If Time Travel was real … (Outlander question)

Posted on October 9, 2017 by Stella

Whether or not you are an Outlander fan, this is a fascinating question.

If you could travel to the past, what would you take with you? On Claire’s second voyage to the 18th century, she takes a number of items, including syringes, penicillin, surgical scalpels (she’s a surgeon in 1968) and photos of her daughter.

What would you take with you into the past?

Claire travels to 18th century Scotland (initially). Where would you choose to travel?

 

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81 Responses to If Time Travel was real … (Outlander question)

  1. Rhea Salacia Volans says:
    October 9, 2017 at 8:53 am

    Wouldn’t her taking those things throw off the course of history somehow though? Won’t someone notice her “magic” (medical supplies) and start to wonder where she gets all this stuff from, or if she’s a witch and should be burned at the stake or something?

    And what if she saves someone that history has already shown was supposed to die? Won’t that radically alter future events?

    Liked by 1 person

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    • stella says:
      October 9, 2017 at 9:09 am

      If you read the books, you would know! Seriously, you don’t have to read them, but I’d be interested to know what YOU would take with you!

      Liked by 1 person

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      • Rhea Salacia Volans says:
        October 9, 2017 at 10:18 am

        I didn’t know there were books, but now I’m interested, and I never watched the show. Most references to TV these days go over my head.

        My camera. My journal. I would say “insulin and needles” but without any additional supplies, I’m probably just prolonging people’s agony rather then helping them. :/

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        • stella says:
          October 9, 2017 at 11:55 am

          There are eight books. The author is a fascinating woman. Her name is Diana Gabaldon. As she describes it, she has a

          B.S. in Zoology, an M.S. in Marine Biology from Scripps Institution of Oceanography and a Ph.D. in quantitative behavioral ecology (thatā€™s just animal behavior with statistics, donā€™t worry about it). My dissertation was titled, Nest Site Selection of the Pinyon Jay, Gymnorhinus cyanocephalus , (or as my husband says, ā€œWhy Birds Build Nests Where They Do, and Who Cares Anyway?ā€).

          She was the founding editor of Science Software Quarterly in 1984 while employed at the Center for Environmental Studies at Arizona State University. During the mid-1980s, she wrote software reviews and technical articles for computer publications, as well as popular-science articles and comic books for the Walt Disney Company. She was a professor with an expertise in scientific computation at ASU for 12 years before leaving to write full-time.

          Outlander was her first novel in the series. She said she wrote it to prove to herself that she could write a novel, didn’t expect it would ever get published, and wrote it to suit herself. Her books include time travel, romance, and history (she pays attention to detail.) If you are interested, here is her blog: http://www.dianagabaldon.com/

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          • nyetneetot says:
            October 10, 2017 at 6:53 am

            There is a little known ninth book that only has one chapter. In it Bob Newhart wakes up in bed panting and turns to Emily and says, ‘This time I was a woman named Claire….’

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    • czarowniczy says:
      October 9, 2017 at 12:27 pm

      Or……would you create an alternative parallel timeline that would exist along with the one you left???????

      Liked by 1 person

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  2. stella says:
    October 9, 2017 at 9:13 am

    Claire tries to alter history in a major way on her first trip to the past (which was an accident), but was unsuccessful. She was also tried as a witch (because she was doling out “potions”, which were really only herbals, and got on the wrong side of the local priest), but escaped. She was very careful after that about what she did, and who knew it.

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  3. Wooly Covfefe says:
    October 9, 2017 at 12:01 pm

    I would bring a portable Bluetooth speaker (preferably a JBL), a crank-charger for it, and 2TB of music from the future. And a Past-proof Ipad or Surface tablet. Just imagine Parliament and Funkadelic doing Flashlight in the 1800s. Or The Commodores doing Brick House.

    Dancing would have been invented as soon as those songs played.

    Al Green and Barry White songs would be singularly responsible for making our nation far more populous when I got back. Funk would be our roots, and dancing would be part of language.

    Also on the 2TB of memory (the capacity is arbitrary here, this is a What If), I would include detailed plans for how to harness electricity, make refrigeration possible, and radio.

    I would be burned as a witch, but dang that would be fun.

    Here’s me at the stake

    OW!!:

    Liked by 3 people

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    • Wooly Covfefe says:
      October 9, 2017 at 12:29 pm

      Tabletop RPGs are designed with this question in mind, really. “What if?”

      Think Dungeons and Dragons. A bunch of nerds with munchies and soda sit around and game these What If propositions out, for fun, each playing the role of someone in a Party of adventurers, with a DM (Dungeon Master, the only guy who has all the maps, and all the rules, and all the authority) officiating the discussion. That’s what these games are. A discussion, with dice, and creative minds.

