Frances Hunter

blog of the author To the Ends of the Earth

 

Frances Hunter's Journal
May 2006

May 25, 2006: The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

I can't remember the last time a book affected me so deeply as The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo. Since immersing myself in the book last week, I have been in something of a daze, not wanting to let go of the details, images, and stirring emotions of this magical book.

You can find Edward Tulane in the children's section of the book store. Ostensibly, it's the story of an exquisite china rabbit who is the favored toy of a wealthy little girl named Abilene. Edward doesn't reciprocate Abilene's tenderness with any devotion of his own. Instead, Edward takes his privileged life for granted.

Then, one day, everything changes ...

I believe that Edward Tulane will take its place alongside Charlotte's Web, Black Beauty, and The Velveteen Rabbit as an immortal work of literature that can be treasured by children and adults. While children will certainly adore reading about Edward's journey into the "real world," the book has even deeper emotional resonance for grownups.

For Edward Tulane is not really the story of a toy rabbit. Instead, it's a masterfully rendered tale about how a young person embarks on life, arrogant and full of himself. Convinced of his own exceptionalness, Edward painfully learns otherwise: he experiences loneliness and rejection, friendship and loss, passionate love and heartbreaking grief, shattering injury, bitterness, and hope.

While it shares some elements with the classic books mentioned above and the wonderful movies Toy Story and Babe, Edward Tulane ultimately reminded me of nothing so much as the hymn "Amazing Grace." At the beginning, Edward is a beautiful person but utterly impoverished spiritually. Through all of his experiences and especially the people he comes to know, he is truly broken into the most humble of wretches. Through his heartbreak, he finally comes to understand that he is utterly lost. It is only then that he can be found.

It's a beautiful and profound journey, made almost unbearably poignant by DiCamillo's wise, mordant portrayal of Edward and by Bagram Ibatoulline's simple and pure paintings. The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane is indeed what the title says: something of a miracle.

May 22, 2006: Bleed, Blister, and Purge

Bleed, Blister, and Purge by Dr. Volney Steele is an interesting anecdotal history of medicine on the western frontier. In the first part of the book, Steele covers a wide range of topics, from native medicine to Lewis & Clark to folk medicine, quackery, and the pioneering physicians who first came to the West. A section on women physicians is both inspiring and troubling: one admires the women who defied convention to become doctors, but shudders at the stories of women's health in the era and how poorly understood were needs such as prenatal care and birth control.

In the second section, Steele talks about public health, including early hospitals, sanitation, and epidemic disease. Again, with a good eye for telling details, stories, and photographs, Steele reveals an unfamiliar story with what he calls a "mixture of awe and distress."

I've always been interested in epidemics, and found particular fascination in the discussion of the frightening diseases that stalked the frontier, especially the resistance of civic leaders and ordinary citizens to take the appropriate measures to stop them. Many families lost children to cholera, diphtheria, and other so-called "childhood diseases" before understanding and civic will brought about changes in sanitation. Cattle ranchers initially fought the tick-control efforts to curb Rocky Mountain spotted fever and the veterinary procedures to eradicate typhoid and bovine tuberculosis. Even during the flu pandemic of 1918, which killed an astonishing 675,000 Americans, people resisted all efforts to curb public gatherings to try to stop the spread of the disease.

But it was the story of polio that most surprised me. Beginning in 1916, a series of polio epidemics terrified the nation almost every summer. Polio was worse in rural areas such as Montana and other western states, where children had not built up the viral resistance that saved many children in more densely populated areas.

Steele notes that the fear of polio took on a life of its own, out of all proportion to the actual risk of the disease. Out of millions infected with polio, only one percent became paralyzed; half of these children later regained normal function. The rest recovered with no lasting harm. From the 1920s to the 1940s, children were five to ten times more likely to catch diphtheria, tuberculosis, scarlet fever, or strep throat than polio, any one of which had a higher death rate.

