launch of Apollo 11.

In general the 60s seem pretty amazing. Space race, British invasion, peace and love, death and destruction

...all televised

 

[cyfanatic13]

I’m going back to yesterday and placing a $1,000 parlay on all 16 winners

 

[Cyclones_R_GR8]

Just curious, what kind of return would that have made?

Hard to say but I imagine in 1911 $1000 would have been a pretty sizeable investment. IBM has split 41 times

 

[RLD4ISU]

I'd go back and invest in Berkshire Hathaway (119,000% return), somehow make it so I couldn't touch the funds until I turned 50. I'd also find a way to leave a voice recording for me and my husband of us talking about what we'd do differently: college path/degrees, more children, etc.

Interesting read on investing returns: https://www.fool.com/slideshow/5-stocks-have-gained-more-100000-1980/?slide=4

 

[CtownCyclone]

I’m going back to yesterday and placing a $1,000 parlay on all 16 winners

This is effectively the plot of Back to the Future II. Would your name happen to be Biff?

 

[JP4CY]

Woodstock

 

[somecyguy]

The responsible thing to do would be as mentioned in the thread already. By stock or a lottery ticket.

What would really be interesting is visiting Rome during the creation of the Vatican. The history buff in me would love to get my hands on those hidden documents that they won't let anyone see.

 

[carvers4math]

Nothing fancy, my parents have been gone over 23 years and I miss them every day. I would just go back and relive a summer weekend when I was five, and give them lots of hugs. Watch my brothers play a lot of baseball. Go fishing with my bamboo pole and make fun of my sister for not touching the worms. Go lay in the doghouse with my dog. Watch Mom make a banana cream pie to take to the grandparents house. Do a few cannonballs in the pool. Fall asleep in my Dad’s arms in the back yard while he points out the constellations to me.

 

[CYCLNST8]

I can't pick one and I don't even need money.

I want to see dinosaurs. How wooly mammoths were hunted. The building of the sphynx & pyramids. The Temple of Zeus. What happened to the Ark of the Covenant? The 1588 Battle of the English Channel. Tenochtitlan before the Spanish ruined it. What was actually recovered at the Roswell New Mexico crash site.

 

[pourcyne]

I never met my paternal grandmother who died when my dad was still a kid, so I would go back and look her up, hear her voice, see her smile.

 

[GMackey32]

I would go back to 2006 and put all of the money on the Northwestern State Demons ML in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

 

[matclone]

1. The early 1860s, London, to see Charles Dickens do some of his public readings.
2. late 1962, England: to see the Beatles (w/Ringo) live, before Beatlemania had set in (i.e., 1963 in the UK).

 

[madguy30]

Humanity wise I'd go back to a certain era and give money to something that helps those that were not allowed the same financial perks so there could be investments.

Biff Tanner me would go back and put like $200 on the most unlikely/lowest odds sporting events I could find and then use the earnings to put down for Google or similar. Not sure what year this would land me in.

 

[MeanDean]

I'm glad Angie decided to run with my idea.

I have spent some time inside my head deciding what I would do. Most of them revolve around music.

Jan 31-Feb 2 1959 Catch an ISU game at the Armory (win over Ok St 48-47) on the 31st. Drive to eastern Iowa to see grandparents and aunts/uncles. Leave there the morning of the 2nd and stop into a record store in Des Moines and pick up some vintage vinyl and a camera/film and head to Clear Lake Surf Ballroom for the concert/dance that night. Taking pictures try for autographs on the records.

 

[cytor]

May 15, 1997... Buy $1000 Amazon, the day it IPO'd