Quote of the Day (John Steinbeck, on America’s Westward Movement)

“Jody hardly knew when Grandfather started to talk…. ‘I tell those old stories, but they're not what I want to tell.…It wasn't Indians that were important, nor adventures, nor even getting out here. It was a whole bunch of people made into one big crawling beast. And I was the head. It was westering and westering. Every man wanted something for himself, but the big beast that was all of them wanted only westering….

" ‘We carried life out here and set it down the way those ants carry eggs. And I was the leader. The westering was as big as God, and the slow steps that made the movement piled up and piled up until the continent was crossed.

" ‘Then we came down to the sea, and it was done.’ He stopped and wiped his eyes until the rims were red. ‘That's what I should be telling instead of stories.’"—American Nobel Literature laureate John Steinbeck (1902-1968), “The Leader of the People,” in The Red Pony (1937)

The Red Pony was my first John Steinbeck book, and though I have read several more since then, this quarter of interconnected stories has resonated the most with me, along with Of Mice and Men.

“The Leader of the People” especially interested me with its themes of generational conflict (garrulous Grandfather annoys taciturn son-in-law Carl with his oft-told tales of pioneering and Indian fighting), the fascination of boys with adventure stories, and, as seen here, the meaning of the Western movement for the American spirit.

The devastation of the land, the displacement of Native Americans, and the violence and sense of loss involved in this migration are as necessary and important to recall as revisionist historians have told us over the last few decades.

But future historians would also have to incorporate what the California native Steinbeck sensed, over four decades after the U.S. Census Bureau officially declared the closing of the American frontier: that “westering” was possible not just because of a spirit of individualism, but also because of the aspirations and cooperation for the public good on those wagon trains crossing unfamiliar, untamed land.

For anyone wondering, the image accompanying this post shows Jack Elam as Grandfather in the TV movie version of The Red Pony, with Henry Fonda, Maureen O’Hara and Clint Howard as, respectively, the father, mother and young boy. It was broadcast in 1973, around the same time that I read the book, and though not as well-made as the 1949 big screen adaptation starring Robert Mitchum and Myrna Loy, I can still recall it vividly, nearly a half-century after the only time I viewed it.)

(This post is dedicated to the memory of my good friend Ann, who died three months ago. I am sure not only that she loved reading The Red Pony, but also that she would have enjoyed teaching it to her high school students.)

This Day in Western History (Death of Daniel Boone, Restless Frontier Legend)

Sept. 26, 1820—Half a continent away from his Berks County, Pa., birthplace, Daniel Boone died quietly in his sleep at age 86 near present-day Defiance, Mo., still yearning to hunt far from the thousands who had followed his lead into the interior of the vast North American continent.

Partly because as a child I watched Fess Parker playing him for six seasons on TV in the 1960s, I associated Boone for years entirely with Kentucky. It would be a long while before I realized he also spent considerable time elsewhere—Pennsylvania, North Carolina, present-day West Virginia, and Missouri.

Many myths already existed about this legendary American frontiersman, and I’m afraid Parker’s TV series dispelled few of them and maybe even added some more. (He probably preferred practical wide-brim felt hats and wool and fabric to the coonskin caps and buckskin in which he’s usually depicted, for instance—and was hardly an Indian fighter, since, by his own admission, he only killed three men throughout his long life.)

It is true that he established the settlement Boonsboro; escaped from captivity by Native-Americans (and helped his daughter do the same); and clashed with the British in the American Revolution.

Other aspects of Boone’s life are not as well known, but explain much of his nomadic life:

*Slaveholder: Despite being raised by Quakers, Boone owned slaves in adulthood—as many as seven at one point. Slaves were used to help farm at Boonsborough, and were among the casualties he died during Native American attacks. At the same time, a slave named Burrell guided the frontiersman in the 1760s as he looked for a potential settlement; another, Adam, owned by another settler, told him about the death of Boone’s son James in a 1773 Indian attack, enabling the grief-stricken father to recover the remains; and an ex-slave, Pompey, was able to save his life when Boone was captured by the Shawnee in 1778 by translating his pleas to Chief Blackfish.

*Land speculator: Like other major figures in the early republic—Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, and financier Robert Morris—Boone was an active land speculator. In Boone’s case, his inability to provide adequate written documentation led to heavy debt, loss of his properties, a warrant for his arrest, and a permanent move out of Kentucky in the 1790s.

*Public official: Hardly the solitary figure of so many legends, Boone was, like his father, Squire Boone, a leader. Aside from his role in helping settle Kentucky, he was a member of the Virginia legislature and, in his 70s, a justice in the new territory of Missouri.