But the fear of paralysis, however unlikely, made polio the most haunting and feared of all infectious diseases. The reason isn't hard to understand. In those years, disabled children were barred from attending school. In some places they were not allowed out in public, and faced ridicule and ostracism if they did go out. Worst of all, they became a burden on their families. In a time and place where most work was physical, a disabled person was a real drain on the ability of a farm or ranch family to survive. Becoming crippled was truly a fate worse than death.

It's interesting to wonder what attitudes now drive our fears and how they will look to generations yet to come. Bleed, Blister, and Purge is full of such thought-provoking nuggets and would be enjoyed by anyone with an interest in the history of medicine. It's a quality book that you can either dip into or enjoy reading straight through.

May 18, 2006: The Little Ice Age

The time of the Lewis and Clark expedition coincided with a period of climate change known as the "Little Ice Age." There's an interesting article about the Little Ice Age here, and some info on how it affected Lewis & Clark's sighting of the aurora borealis.

Homage to the King

The sun was setting over Big Town, but far from settling down to rest, the Chickasaws were abuzz with activity. Smoke from ovens and cookfires drifted over the camp, heavy with the smells of hot corn, hominy and roasting meat. Women carried baskets of apples in from the orchards, and children and dogs scampered across their path. If not for Seaman’s imposing appearance, few people would have bothered to stop and look them over. White men were commonplace in Big Town; as for blacks, many Chickasaws kept negro slaves themselves. They were accustomed to a constant parade of soldiers, traders and fortune-seekers crowding into their settlement, and they accepted the newcomers with peaceful, albeit grudging, hospitality.

As far as we could discover, nothing remains to be seen of Fort Pickering or anything else from the founding days of Memphis, so we decided to limit our stay here to a tour of the King's place. (Very few pictures are allowed at Graceland; here is a site that shows a little of what it looks like.)

We had visited Graceland before in the early 1980s. Since then, the accommodations for visitors have grown to include a spacious parking lot, an attractive visitor center, and really nice gift shops. We had wisely reserved our tour time in advance, so before we knew it we found ourselves herded on to vans with dozens of other people and given audio headsets for our tour.

The inside of Graceland is a combination of gracious Southern charm and '70s excess, all well-lived in. The dining room and living room with its peacock stained-glass windows are lovely, in contrast to the more way-out theme of the infamous green shag Jungle Room. It's easy to imagine Elvis sitting around here, playing his guitar or munching on his bowl of bacon.

A large portion of the mansion is given over to display of Elvis's trophies, including gold records and costumes. You can also view the offices where Elvis and his father Vernon worked. Outside, the grounds include an inviting pool and a horse paddock, along with the graves of Elvis, his parents, and his grandmother.

I had mixed feelings about Graceland. The lovely house is the fulfillment of Elvis's dreams, but also his prison. It was hard not to feel that we were all there to pick over the leavings of his life. On the other hand, Elvis himself wouldn't have cared, and judging by the huge crowds, the fascination with the King will never die.

We headed out of town, first stopping at the nearby Southland Mall for a great lunch at the Piccadilly Cafeteria. This southern chain has excellent gumbo, cornbread, and pie.

For the next leg of the journey, we retraced Lewis's last journey down "Pigeon Roost Road," a wilderness road leading through the Chickasaw nation. Today it's known as US 78, and just happens to lead to Tupelo, Mississippi, birthplace of the King.

While the forests and their millions of passenger pigeons are long gone, this part of Mississippi is pretty and green. As for Tupelo, we found it to be much larger and more prosperous than we expected. It appears to be something of a crossroads for commerce in this part of the state. A lot has changed since Elvis was born here on a "cold and frosty morn" in the midst of the Great Depression. (According to genealogists, Elvis's family were among the first white settlers in the area; it's one of those strange juxtapositions of history to think of Meriwether Lewis encountering one of Elvis's ancestors when he passed this way.)

