American Essence- Vol.2 Issue 3- Preview

A me rican Es s e nc e

American Essence FO R E V E RYO N E W H O LOV E S T H I S C O U N T RY

Worth the Climb Professional tree climbers help people find solace way up high

MARCH 2022

Landscapes of Light Hudson River School painter Frederic Edwin Church triumphed over adversity to create luminescent artwork

‘Tough as Nails’ We salute Samuel Whittemore, the 18th-century war hero who holds the record of oldest combatant in American history

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Contents Features 10 | Kate Somerville

A young girl who suffered from debilitating eczema transcended trauma to help others win back self-confidence through skin care.

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14 | The Elephant Keeper

Adam Brooks, a former banker who became a passionate zookeeper, gives insight into the care and communication that goes into nurturing his beloved African elephants.

18 | Lore Keeper of the Wild West

The last of the Yellowstone horseback rangers is keeping frontier traditions alive by recounting the stories and knowledge of his forefathers.

22 | Head Up High

Professional tree climber Tim Kovar teaches people to find serenity where it’s perhaps least expected.

28 | Not Rocket Science

Dr. Lee Moradi heads multi-million-dollar NASA projects to develop innovative coolers for scientific advancement—and sometimes, for sending ice cream to astronauts.

30 | March Madness

A record-setting basketball coach returns to his alma mater, ready to train his team of college athletes to sweep the board.

34 | Becky’s Diner

Becky Rand’s two-story diner has been called “the feel of Maine” and “the soul of Portland.” Most of her customers are repeats—and not just for the food.

38 | Twirling on Ice

Oona and Gage Brown, siblings representing Team USA as an ice-skating duo, keep each other grounded despite their success.

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40 | Puppy Raisers

The Scharfens have been voluntarily training puppies to become guide dogs for the blind, and they’ve worked hard over the past 21 years.

44 | Nurturing Love From Pain

Judy Crotchett became a motherly figure to a troubled teen 30 years ago.

Now, she is determined to become a court-appointed advocate for institutionalized children.

46 | A Grand Move

Mike Marsh moves pianos for a living.

It’s a unique and demanding profession in which plenty can go wrong.

48 | Why I Love America

A couple who pedaled a tandem bicycle 3,887 miles from Oregon to New Jersey wound up loving their country even more.

50 | The Artist Within

Carmen Gloria Perez served in the Army, became an actress, and then fell in love with painting. Now, she wants to inspire children to take up the arts.

53 | A Labor of Love

After Irene and Billy Clements found out they couldn’t have children, they poured their love into creating a family through foster care and adoption.

54 | Living in Harmony

Growing up in “the biggest little town in southern Minnesota,” community was strong and school life was idyllic.

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38 History 56 | The Oldest Revolutionary War Hero “Old Sam” Whittemore battled several British grenadiers at an age when most of us would have long been retired.

60 | He Took Down Bonnie and Clyde Texas lawman Frank Hamer had stopped a lot of criminals before he confronted the infamous Barrow Gang.

66 | The Irish in America

Millions of Irish came to America from the 1840s to 1940s, many of whom were fleeing famine. Some eventually made it big.

70 | A Man of Steel and Letters

Andrew Carnegie made millions in the steel industry, then spent the rest of his life giving it all away.

74 | Currier & Ives, Lithographers

The colorful scenes created by Currier & Ives appeared in households all over America in the 19th century and beyond.

78 | The Longest Cattle Drive

In 1866, Nelson Story pushed a herd of Texas longhorns up the Bozeman Trail amid bloody conflicts with Native American tribes.

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82 | The Great Molasses Flood

Boston’s North End was swept by a wave of death and destruction when a molasses storage tank exploded in early 1919, exposing a lack of industrial safety.

86 | ‘Chicken Linen’

Feedsacks became the fabric of life during the Great Depression of the 1930s, used for everything from clothing to bedding and curtains.

A Love of Learning 90 | Learning the Ropes

At the Webb Institute, students are enrolled in a specialized tuition-free bachelor’s program in the dual disciplines of naval architecture and marine engineering.

94 | The Magic of Pi Day

A fifth-grade class honors this yearly March tradition by having fun with math, learning about Archimedes and pi, and enjoying some pie too.

98 | Tapping Into Local Wisdom

Some of the best learning opportunities and memories can be found and made right in one’s own backyard.

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100 | Teaching About Service

When children come to understand the gift of giving, it instills into the next generation a desire to help others.

104 | Virtual Fitness for Kids

One physical fitness teacher turned the challenges of virtual learning into a new, fun, and growing business.