      I just described my loadout in my last comment. Now all five or so other people at the table (and the DM can also be a Player, and has to discount his knowledge of maps and rules for the sake of his Player role, kinda like the Zimmerman jury had to discount and pretend to forget a lot of things on Trayvon’s phone), they also describe, on paper, their preferred inventory to bring to the past. Mine has to do with influencing culture and science. Theirs might me medical supplies, or tools.

      The DM says, “Everyone ready, now?” He gets nods. “Okay, game on.” Pushes the “go back in time button”. And then everyone eats Cheetos and drinks Mountain Dew and games it out, as creatively and fun as possible.

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    • czarowniczy says:
      October 9, 2017 at 12:39 pm

      Burned as a warlock, actually, but hey, who are we to judge which chamber pot you’d identify with?

      Liked by 1 person

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    • czarowniczy says:
      October 9, 2017 at 12:54 pm

      How’d you know I was gonna Youtube the late Ohio Players and ‘Fire’? Ah well, thematic to witches AND reminds me when, some years back, I went to an ‘intimate’ Donovan concert (polite way to say not that many people were interested in buying the tickets) and discovered HE’S OLD!

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  4. lovely says:
    October 9, 2017 at 12:54 pm

    My daughter asks me this question once in a while with qualifiers.

    Something I had not thought of but wondered just now is what if I went back to the Garden of Eden and warned Adam and Eve of the destruction and evil that would come from their decision to eat the serpent’s fruit? What if I encouraged them to eat from the tree of life?

    Who would I be because God had only created Adam and Eve? God warned them am I being arrogant to think I would make a difference.

    What if Adam and Eve didn’t eat the serpent’s fruit but their children did?

    Anyhow for some reason that is the first thing that came to my mind.

    Liked by 1 person

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  5. stella says:
    October 9, 2017 at 2:05 pm

    Money from the time and place you are going, antibiotics, water purification tablets, Neosporin, gold/gems to sell. I have seen suggestions such as ladies’ sanitary supplies (if you are young) and toilet paper. Eyeglasses. Toothpaste. Shampoo.

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    • Rhea Salacia Volans says:
      October 9, 2017 at 2:49 pm

      Those are all good ideas. I would also want period-appropriate clothing so it wouldn’t be obvious that I was from a different time.

      Liked by 1 person

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      • stella says:
        October 9, 2017 at 4:07 pm

        Claire time traveled for the second time this week. She made a costume appropriate for the period, with lots of secret pockets to hide her treasures.

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        • Menagerie says:
          October 9, 2017 at 4:42 pm

          Why did she wait so many years to go back? Did she think he was dead?

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          • stella says:
            October 9, 2017 at 4:56 pm

            She left the 18th century to return to the 20th because she was pregnant, and it was just before the battle of Culloden, where her 18th century husband, Jamie, expected to die. She had lost a child just the year before, and they knew that times in Scotland would be dire after the battle was lost, so Jamie sent her back for safety for her and for their child.

            She raised her daughter with her 20th century husband, Frank. Frank died 18 years later in a car accident (she thinks Jamie is dead), after which she finds out that Jamie survived the battle, and that he was still alive in Edinburgh. That is why she decides to go to find him.

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          • stella says:
            October 9, 2017 at 5:03 pm

            By the way, she goes to Harvard Medical School in the meantime, and becomes a surgeon. Her husband Frank teaches history at Harvard.

            ADD: And her husband Frank is sterile, which is why she never has any other children.

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        • Wooly Covfefe says:
          October 9, 2017 at 6:19 pm

          This sounds like a fantastic series. I hope they have a conclusion in mind, and aren’t playing this like a tabletop RPG, like they did with Heroes, LOST, and are doing with The Walking Dead, leading it to un-maintainable complexity and endings that make no sense at all.

          All the TV soap operas were written like tabletop RPGs., with no end in sight. A good story has a good beginning, middle, and end. Babylon 5 is a good example of a good story, one that wasn’t written to be never-ending, but to have a satisfying conclusion.

          Menagerie is right, this is a fun exercise, one that leads to great fiction when a bunch of people get together and game it out.

          I would bring with me the five mother sauces, too. Imagine English cuisine today if they didn’t ignore those. Imagine French language today if they didn’t feel the need to replace the sound “O” with “eaux” and instead just went with, “o”.

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          • stella says:
            October 9, 2017 at 6:32 pm

            The tv show is based on a series of novels by Diana Gabaldon. This is season 3, and based on the 3rd book, “Voyager”. They are making more changes to the story this season, inserting unnecessary scenes about women’s rights, and changes to remove religious references. I also think the writers think they have to earn their salaries by changing things just because.