*Legend in his own time: Unlike a frontiersman of the second generation, Davy Crockett, was not interested in generating publicity for himself. But legends began to accrue about him even in middle age. John Filson started the process in 1784 with an appendix about the hunter in Discovery, Settlement and Present State of Kentucke. Very problematically, the “interview” with Boone sounded suspiciously flowery. By the end of his life, the English poet Lord Byron extended his legend across the Atlantic by including him as a character in the epic Don Juan.

In encountering Boone’s grandchildren decades later, historian Francis Parkman hailed their famous ancestor’s “quiet and tranquil spirit.” Quiet, even given his disgust with the court system in Kentucky, taciturn, perhaps; but tranquil? That’s not a word I would use to describe someone with Boone's wanderlust.

While slightly romanticized, Theodore Roosevelt’s portrait of Boone in the 1890 book he wrote with friend Henry Cabot Lodge, Hero Tales From American History, offers a judicious appraisal of this pioneer:

“The toil and hardship of his life made no impress on his iron frame, unhurt by intemperance of any kind, and he lived for eighty-six years, a backwoods hunter to the end of his days. His thoughtful, quiet, pleasant face, so often portrayed, is familiar to every one; it was the face of a man who never blustered or bullied, who would neither inflict nor suffer any wrong, and who had a limitless fund of fortitude, endurance, and indomitable resolution upon which to draw when fortune proved adverse. His self-command and patience, his daring, restless love of adventure, and, in time of danger, his absolute trust in his own powers and resources, all combined to render him peculiarly fitted to follow the career of which he was so fond.”

This Day in Western History (Narcissa Whitman Becomes 1st White Woman to Cross America)

Sept. 1, 1836—When Narcissa Whitman reached what is now Walla Walla, Washington (then part of what was known as Oregon Country), on this day 180 years ago, with her husband, Dr. Marcus Whitman, as part of a small missionary group, she became what is believed to be the first white woman to cross North America. The couple’s epic, 3,000-mile journey paved the way for similar journeys (many conducted with the help of Marcus) undertaken in the following decade along the Oregon Trail, and even beyond into the post-Civil War era.

I’ve long felt that the story of Narcissa and Marcus would make a compelling subject for a film: a couple engaged in missionary work who must face all kinds of struggles to achieve their goal--physical hardship, internal dissension, the constant threat of attack. But it would not be the kind of happy, triumphant film about strong pioneers favored by Hollywood in its Golden Age, but rather a kind of Protestant counterpart to the 1990 adaptation of Brian Moore’s Black Robe—about cultural conflict, misunderstanding, and self-doubt among all-too-human people who choose to do divine work.

At the time of her transcontinental trek, Narcissa was, at 28 years old, still young and strong enough to survive the rigors of an overland journeyl. (After comparatively easy steamboat travel, the trans-Mississippi portion was accomplished partly by wagon train, then on horseback, over often bumpy terrain.). But she would encounter other circumstances far less happy and far more troubling over the next 11 years, and her spirit would be tried in ways that even her deep religious faith could not help her sustain.

Ever since I read Jane Eyre, I’ve applauded the decision by that heroine not to become the missionary wife of St. John Rivers. Not only is there the rather large matter of how she could stay devoted to this repressed clergyman who is still carrying the torch for someone else, but all Jane’s considerable hard work and self-discipline might not even be enough in India, a land completely alien to her. 

That mismatch between a woman’s skills and temperament in a much different environment was even more marked in the case of Narcissa Whitman in the Pacific Northwest, among American Indians. On the surface, it shouldn’t have appeared so: She had learned the kind of skills needed to survive life on the frontier, away from a community: how to weave and spin, sew, cook over an open fire, and make soap and candles. As a result of a second spiritual awakening at a revival meeting, the 16-year-old resolved to "consecrate myself without reserve" and "go to the heathen" as a missionary. A comparatively well-educated woman for her time, she was among the first students at Franklin Academy, a church-affiliated secondary school in Prattsburg, N.Y., where she was raised.

But the question faced by Jane Eyre—of how much commitment to a spouse can help one in missionary work—was present in Narcissa’s life, too. The American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, the governing agency for missions sponsored by Presbyterian and Congregational churches, made it plain that it preferred married rather than single people for this work, perhaps believing that couples were more likely to reject any temptations in faraway places. As it happened, Narcissa and Marcus had not known each other long or well before they wed in New York State. They had still only been married six months when they reached Walla Walla.