Arts & Letters 108 | Indomitable Light

Born into privilege yet winnowed by the hardships of war, Frederic Edwin Church’s paintings exemplify the adage “where there is light, there is hope.”

The Great Outdoors 118 | Formidable Sanctuary

Zion National Park’s majestic landscape was both revered and feared by natives of the land, who recognized that it was a gift from the divine.

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Features | American Success

Comfortable in Her Skin

Once a young girl who suffered from debilitating eczema, Kate Somerville transcended trauma to help others win back self-confidence through skin care WRITTEN BY

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Rhonda Sciortino

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American Success | Features

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f you’ve seen Kate Somerville Cosmetics ads or have seen Kate in magazines or on TV, you would think that she’s always been beautiful and that her life is perfect and always has been. Kate says, “People usually expect me to be ‘silver spoon stuck up.’” But that is the furthest thing from the truth.

Kate grew up on a farm in Fresno, California, with a dad who was a high school football coach who wasn’t in touch with his emotions and a mother who suffered from mental illness and addiction. Actually, it was probably Kate who suffered most.

Kate’s dad was known to all as a great guy. He was beloved by the boys at the mostly black high school where he coached. He mentored those boys and helped them see that there was a good future for their lives. The single moms of the boys he coached were grateful because he helped them keep their sons in line. But at home, he was full of rage, so much so that Kate remembers that no doors were left standing in their house. Her dad was completely unable to cope with his wife’s erratic behaviors or to be there for her.

Kate describes her mother as an “eccentric hippy.” She would go out drinking and partying and then fall into deep depression. When Kate was 9 years old, her mother left her with her dad.

But occasionally her mother would call to tell Kate that she was going to commit suicide. It was an emotional roller coaster. For the next year, it was just Kate and her dad living in the barn on their land. She describes it as, “incredibly eclectic and artistic with a beautiful garden, a trailer for a kitchen and an outhouse for a bathroom. I was the only person I knew who lived this way and I’m convinced it was the source of my creativity.”

Kate’s dad moved on, remarried, and started a new family, a family where Kate didn’t fit in.

She loved her dad and knew he was a good guy (because everyone said he was), but she felt completely abandoned.

She spent her high school years “couch surfing” with friends and living with a relative, and then in her senior year of high school, she moved in with her boyfriend. All throughout her high school years, her mother would come in and out of her life, and every time she showed up, she brought chaos and pain with her. Fortunately for Kate, her boyfriend’s mother became a strong mentor in her life, providing a sense of stability.

Another important person in Kate’s life was her high school counselor, Mr. Talley. He knew that things were rough for her. He saw her struggling and not fitting in at school. He knew when Kate’s

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mother was in her life because Kate would get hives and have a painful flare-up of eczema from head to toes, complete with dried, cracked, and oozing skin. Mr. Talley knew that Kate was working, trying to deal with her mother, and suffering through the humiliation of the skin problems she experienced, so she wasn’t able to have a normal senior year. She couldn’t go to the prom or to games or do any of the other things that other kids seemed to be enjoying.

Mr. Talley, with whom she is still in touch today, made a deal with Kate—he would let her leave high school early (she had enough credits to graduate) if she would go to city college, which she did. Kate worked three jobs to support herself while attending college. Her mentor, Barbara Wells, her boyfriend’s mother, taught her the value of unconditional support and believing in yourself. Because she had grown up with horrible eczema, she knew what it felt like to be uncomfortable in her own skin. She had always looked for different remedies to solve her own skin issues, which sparked her passion for helping others do the same. So when a friend who was a dermatologist suggested she get a degree in esthetics, she enrolled in esthetician school and focused all her attention on helping others who suffered with skin problems.

Comfortable in Your Skin As a result of the suffering Kate experienced with her own skin condition, she wanted desperately to learn what she could do for herself and others who suffered with skin problems. Kate knew intimately the impact of an ugly skin condition on one’s self esteem and confidence level. She had experienced the helpless feeling of her body’s obvious public outcry of eczema. Kate knew better than most that the trauma we experience in our lives takes a toll on our body, mind, and spirit.

While in school, Kate had an idea to work side by side with doctors to complement their services.

This was unusual at the time, as most estheticians worked in spas giving facials. Kate created and presented a business plan to a cosmetic surgeon, and shortly after graduation, she opened her first clinic inside one of the country’s top cosmetic surgery offices. Celebrity clients quickly fell in love with Kate’s post-procedure care and began booking esthetics appointments with her.

