My AutoBlogs!

In the early twenties of the last century one of the popular

Autoblog — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 02:00:03 +0000

songs of the day was ‘The Hunters of Kentucky
In the early twenties of the last century one of the popular
songs of the day was ‘The Hunters of Kentucky.’ Written by Samuel
Woodworth, the author of ‘The Old Oaken Bucket,’ it had
originally been printed in the New York Mirror but had come into
the hands of an actor named Ludlow, who was playing in the old
French theater in New Orleans. The poem chants the praises of the
Kentucky riflemen who fought with Jackson at New Orleans and
indubitably proved

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One of the most remarkable plans for the capture of foreign trade

Autoblog — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 08:00:02 +0000

to be found in the annals of American commerce originated almost
simultaneously in the Muskingum and Monongahela regions
One of the most remarkable plans for the capture of foreign trade
to be found in the annals of American commerce originated almost
simultaneously in the Muskingum and Monongahela regions. With a
view to making the American West independent of the Spanish
middlemen, it was proposed to build ocean-going vessels on the
Ohio that should carry the produce of the interior down the
Mississippi and thence abroad through the open port of New
Orleans. The idea was typically Western in its arrogant
originality and confident self-assertion. Two vessels were built:
the brig St. Clair, of 110 tons, at Marietta, and the Monongahela
Farmer, of 250 tons, at Elizabeth on the Monongahela. The former
reached Cincinnati April 27, 1801; the latter, loaded with 750
barrels of flour, passed Pittsburgh on the 13th of May.
Eventually, the St. Clair reached Havana and thus proved that
Muskingum Valley black walnut, Ohio hemp, and Marietta
carpenters, anchor smiths, and skippers could defy the grip of
the Spaniard on the Mississippi. Other vessels followed these
adventurers, and shipbuilding immediately became an important
industry at Pittsburgh, Marietta, Cincinnati, and other points.
The Duane of Pittsburgh was said by the Liverpool ‘Saturday
Advertiser’ of July 9, 1803, to have been the ‘first vessel which
ever came to Europe from the western waters of the United
States.’ Probably the Louisiana of Marietta went as far afield as
any of the one hundred odd ships built in these years on the
Ohio. The official papers of her voyage in 1805, dated at New
Orleans, Norfolk (Virginia), Liverpool, Messina, and Trieste at
the head of the Adriatic, are preserved today in the Marietta
College Library.

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With such a race of born horsemen, every whit as bold and

Autoblog — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 18:00:04 +0000

resourceful as the voyageurs, to bear the brunt of a new era of
transportation, all that was needed to challenge French trade
beyond the Alleghanies was competent and aggressive leadership
With such a race of born horsemen, every whit as bold and
resourceful as the voyageurs, to bear the brunt of a new era of
transportation, all that was needed to challenge French trade
beyond the Alleghanies was competent and aggressive leadership.
The situation called for men of means, men of daring, men closely
in touch with governors and assemblies and acquainted with the
web of politics that was being spun at Philadelphia,
Williamsburg, New York, London, and Paris. Generations of
tenacious struggle along the American frontier had developed such
men. The Weisers, Croghans, Gists, Washingtons, Franklins,
Walkers, and Cresaps were men of varied descent and nationality.
They had the cunning, the boldness, and the resources to
undertake successfully the task of conquering commercially the
Great West. They were the first men of the colonies to be
unafraid of that bugbear of the trader, Distance. We may aptly
call them the first Americans because, though not a few were
actually born abroad, they were the first whose plans, spirit,
and very life were dominated by the vision of an America of
continental dimensions.

