By Tom Dare
Anyone who’s ever had children will know that every parent needs a break at some point – but a recently resurfaced video from the 1960s seemed to take that idea to new extremes.
The footage, taken in 1960 as part of a news report, shows a nurse operating some hilariously “High-Tec” baby care equipment in a state-of-the-art nursery in Budapest, Hungary, which was run by the Communist-regime at the time.
The equipment can not only move babies from one crib to another at the touch of a button, but can also feed them by lowering a bottle into their arms, leaving no need for mum and dad.
The invention is just a prototype, though, with the nursery being used as a demonstration of how nurseries could be run in the future. The idea was that, free from contact with people, the babies could avoid contracting any illnesses and remain antiseptic.
“Automation enters the nursery in this playful prediction from Budapest,” the voiceover reads.
“One nurse at a central control panel will be able to manage a whole brigade of babies, and the tikes will spend happily antiseptic infancies untouched by human hands, and even be tucked into their cribs by remote control.
“Bringing up baby by push-button, a grandiose conception indeed. But there’s one flaw apparent in this brave new world.
“After the bottle, how are they gonna burp em?”