In 2004, Kate opened her first Skin Health Experts Clinic in the heart of Hollywood. She built a team to help create custom skin care protocols for people of every age, ethnicity, and skin type. They found solutions for those who couldn’t 11

Up in the Trees Professional tree climber Tim Kovar finds joy in teaching people to conquer their fears and take in the view 22

WRITTEN BY

Savannah Howe

PHOTOGRAPHED BY

Steve Lillegren

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Odd Jobs | Features

T

he Nepalese poet Santosh Kalwar once wrote that “all our wisdom is stored in the trees.” If it takes climbing to the top of a sequoia to be wise, many of us would swiftly accept a life of oblivion instead.

Isn’t it peculiar how humans tend not to think of gravity until we’re farther off the ground than we feel we should be? It’s always there, anchoring us to the earth, but just as we breathe without a second thought until we’re forced to hold our breaths, our safety on the ground is forgotten until it is called into question. That is because gravity, while our strongest anchor, could also be our greatest downfall—pun intended?—when challenged. Some people choose to do exactly that, including professional tree climber Tim Kovar.

Feet on the Ground, Head in the Sky Kovar spent his childhood in a state about as flat as it gets. With no mountains, bluffs, or even substantial hills in Fremont, Nebraska, a child who wanted a view of the world only had one option: trees. At 5 years old, Kovar clambered his way up into his neighbor’s apple tree, where he inevitably got stuck and needed rescuing. Climbing came easy to the adventurous boy, whether it was a giant cottonwood or the neighbor’s roof—“not that I ever did that,” Kovar quickly noted. Even as a teenager, while others were in the stands of a football game, he could usually be found sitting in the crown of the nearest oak. Kovar joked that his affinity for being in the trees was regarded by others as uncool or strange at 15 (it’s cute for a 5-year-old to climb trees, but decidedly less so for a nearly-grown man). But the reward meant the ribbing didn’t much matter. He wasn’t just up there to commune with the birds and other wild-

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life, although he did make a few attempts at some semblance of communication; that slight elevation change always brought Kovar his greatest solace and strongest clarity.

And yet people don’t just say they want to climb trees for a living. Kovar was no exception. The coarse touch of bark, the sound of wind through the branches, the thrill of hoisting himself up inch by inch, had become a distant memory for Kovar after entering the adult world. He was in the daily grind, working as a restaurant cook in Atlanta during the early ’90s—when he met Peter “Treeman” Jenkins at his martial arts dojo.

Jenkins is also the founder of Tree Climbers International. Kovar quickly discovered that he didn’t want to spend his life toiling away at a boring job; it wasn’t long before Kovar left his knives and spatula behind to work for Jenkins as a tree caretaker. But even though he had escaped the confinement of working within four walls, something still felt missing as he lugged forest brush to and fro.

“I would look up in the tree and I would see Peter moving around, jumping around like a squirrel up there, and I would think, ‘I want to be up there. I don’t wanna be down here, dragging brush like a bottom feeder.’”

Changes in Altitudes, Changes in Attitudes Was Kovar looking for his calling or just chasing a childhood dream? Perhaps both. In 1992, he attended the world’s first-ever technical tree climbing school in Atlanta, opened by Jenkins.

Alongside 6-year-olds and 75-year-olds, he learned the ins and outs of how to climb a tree the official way—with saddles, ropes, and helmets. He was finding out far more about the bonds that tie people together than he was about how to knot a 23

Features | Odd Jobs

to find that it’s the equipment that brings him security, admitting that he is “more comfortable 300 feet up on a rope in a tree than 10 feet up on a ladder.” While the special saddle seat and rope rigging meant for tree climbing are secure, Kovar explains that the biggest risk is when students get halfway off the ground and realize just what and where they’ve gotten themselves into. When that happens, Kovar has to either coax the student up farther into the tree and out of his or her daze, or coach him or her back down to the ground, where the threat of gravity is slightly less imminent.

“I’m not a scientist and I’m not up there taking brain-graphs, but I’ve seen it for the past 30 years.

Trees change people.”

—TI M KOVAR

People love being high up—until they see how hard they would fall. Interestingly enough, one of Kovar’s best teachers in tree climbing was a 10-year-old blind girl, a climber who, deprived of one of the senses we deem most essential, learned to navigate a tree just by the sounds of branches moving and the texture of bark.

“It was magic, it was beautiful, to hear her explain her experience. I was looking at her and thinking, ‘She sees but she doesn’t look. We look but we don’t see. Who’s really blind here?’ So I started doing blindfolded climbs after that to open up the other senses and get a deeper connection with these trees that I claim to love.”

What happens when the climbers reach the top? There’s always a view worth admiring. They can even spend the night up in the canopy, in a specially-built vessel meant for safely sleeping in trees. The experience, Kovar said, can’t be compared to any other, describing “the birdsong, everywhere. Above you, below you, surrounding you. It is a vortex of morning bird symphony.”