Elvis's birthplace is located in a very nice park that Elvis himself funded for the city of Tupelo. The complex includes the home, an excellent visitor center, a statue of the young Elvis, chapel, and a wall with interesting reminiscences about Elvis from the people of Tupelo.

Liz at Elvis's birthplace: He was born in the front room on January 8, 1935

Elvis at age 13

 

The tiny two-room house was built by Vernon for $180, and included a wood stove and a pump and privy outside. Vernon lost the house when Elvis was about three years old, and the Presleys beat around Tupelo in various housing for the next ten years before finally fleeing their impoverished lives and moving to Memphis in 1948.

For today's visitor, restaurants and motels, both chain and independent, abound in Tupelo. We had a relaxing meal at an Outback Steakhouse. The Days Inn Tupelo, sadly lacking a pool but otherwise OK, will be our base for the next couple of nights as we explore the Shiloh battlefield and the Natchez Trace where Meriwether Lewis lost his life in 1809.

May 10, 2006: Cover Design is Here!

 

The Flight Down River

It seemed like a lifetime ago, but he’d served at Fort Pickering once, as a lieutenant in the First Infantry. The fort looked exactly the same as it had then. Barracks, blockhouses, storage buildings, and men clustered behind a high log palisade, a rough little world of a few thousand square feet. Back then, the cramped confines of the fort’s log walls had seemed like a prison, and his duties had been stultifying, a long chain of routine tasks that kept him from the exciting adventures he longed for. Now the snug huts and solid log stockade seemed like the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

When Meriwether Lewis fled St. Louis by boat on September 4, 1809, he was sick, besieged, and on the run. Ten days later, after stopping to make his will in New Madrid, he would arrive at Fort Pickering, a small garrison at a place called Chickasaw Bluffs. By all accounts, the great explorer was drunk, desperately ill, and perhaps suicidal.

Hoping to avoid such a fate, we bid a leisurely farewell to St. Louis, not heading out on I-55 until well after rush hour traffic had subsided. Like Lewis, our destination was Chickasaw Bluffs, better known today as Memphis. We spent the day traveling through southern Missouri and Arkansas, an beautiful green landscape of trees and farms. The difference in tax base between the two states was apparent immediately upon crossing the Arkansas state line. The car shook so badly that I pulled into a roadside rest, certain that we had somehow blown a tire. But no; the road here is simply pitted and worn out.

Late in the afternoon, we enjoyed crossing the Mississippi at Memphis and making our way into town and the Days Inn Graceland, a modest but nice motel which would be our base for the night.

After a rest, we decided to try to renew our quest for a decent meal, though the prospects for that around Graceland appeared slim indeed. We decided to try a BBQ joint called Marlowe's, which provided hotel pickup in a huge pink Cadillac! We liked feeling like big shots for a change. And we were in luck--the restaurant itself turned out to be a friendly place with yummy food. We enjoyed good ribs, side dishes, and apple pie a la mode.

After arriving back at the Days Inn in style, we took a walk across the street to Graceland. I found myself unexpectedly moved by the hundreds upon hundreds of inscriptions that people had written on the stone walls surrounding the estate. One person even asked Elvis to look after her parents in heaven. The house itself is an island of striking serenity amidst the squalor and gimcrackery of Elvis Presley Boulevard. Perhaps Elvis himself was that same bit of serenity in the lives of millions of fans. Too bad that E himself never found the peace he helped bring into the lives of others.

May 4, 2006: William Clark's Grave and Cahokia Mounds

[Continued from last month -- a series of blog entries about our research/vacation trip retracing the journey depicted in our novel, with excerpts from the novel]

He rubbed the sleep out of his eyes and, taking care not to stumble in the darkness, went down to the sand spit and found a place to sit near the water. He looked at the blanket of gray mist covering the river, but he wasn’t really seeing it. In his mind’s eye, he saw instead the fog hovering in the giant, tangled trees along the Columbia River as the Expedition took their canoes through the river channels, coming ever closer to the Pacific Ocean they were so anxious to see. He could almost feel their heavy dugouts quiver in awe of the rough tidewater.

