Yup, 125 years ago inventors and manufacturers were not burdened with the mountains of regs and requirements that exist today. For example, I worked a program where DCMA rep prohibited soldering strain gage leads as he considered it a fire hazard in a hangar that was equipped with a deluge system. The acquisition cost for laying in the gages subsequently increased by about eight fold. And that’s just one small example.
Bet Uncle Einar wasn’t told that he had to do an emissions environmental impact study either.