In the Amazon, waking up in a tree boat means watching macaws and parrots soar through the air—below you. When you’re on the ground looking up at a bird, Kovar explained, all you can see is a dark silhouette. But from the unique juxtaposition of a flightless creature being above a winged one, you can see how the sun rays hit the birds’ feathers. The tropical birds “shoot by like 26

flying rainbows,” all while dawn is bringing the canopy around you to life.

Changing Lives, One Climb at a Time Kovar has reached for the treetops all over the world: Malaysia, India, Central America. He’s climbed with ropes, saddles, and protective hardware alongside Brazilian natives who scale huge trees with nothing but a scrap of cloth wrapped around their ankles to prevent chafing.

He has come into contact with massive beehives, howler monkeys, and hazardous dead branches.

He is often asked what his favorite type of tree to climb is, and while it would be easy to give AMERI CAN ESSE NCE

above Tim Kovar owns Tree Climbing Planet, a recreational tree climbing school that teaches students how to scale trees hundreds of feet in the air.

One of his favorite climbs is going up the redwoods of California.

a towering, exotic species as an answer, what he usually says is unexpected: the little, 75-foot white oak tree in his own backyard in Seattle.

The familiarity of oak is like running into open, loving arms, welcoming him back home. “My philosophy is, I think of climbing trees as more of a place to be versus a thing to do. I’ll go up just 30 feet, put in a hammock, and just chill the rest of the day. It’s not about getting to the top of the tree for me anymore.”

After scaling a redwood—beautiful, ancient beings, he said—his students return to the ground with a sense of fullness, the tendency to walk a bit softer, to be a bit more mindful of the

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world spinning around them. Being in the trees helps us “keep our awareness a little more open and expansive,” Kovar said, “especially for people that have an office job and are kind of stuck inside all the time.”

And perhaps a question that will never be answered: which experience is most worth it, the view or the climb? Kovar will never forget the views, whether it’s the view of his backyard that he’s seen thousands of times or watching the sunset melt over the Amazon canopy: “Getting the last little rays of sunlight—the ground is already pitch-black, but here you are, bathing in that last little bit of day.” • 27

Features | March Madness

In a game that started out neck and neck, the UAB Blazers fought hard and ultimately won.

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March Madness | Features

Reviving a Winning Tradition Basketball coach Andy Kennedy’s return to his alma mater is a fitting homecoming WRITTEN & PHOTOGRAPHED BY

Karim Shamsi-Basha

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oach Andy Kennedy’s voice may have risen early in the game between the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) and Mississippi Valley State University (MVSU) back in December 2021. But despite Coach Kennedy’s frustration with his team’s slow start, he still gave off an encouraging attitude.

Coach Kennedy is tall with a youthful look and a commanding presence. His baggy pants and loose UAB shirt do not hide his athletic build, and he strides the sidelines, expecting to win every game. True, most coaches may approach games with a winning outlook, but Kennedy’s eyes tell you that he more than expects. He believes—way beyond the recruiting and practice plans, the stats and records—and far beyond his breast bone.

The University of Alabama at Birmingham was favored to win against unranked Mississippi Valley State, but the game began unexpectedly.

MVSU and UAB were neck and neck, and Coach Kennedy shouted at his players to get it together.

“That’s just sports,” Coach Kennedy said after the game, which UAB ultimately won, 100 to 58.

“MVSU players were ready, and we were not. We made the necessary adjustments and ended up winning big. That’s what matters.”

Kennedy became head coach at UAB in March 2020. He had played at UAB from 1988 to 1991 and was the second-leading scorer in program history.

Returning to UAB was gratifying and meaningful to Kennedy, “On behalf of my wife, Kimber, and our two daughters, I am blessed to be able to return to my alma mater, in a city that I love, to lead this storied basketball program,” Kennedy had said in a letter posted on the UAB Athletics website.

An official introductory statement from UAB welcoming Kennedy back home had stated, “Remember this day, Birmingham. When we look back a few years from now, Kennedy to UAB might be the moment a university system started to truly heal and win back some respect.”

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Features | Odd Jobs

A Grand

Move

It takes quite some skill to move pianos, but Mike Marsh makes it happen for Alabamans WRITTEN & PHOTOGRAPHED BY

Karim Shamsi-Basha

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ike Marsh moves pianos for a living.

Mike Marsh also drag-races a Chevy Camaro.

Two completely opposite interests, but those two are Mike Marsh’s job and hobby.

“I got into drag racing because it was the farthest from what I did for a living,” Marsh said during a recent interview conducted while he was moving a piano. “People who know me from drag-racing can’t believe I move pianos, and people who know me from piano-moving don’t believe I drag-race.”