When we planned our visit to St. Louis for July, the last thing we expected was for the weather to be cold. But when we stepped out of the hotel this morning, that was exactly what we found -- wind, drizzle, and temperatures that lingered in the low 60s all day. Since we were planning to spend the whole day outside, the first thing we did was hustle over to the Gateway Arch and join the crowd of tourists buying souvenir sweatshirts!

"His life is written in the history of his country."

That errand accomplished, we headed off on our pilgrimage to Bellefontaine Cemetery, a very large, beautiful Victorian cemetery that is the last resting place of many prominent St. Louisians, including William Clark. When he died in 1838, Clark was buried at the farm of his nephew, a wealthy St. Louis businessman named John O'Fallon. His funeral revealed his status and popularity in the community; it was the largest ever held in St. Louis. Ironically, although the people prized Clark as a beloved representative of the past, they'd long since rejected most of what he stood for, especially decent treatment of the Indians in the West.

In the 1850s, after the cemetery opened, the graves of Clark, his wife Harriet, and several of their children were moved to Bellefontaine. The impressive obelisk and bust depicting a handsome and dignified Clark in the prime of life were unveiled in 1904 during the centennial of the Expedition with funds donated by Clark's youngest son, Jefferson. It was restored and rededicated in 2004.

We paid our respects by placing a Texas flag on the grave. I was struck by the fact that servants were also buried in the plot. Undoubtedly these were family slaves, and it was both touching and sad to realize how intertwined were the lives of masters and slaves in those years. It was also moving to see that some of the graves were recent, testifying to the family unity that still binds together the Clark descendants. Overall, this great American could not ask for a better resting place: a serene and peaceful spot surrounded by his family.

Liz at Cahokia Mounds. Once this was a metropolis.

We said goodbye to Clark and headed across the river to the Illinois side and our big stop of the day, Cahokia Mounds. About 500 hundred years ago, Cahokia was the site of one of the largest cities in the world. Thousands of people made Cahokia comparable in size to London during the same time period. I have to confess that I never heard a word about Cahokia until we started planning our trip to St. Louis and had no idea such a place ever existed in North America. It should be much more famous.

Of the people that lived in powerful Cahokia, today only their mysterious mounds remain. An object of veneration by the native Americans who came after the fall of Cahokia, and fascination by generations of white settlers, the mounds have been the object of only limited excavation. What has been discovered includes beautiful carvings, ceremonial graves, and evidence of human sacrifice similar to that practiced at corresponding sites in Mexico.

The visitor center has excellent exhibits and a good orientation movie, along with a tape that you can use to guide you on a walking/driving tour of the great city. I suggest bringing a picnic lunch which you can eat outside or inside in a spacious break area that also contains some vending machines.

We spent the day viewing and exploring the huge mounds and learning about the life of the people who lived around them. There is evidence that Cahokia was a walled city, and some of the stockade has been reconstructed. The inhabitants followed the sun calendar which they followed with a giant calendar, now reconstructed and called "Woodhenge."

Amazed and delighted by our experience at the mounds, we headed back to St. Louis. A little later, we took a farewell stroll down to Laclede's Landing, a restored entertainment district where we were afflicted with yet another mediocre meal. But no matter. On the way back we watched ducks and bunnies playing in the park, people of all types enjoying the Arch and the river, and a stupendous pink sunset behind the Old Cathedral. The silvery Arch reflected the colors back at the sun. Not unlike the mounds made by the mysterious Indians at Cahokia, this structure is truly an expression of the highest aspirations of mankind.

It was hard to believe that it would already be time to head out downriver tomorrow. There is so much to see and do here. I look forward to coming back someday.

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