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Such were the varied and contradictory stories told by the men

Autoblog — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 14:00:02 +0000

who had entered the portals of inland America
Such were the varied and contradictory stories told by the men
who had entered the portals of inland America. It is not
surprising, therefore, that theories and prophecies about the
interior were vague and conflicting nor that most of the schemes
of statesmen and financiers for the development of the West were
all parts and no whole. They all agreed as to the vast richness
of that inland realm and took for granted an immense commerce
therein that was certain to yield enormous profits. In faraway
Paris, the ingenious diplomat, Silas Deane, writing to the Secret
Committee of Congress in 1776, pictured the Old Northwest–
bounded by the Ohio, the Alleghanies, the Great Lakes, and the
Mississippi–as paying the whole expense of the Revolutionary
War.* Thomas Paine in 1780 drew specifications for a State of
from twenty to thirty millions of acres lying west of Virginia
and south of the Ohio River, the sale of which land would pay the
cost of three years of the war.** On the other hand, Pelatiah
Webster, patriotic economist that he was, decried in 1781 all
schemes to ‘pawn’ this vast westward region; he likened such
plans to ‘killing the goose that laid an egg every day, in order
to tear out at once all that was in her belly.’ He advocated the
township system of compact and regular settlement; and he argued
that any State making a cession of land would reap great benefit
‘from the produce and trade’ of the newly created settlements.

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For the most part, however, work was carried on simultaneously on

Autoblog — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 12:00:04 +0000

all the three great links or sections into which the enterprise
was divided
For the most part, however, work was carried on simultaneously on
all the three great links or sections into which the enterprise
was divided. Local contractors were given preference by the
commissioners, and three-fourths of the work was done by natives
of the State. Forward up the Mohawk by Schenectady and Utica to
Rome, thence bending southward to Syracuse, and from there by way
of Clyde, Lyons, and Palmyra, the canal made its way to the giant
viaduct over the Genesee River at Rochester. Keeping close to the
summit level on the dividing ridge between Lake Ontario streams
and the Valley of the Tonawanda, the line ran to Lockport, where
a series of locks placed the canal on the Lake Erie level, 365
miles from and 564 feet above Albany. By June, 1823, the canal
was completed from Rochester to Schenectady; in October boats
passed into the tidewaters of the Hudson at Albany; and in the
autumn of 1825 the canal was formally opened by the passage of a
triumphant fleet from Lake Erie to New York Bay. Here two kegs of
lake water were emptied into the Atlantic, while the Governor of
the State of New York spoke these words:

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The capture of Fort Duquesne by the English army under General

Autoblog — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 20:00:03 +0000

Forbes in 1758 and the final conquest of New France two years
later removed the French barrier and opened the way to expansion
beyond the Alleghanies
The capture of Fort Duquesne by the English army under General
Forbes in 1758 and the final conquest of New France two years
later removed the French barrier and opened the way to expansion
beyond the Alleghanies. Thereafter settlements in the Monongahela
country grew apace. Pittsburgh, Uniontown, Morgantown,
Brownsville, Ligonier, Greensburg, Connellsville–we give the
modern names–became centers of a great migration which was
halted only for a season by Pontiac”s Rebellion, the aftermath of
the French War, and was resumed immediately on the suppression of
that Indian rising. The pack-horse trade now entered its final
and most important era. The earlier period was one in which the
trade was confined chiefly to the Indians; the later phase was
concerned with supplying the needs of the white man in his
rapidly developing frontier settlements. Formerly the principal
articles of merchandise for the western trade were guns,
ammunition, knives, kettles, and tools for their repair,
blankets, tobacco, hatchets, and liquor. In the new era every
known product of the East found a market in the thriving
communities of the upper Ohio. As time went on the West began to
send to the East, in addition to skins and pelts, whiskey that
brought a dollar a gallon. Each pony could carry sixteen gallons
and every drop could be sold for real money. On the return trip
the pack-horses carried back chiefly salt and iron.