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            • Wooly Covfefe says:
              October 9, 2017 at 6:39 pm

              Question: do you think that The Walking Dead will have a satisfying conclusion, or that one is even planned? Or is it another As the World Turns or All My Children or Guiding Light for the modern age, with no end in mind? I think it’s the latter. I think Game of Thrones is, too. Milk it forever.

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              • stella says:
                October 9, 2017 at 6:47 pm

                I don’t watch either of those. I guess GOT is based on books too.

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                • Wooly Covfefe says:
                  October 9, 2017 at 6:52 pm

                  Books that George “Rape-Rape” Martin will likely never finish, before his lethargic, monolithic body feeds a few million worms. Books that I’ve never read, nor plan to. But I hear there are slightly less rapes per half-hour in the TV show than in the books. (He’s a SJW, who decries rape culture, and manages to write it into every scene, for some reason. 50 shades of leftist hypocrisy, I suppose. GRRM loves him some rape.)

                  Liked by 1 person

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                  • Menagerie says:
                    October 9, 2017 at 9:44 pm

                    And incest from what I hear. I’m glad I chose not to read the books. I’ve generally found when books get to be a big huge success and develop a following I will hate them. I almost never like whatever is popular.

                    I’m sure I’ve missed some good stories because I have such a backwards bias, but off the top of my head, I can’t remember proving this theory wrong even one time.

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            • Wooly Covfefe says:
              October 9, 2017 at 6:47 pm

              I quit watching Walking Dead at the beginning of Season 4. It started getting that tabletop RPG We-Don’t-Really-Have-A-Plan feel to it by Season 3.

              When they made Babylon 5, which was phenomenal fiction, they had 7 Seasons in mind, and a defined story arc, with a conclusion in mind.

              Most “serials” like this now, don’t. They are kids in a sandbox, making it up as they go.

              That’s not a story.

              Liked by 1 person

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  6. czarina33 says:
    October 9, 2017 at 2:14 pm

    First, I’d only go back to a place where there are good bathroom facilities & nice clothes & I could live with adequate food & safety. Perhaps ancient Greece, & I would take Plato’s (or Aristotle’s) works to publish before he did & I’d get all the credit & accolades… Definitely not Socates.

    Liked by 4 people

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    • nyetneetot says:
      October 10, 2017 at 6:43 am

      Circa early 2nd century Rome is supposed to be the safest and have some of the most personal prosperity in human history. I’d also like to hear the philosophy of Epictetus from the man rather than read the cliff notes we have today.

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  7. Menagerie says:
    October 9, 2017 at 2:49 pm

    Rubbing alcohol and Jack Daniels alcohol. Soap. Bras. Hiking boots, blue jeans, good comfortable socks. As many guns and as much ammunition as I could transport with me. Table salt and sugar. Books if I’m staying a few days. Aspirin and a boat load of penicillin. Mirrors. Pictures.

    There are many places I’d want to go, but my first choice would probably be right around here, where I live, maybe three hundred or four hundred years ago. Next stop Israel to listen to an itenerate preacher a couple thousand years ago. Ireland, have to think about the time frame, Venice, also have to zero in on time. Might skip around over a few centuries there. The Rocky Mountains a few hundred years ago. Colonial America, the South in the early 1800’s. New England in the whaling days. Boston in the rabble rousing days. The Old West. Egypt, Rome, Austria, Athens, the Silk Road. Wales in the time of Arthur Pendragon.

    I would love to go back to the mid 1880’s and meet my great grandmother who forged a living on the Kansas Plains for her six or so kids after the death of her husband. The youngest, my grandfather, was only three. She ran the farm and kept it in the family. My grandpa said Indians still occasionally watered their ponies in the creek.

    And I would love to visit the convent of St. Teresa of Avila for the butt chewing I know she would give me.

    This was fun Stella.

    Liked by 3 people

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  8. Jacqueline Taylor Robson says:
    October 9, 2017 at 5:45 pm

    I’d like to go back to 1975 knowing what I do now!

    Liked by 2 people

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  9. Lucille says:
    October 9, 2017 at 6:15 pm

    Without reading any of the posts so I wouldn’t be influenced, this is my take.