The Whitmans, anxious to have at least one other missionary couple accompanying them to Oregon County, prevailed upon Henry Spalding, an ordained Presbyterian minister, and his wife, Eliza Hart Spalding. This turned out to be a mistake.

Historians have divided on whether or not Narcissa had rejected a marriage proposal from Rev. Spalding before her marriage to Marcus. But at very least, they had been students together at Franklin Academy and had worshipped at the same church, and for whatever reason, he had expressed misgivings about her before the trip.

Trouble between the two couples soon erupted, as they differed even over the elementary question of how to load their wagon train. As they crossed prairie, mountain, and desert, guided at various points by fur traders and Nez Perce Indians, the weather turned hotter, the diet more tiresome and their patience thinner. After seven months, with the Whitmans traveling a bit ahead of their companions, they finally made it to Fort Walla Walla.

“The whole company galloped almost the whole way to the Fort,” Narcissa wrote home. “The fatigues of the long journey seemed to be forgotten in the excitement of being so near the close….[S]oon we were seated at the table and treated to fresh salmon, potatoes, tea, bread and butter. What a variety, thought I. You cannot imagine what an appetite these rides in the mountains give a person. I wish some of the feeble ones in the states could have a ride in the mountains; they would say like me, victuals, even the plainest kind, never relished so well before.”

What delighted Narcissa was a crowing rooster, as well as other animals she could no longer take for granted: “You may think me simple for speaking of such a small circumstance. No one knows the feelings occasioned by seeing objects once familiar after a long deprivation. Especially when it is heightened by no expectation of meeting with them. The door-yard was filled with hens, turkeys and pigeons. And in another place we saw cows and goats in abundance, and I think the largest and fattest cattle and swine I ever saw.”

Eleven days later, after a far less grueling trip down the Columbia River, the Whitmans and the Spaldings reached Ft. Vancouver. The two wives stayed put while the husbands, undoubtedly glad to be out of each other’s company, scouted separate missions. Henry Spalding chose one in what would become Idaho, while Marcus picked a site 120 miles away: Waiilatpu, or "Place of the Rye Grass."

The location, on the Walla Walla, was every bit as pleasant as the Indian name indicated. But it lacked good, abundant timber, and Marcus ignored warnings that the Cayuse tribe was harder to persuade than the Nez Perce. Arriving at their mission in mid-December, when food was hard to find and Narcissa was already well along in her pregnancy, the couple only survived that first winter by killing 10 wild horses. It was only the first example of misfortune arising from their own failure of vision.

In Narcissa’s case, this was more than metaphor: Within a few years, her eyesight rapidly deteriorated. That was by no means all of the couple’s problems:

*Marcus was absent from the mission for long periods, plunging Narcissa into increasing isolation and depression.

*In 1839, their two-year-old daughter Alice Clarissa—her mother’s chief solace—accidentally drowned in the river behind the mission house.

*While Alice, before her death, had, amazingly enough, started to pick up Nez Perce, the primary language of the Cayuse, Narcissa never learned the native language.

*The Whitmans denounced practices that the Cayuse enjoyed, including dancing and gambling. In fact, they made few attempts to accommodate native ways—and little headway in converting the Indians.

*Unease on the part of the Whitmans toward the Indians grew into dislike. The Indians sensed this condescension, and reacted accordingly.

*The Whitmans pretty much gave up converting Indians, concentrated on medicine and aiding white settlers. The Cayuse grew alarmed at the swelling white influx onto their land.

*In 1847, Marcus attempted to treat an outbreak of malaria in the area. The Cayuse died in greater numbers under his care than the white settlers did. The Indians, acting on their belief that the families of those who died under the care of a medicine man (as they viewed Marcus) had the right to take his life, did so. Shortly afterward, they killed Narcissa and the couple’s adopted children as well.

Quote of the Day (Dave Barry, on Why Early Pioneers Were Manly)

“I’ll tell you who was manly: the early American pioneers. Those guys didn’t even know they had cores. They set out into the wilderness with nothing but a musket and a sack of hardtack and hominy, and they had to survive out there for months, even years, completely on their own, sleeping on the ground in bear-infested forests. That’s why they brought the hardtack: to throw at the bears. They had no idea why they brought hominy. Like you, they had no idea what ‘hominy’ meant. It sounds like some kind of disease.” —Dave Barry, You Can Date Boys When You’re Forty: Dave Barry on Parenting and Other Topics He Knows Very Little About (2014)