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As most of the efforts to improve the rivers, however, met with

Autoblog — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 12:00:02 +0000

indifferent success and many failures were recorded, the pendulum
of public confidence in this aid to inland commerce swung away,
and highway improvement by means of stone roads and toll road
companies came into favor in the interval between the nation”s
two eras of river improvement and canal building
As most of the efforts to improve the rivers, however, met with
indifferent success and many failures were recorded, the pendulum
of public confidence in this aid to inland commerce swung away,
and highway improvement by means of stone roads and toll road
companies came into favor in the interval between the nation”s
two eras of river improvement and canal building.

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It was doubtless Fitch”s experiments in 1785 that led to the

Autoblog — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 08:00:02 +0000

first plan in America to operate a land vehicle by steam
It was doubtless Fitch”s experiments in 1785 that led to the
first plan in America to operate a land vehicle by steam. Oliver
Evans, a neighbor and acquaintance of Fitch”s, petitioned the
Pennsylvania Legislature in 1786 for the right of operating
wagons propelled by steam on the highways of that State. This
petition was derisively rejected; but a similar one made to the
Legislature of Maryland was granted on the ground that such
action could hurt nobody. Evans in 1802 took fiery revenge on the
scoffers by actually running his little five-horse-power carriage
through Philadelphia. The rate of speed, however, was so slow
that the idea of moving vehicles by steam was still considered
useless for practical purposes. Eight years later, Evans offered
to wager $3000 that, on a level road, he could make a carriage
driven by steam equal the speed of the swiftest horse, but he
found no response. In 1812 he asserted that he was willing to
wager that he could drive a steam carriage on level rails at a
rate of fifteen miles an hour. Evans thus anticipated the belief
of Stephenson that steam-driven vehicles would travel best on
railed tracks.

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The traveler at the beginning of the century noticed a change in

Autoblog — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 18:00:03 +0000

the temper of the people as well as a change in the soil when the
Bonnyclabber Country was reached
The traveler at the beginning of the century noticed a change in
the temper of the people as well as a change in the soil when the
Bonnyclabber Country was reached. The time-serving attitude of
the good people of the East now gave place to a ‘consciousness of
independence’ due, Baily remarks, to the fact that each man was
self-sufficient and passed his life ‘without regard to the smiles
and frowns of men in power.’ This spirit was handsomely
illustrated in the case of one burly Westerner who was ‘churched’
for fighting. Showing a surly attitude to the deacon-judges who
sat on his case, he was threatened with civil prosecution and
imprisonment. ‘I don”t want freedom,’ he is said to have replied,
bitterly; ‘I don”t even want to live if I can”t knock down a man
who calls me a liar.’

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>From the journals of the time may be caught faint glimpses of

Autoblog — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 00:00:03 +0000

the
toils and dangers of travel through these wild hill regions
>From the journals of the time may be caught faint glimpses of
the
toils and dangers of travel through these wild hill regions. Let
the traveler of today, as he follows the track that once was
Braddock”s Road, picture the scene of that earlier time when, in
the face of every natural obstacle, the army toiled across the
mountain chains. Where the earth in yonder ravine is whipped to a
black froth, the engineers have thrown down the timber cut in
widening the trail and have constructed a corduroy bridge, or
rather a loose raft on a sea of muck. The wreck of the last wagon
which tried to pass gives some additional safety to the next.
Already the stench from the horse killed in the accident deadens
the heavy, heated air of the forest. The sailors, stripped to the
waist, are ready with ropes and tackle to let the next wagon down
the incline; the pulleys creak, the ropes groan. The horses, weak
and terror-stricken, plunge and rear; in the final crash to the
level the leg of the wheel horse is caught and broken; one of the
soldiers shoots the animal; the traces are unbuckled; another
beast is substituted. Beyond, the seamen are waiting with tackle
attached to trees on the ridge above to assist the horses on the
cruel upgrade–and Braddock, the deceived, maligned,
misrepresented, and misjudged, creeps onward in his brave
conquest of the Alleghanies in a campaign that, in spite of its
military failure, deserves honorable mention among the
achievements of British arms.