    Depending upon what year/month I could pick from which to leave (preferably June 1965 when I was in good health, curious about everything, and game for travel) and what year I would arrive in (anytime between 1865 and 1880), and where I would land (only the U.S.), a short list would be the following (in no particular order):

    Photos of family living at that time so I’d recognize them if I met them.
    Easy wash Polyester clothing so I wouldn’t have to iron.
    Ballpoint pens.
    Comfortable shoes with modern-day orthotics.
    Hanes cotton underwear.
    Aspirin and Advil.
    Cold medicines.
    Books on using herbs to help in healing illnesses.
    Vitamins, probiotics, herbs, antacids.
    Good set of stainless flatware.
    Non-stick skillet.
    Paper towels, Kleenex and toilet tissue.
    Oil of Olay products.
    Books on how to grow a garden properly.
    Wormer for dogs and cats.
    Modern English version of the Bible such as the NIV.
    Books of Biblical commentary and apologetics.
    Cheezits.
    Copy of the U.S. Constitution.
    Calculator.
    Vegetable and fruit seeds.
    Jewelry: gold, silver, gems that would have been common at that time (no blue topaz).
    Gold coins of the time.
    First quality set of cutting knives.
    Daggers.
    Repeating rifle and a Colt revolver plus ammunition
    Books on how up and coming millionaires got rich and purloin their ideas.
    Some tropical fruit mix for the trip.

    Liked by 1 person

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    • Lucille says:
      October 9, 2017 at 6:19 pm

      P.S. Never seen OUTLANDER or read the books and din’t know it was about time travel. Since that’s the case and if the episodes are on YT, I’ll take a gander (my cable is the basic variety since I only watch TV every couple of months).

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    • Jacqueline Taylor Robson says:
      October 9, 2017 at 6:48 pm

      That Oil of Olay might get you burned at the stake! Joking aside, it is pretty good stuff!

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      • Wooly Covfefe says:
        October 9, 2017 at 7:12 pm

        It would be nothing new at that time, actually. It’s an ancient Chinese secret.

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      • Lucille says:
        October 9, 2017 at 7:39 pm

        I’d have to tell a lot of folks that I’d spent time in Paris and that’s where the cremes and other OoO items came from. As for the books, I’d have to tear out the copyright pages; aspirin and Advils would have to be in paper wrappers used in pharmacies of the time; anything that seemed off such as the Polyester clothing, I’d just say it was purchased from a wonderful maker discovered at one of the Paris Exhibitions.

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        • stella says:
          October 9, 2017 at 7:43 pm

          The first time that Claire time traveled (by accident), they thought her dress was a “shift”. She explained her bra to a servant as being “French” when asked, “What kind of corset is that?”

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    • Wooly Covfefe says:
      October 9, 2017 at 7:11 pm

      Can you carry all that? Add up the poundage.

      That’s why I picked an SD card and a crank-charger and a tablet.

      I can carry the Library of Congress on that.

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  10. nyetneetot says:
    October 9, 2017 at 6:21 pm

    Costco palette of antibacterial hand wipes. A couple thousand 500mg amoxicillin capsules.

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  11. stella says:
    October 9, 2017 at 6:27 pm

    Adding a lighter, matches, OTC pain relief, nasal spray, moisturizer.

    Pen, pencil, knife, gun, ammo.

    Liked by 3 people

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  12. Wooly Covfefe says:
    October 9, 2017 at 7:16 pm

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  13. Sharon says:
    October 9, 2017 at 8:27 pm

    This is a great question/thread for several reasons.

    First of all, now I finally get what “The Outlanders” is about. Thank you for that!

    And secondly – good grief, I can’t think of what I would take without quickly running out of ability to manage “that much stuff”!

    My prescription glasses and my most recent backup pair for starters.

    Matches.

    Binoculars.

    Paring knife.

    Small/hand ax (wouldn’t want to be caught stealing right away, doncha know, even if they might have them)

    Some chocolate. (Why shouldn’t earlier times/civilizations be addicted as well? I’m not sure how far back the chocolate problem extends…..)

    No point in messing with prescription meds so will be interesting to find out what happens when I don’t have any of them. Might turn out fine. Who knows. I’m on a minimum (3, I think? – some due to cancer treatment regiment).

    I feel compelled to include my down jacket with the big close-around-the-face hood, and my ankle length thick, thick down coat that can keep me alive down to 30 below for a considerable time. But that is getting to sound like a lot of stuff to carry. Maybe just better to find a cave until spring.

    And some chocolate chip cookies (That’s different than chocolate alone)

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    • stella says:
      October 9, 2017 at 10:23 pm

      More info:

      Beginning of the story is Claire and her husband Frank on vacation in Inverness, Scotland, after WWII. She was an Army nurse, and he was in Army Intelligence. They have been parted for most of the war.

      Claire and Frank visit a place with standing stones one night (Beltane), to watch the local Druids dance by candlelight until the sun rises. Claire returned there the next day to collect some wild flowers she saw on the first visit. She leans against one of the tall stones, and is transported to the year 1743. It turns out that the stone is a time portal that is especially sensitive at the solstices and equinoxes, but only certain people can travel. Claire, unfortunately or fortunately, is one of them.

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  14. stella says:
    October 9, 2017 at 10:26 pm

    If anybody is interested, the Kindle version of the first book, Outlander, is available on Amazon for $3.99.

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