JF Ptak Science Books Quick Post
There are many things that are rolling and rolled, though not so many of those are houses. "Rolling" as a word goes way back in English, to the 14th century at least, referring to a not-good sensation of the stomach, which no t surprisingly could be used very nicely in describing this Popular Mechanics idea from 1938 of the near-future. Much more useful in the history of rolling is log rolling, rolling your "r's", taking your tobacco to the rolling house, going to work at the mint in the rolling room, getting your seal legs for the rolling moment (and adjust ballast in the rolling chamber), hearing the rolling sound of waves, and such.
It remains unclear to me why you'd need a house that could be rolled...after all, it couldn't be rolled that far, and as we can see the tractor-of-the-future looks pretty much like a tractor-of-the-past, which also means that the house isn't being rolled that far at 2 mph. Also for the sake of convenience the added track for rolling the rolling house is added to the center of the structure, which in this case is also where the first floor windows are, though in the other houses placing the tracks might be an issue because there the windows are not centered. And for some reason the houses look like they might be built on the hill in the background--that gives thought to the fancy that the houses needed to be rolled to get them down the hill and into place--of course they could just be built on site like most places, and therefore negate the rolling need. There is one bit that does make sense--the crushing issue of the house rolling on top and over the driver of the tractor seems to be answered in the background, the artist allowing the driver to let the house roll down the hill ahead of him or her. Anyway, I'll stop here with this wonderful image, and just roll along.
Here's a rolling thing that makes more sense, and is quite lovely as well, found in Rees Encyclopedia (1812):
This is a small detail from the general engraving on lamps:
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