Whither goest thou, America, in thy shiny car in the night?Jack Kerouac, On the Road What a long, strange trip it’s been…The Grateful Dead, Truckin’ Lowell is a former mill town to the north of Boston. It is named after Francis Cabot Lowell, who developed the first American textile mill in 1814. It is located… Continue reading Lowell, Jack and Me: An Excerpt from The Yankee Road – Volume 1
Category: Road Books
On “Cactus Ed”
Perhaps the most notable character to inhabit the 1900s desert West was “Cactus Ed” Abbey, who died a few years before we took the first of our many trips to the Southwest. We loved what he saw and worried about its sustainability as well, but we were, sort of, part of the problem. Abbey worried… Continue reading On “Cactus Ed”
The Unlucky Inventor
The oils from different coals require different treatment. The oils of Albert coal (ashphaltum) [New Brunswick, Canada], Boghead coal [Scotland] and Breckenridge coal [Kentucky] are easily purified, while the oils from ordinary American, English and Scotch cannels, require more skill….The author has made more than 2000 experiments in reference to the manufacture and purification of… Continue reading The Unlucky Inventor
Retailing “Yankee Notions”
Every inhabited part of the United States is visited by these men. I have seen them on the peninsula of Cape Cod and in the Neighborhood of Lake Erie, distant from each other more than six hundred miles. They make their way to Detroit, four hundred miles farther, to Canada, to Kentucky, and, if I… Continue reading Retailing “Yankee Notions”
The Second Butterfield Stage (Sort Of)
When I was writing a chapter for the second volume of my book, The Yankee Road, I told the story of John Butterfield and his Overland Mail Company, which operated a stagecoach line between St. Louis and San Francisco between 1858 and 1861; its existence cut short by the outbreak of the Civil War. The… Continue reading The Second Butterfield Stage (Sort Of)
A Story for Labour Day
In these days of ‘gig’ employment and lots of home delivery options, we may forget why there is a day dedicated to those who work for a living—that is, most of us. In the late 1800s, there was a lot of labour unrest, in part because of long hours, over-controlling bosses, low pay and dangerous… Continue reading A Story for Labour Day
Following Paddy’s Footsteps: Two European “Road Books”
A long time ago, a friend introduced me to the story of the British writer, Patrick Leigh Fermor. At the age of 18 in 1933, being both charming and restless, he decided to walk alone overland from the Hook of Holland to Istanbul. He planned, if that is the word for it, on sleeping in… Continue reading Following Paddy’s Footsteps: Two European “Road Books”
American Road Books
"Not only for Cyrus’ sake did Xenophon march up toward the Persians. But in search of a road which led up to Zeus." Diogenes Laërtius Americans have added, in great numbers, to the road book literature. American stories of travel and roads have been conditioned by the general habit of a people constantly on the… Continue reading American Road Books
Old Professor by the Sea 