READING:
Nothing Like It In The World: The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad by Stephen E. Ambrose. It all started with those Lincoln books. And then the Jackson book. I decided my next little reading jaunt was going to include either the steamships or the canals.
But, what can I say...it all REALLY started back on my 18th birthday, which was a Saturday, in 1973. It was my senior year of high school and my friend and I decided we were going to do something crazy (well as crazy as it gets for Iowa kids back in the early 70's anyway) and drive clear across the state of Iowa to Council Bluffs to visit my friend's sister who lived there. Living on the edge, I know.
Anyway, we did that and while we were there, the sister took us on a little tour of, of course, the Bluffs. These Bluffs are fabulous...you can stand there day or night and have the most magnificent view that seems to go on forever and a day. While everyone was "oohing" and "aahing" over the vision, I noticed two plaques: one that said Lewis and Clark stood there and the other that said Abraham Lincoln had stood there. Wow. Impressive. I was standing on the very spot that these men stood upon.
As we toured, we saw the golden railroad spike that marked the eastern terminus of the Transcontinental Railroad and then, much to my delight, the very place where Lincoln met Grenville Dodge and inquired of him one thing: "What's the best route for a Pacific railroad to the West?" The rest, as they say, is history.
So, as I was reading the Jackson book and the Lincoln books, the tug of Lincoln's dream of the Transcontinental Railroad began it's pull...his dream, although he never got to witness it completed, was the defining "go ahead" that put all the right men in all the right places at all the right time together and made it happen.
After the Civil War, vast numbers of Southerners had nowhere to return, their homes gone, their way of life a thing of the past, and these men saw the opportunity to do something important and amazing: to build a railroad that would span the United States of America. And so they did. These men, men like them, immigrants, especially the Irish, the Chinese from California, the financiers...all joined forces and did what everyone said could not be done. Fascinating reading.
I first touched on it from that moment staring out at what would be the railroad route west in Council Bluffs. When I went to college, I had the opportunity to be part of a history seminar that started out west and worked its way east via California's Central Pacific Railroad. In that seminar grew my love of Far Western history, the missions, the gold rush, movements of expansion, civilization, mountain explorers, the Native American tribes, and people like Moran and Remington and Bierstadt, etc. etc. who captured it all in their art. I fell in love with it all.
When I mentioned to Mark that I was headed for railroads instead of steamships, he perused the wall of the floor-to-ceiling bookcases we have in the den, and surfaced with just the right read. This book. I opened the first couple of pages and saw the names of Lincoln, Dodge, Huntington, Sherman, Stanford, Crocker, Hopkins, Judah, Durant, Ames, and Frederick Landers (of Bierstadt fame), and while these names might not mean anything to you, they were old friends of mine from back in that college seminar when I learned them and knew them as well as my own.
The first chapter began in Council Bluffs, Iowa, with Lincoln and Dodge meeting by accident, Lincoln there for speeches promoting his candidacy for presidency and Dodge there for various business reasons. The transcontinental railroad had been talked about in Jackson's time...a dream for 30 years, but on that day in 1859, it became a reality because the right dream hit the right two men at the right time. Other issues of the Civil War quickly became more dominant than the one occupying the time and thoughts of just where this railroad should be built...the southerners obviously wanted a southern route and the northerners wanted a northern route: slavery became the issue in the debate over location as the northerners did not want the slave owning states to control the transcontinental railroad. Lincoln and Dodge came up with a plan and Council Bluffs was it.
I'm not sure if I chose this book, or if it chose me, but I just know that by the end of my weekend, east will meet west and the two railroads, the Central Pacific and the Union Pacific, will be one when they joined in Utah in 1869 (technically it was a year later in Colorado, but Utah likes the hype). I tend to get excited about things like that. Those who know me well are rolling their eyes and yawning...but it has never deterred me for a moment: I am a history nerd! The Transcontinental Railroad changed the history of the United States like nothing else...how much more interesting can it get than that?
LISTENING TO: Billy Joel...once in awhile I just go completely out of character and listen to unaccountable blasts from the past. Don't judge me too harshly.
COOKING THROUGH: Le Cordon Bleu at Home (Le Cordon Bleu School of Cooking), this week's assignment is Pintade à la Cévenole (Guinea Hen with Mushrooms and Chestnuts) pages 187-188; Baking: From My Home to Yours (Dorie Greenspan), this week's recipe is Blueberry Crumb Cake, and can be found on pages 192-193. You can cook/bake along, too!
FAV NEW FIND: Lemongrass Powder...I can't always find lemongrass, so this will do in pinch!
FAV THING TODAY: It's officially the First Day of Spring and there are NCAA games on all day, the weekend is almost here, what more do you need of a Friday?
GOING TO: Watch the NCAA Tournament games, of course, spring clean (goal would be another five rooms), do some yard work (that would be mostly Mark, let's give credit where credit is due, after all), and hopefully a trip to Noblesville and one to Elwood for visits.
PRAYING FOR: More patience. And, then, some more. Please join me, or pray for whatever you are striving for in your life.