Marsh appears more like a drag-racer than a piano-mover. Mowing slowly and with intention, he sports a white mustache-goatee combination, piercing blue eyes, and rough-skinned hands. He

speaks with a heavy Southern drawl filled with confidence. All of Marsh looks rough and tumble, yet the man moves pianos with the precision and litheness of a butterfly. “I got into this business when I was fifteen. My dad and uncle were in the piano-moving business, and I helped on the delivery truck. After I majored in music at Jefferson State Community College, I continued moving pianos.”

Piano-moving, according to Marsh, is a unique and demanding profession. There is much to know about how to care for the piano. Movers first flip the piano to the side, then take the legs off in a specific order. There is also plenty that can go wrong.

“We do on occasion have a crazy catastrophe.

One time in Louisiana, we took the huge grand piano down a wheelchair-ramp on the side of the house. When we started, it looked good. Then, a piece of the plywood gave way and the piano flipped to the side. Before I knew what was happening, I found myself flying and landing in the 46

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Odd Jobs | Features

yard. The piano flipped me into the air. My shoulder was sore for weeks, but I survived,” Marsh said. The piano was slightly damaged, but Marsh and his team managed to repair it.

Marsh insists that much more goes according to plan than the crazy stories, but those do keep him and his crew on their feet. “Another time, we needed to move a piano into a condominium building and up to the fifth floor. The piano was too large to go into the elevator or go up the stairs,” Marsh said. “So we brought in a crane that lifted the piano over the entrance and pool, then up to that balcony. We got the crane to swing the piano back and forth towards the balcony until we could bring it in. That was scary. We were all tense until we got that piano inside.”

On another move, Marsh had to take a piano nine flights up the stairs and navigate tight corners. Considering that grand pianos can way over 1,000 pounds, that one was exhausting. Despite the occasional craziness, Marsh adores his job.

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love what I do. You meet and know different people, and I visit many new places. From one week to another, I don’t know where I’m going to be,” Marsh said. “We treat every piano like it’s our own.

We want the customer happy, and I’m thankful my customers are always happy.”

Marsh thinks he has moved over 10,000 pianos in his career. This past December (a typical month for the business), he moved 32 pianos. He owns four pianos that he rents out, and plays on occasion.

And the drag-racing? Marsh admitted that he loses a lot more than he wins, but he will continue drag-racing as long as he can drive. “I did win one last year down in Montgomery, and it felt real good,” Marsh said. Then, with a loud chuckle, he added: “I love the people I meet drag-racing. I tell you though—they are different than the people I meet moving pianos. The two groups are the farthest it can get, but I do enjoy knowing both.” So moving pianos does have something in common with drag-racing after all. • 47

The Oldest Revolutionary War Hero Samuel Whittemore was well beyond retirement age when he took on multiple retreating British grenadiers at Concord—and he lived almost 2 vigorous decades more WRITTEN BY

“

O

Andrew Benson Brown

ld Sam” Whittemore was about 80 when he encountered a British army of about 1,700. If a standard retirement age or the right to claim disability had existed in colonial America, Samuel Whittemore would probably not have felt these

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things were right for him. He was just one of the many minutemen who dropped his plow to take up his musket after the first shots at Lexington and Concord were fired, but he differed from most of his fellow embattled farmers in at least one important respect: he was not young. Nor AMERI CAN ESSE NCE

War Heroes | History

He was the oldest combatant to serve in any American war. was he middle-aged. Or even close to the standard retirement age. He was, in fact, the oldest combatant to serve in any American war. And despite sustaining terrible wounds from British soldiers that day, he survived to live for another 18 years. Among the many firsthand accounts that have come down to us from April 19, 1775, Samuel Whittemore’s story stands out as a testament to resilience, longevity, and sheer toughness.

As straggling, exhausted British soldiers were retreating from Concord on their way back to Boston, they entered the town of Menotomy, where an elderly man was working in his fields.

Although approximately 80 years of age and crippled, Samuel Whittemore did not hesitate. He exhorted his fellow townsmen to stand up to the British, ending his speech with the words, “If I can only be the instrument of killing one of my country’s foes, I shall die in peace.” Gathering a musket, sword, and brace of pistols, he then entered the fray as his wife fled to seek refuge elsewhere. He crouched behind a stone wall and began shooting at the passing British with his musket. Taking notice of this apparent fly, a party of grenadiers was sent to swat him. As they

closed in, Sam reloaded, aimed his musket, and killed one. He drew his pistols, shooting a second soldier, then a third. When he attacked with his sword, another grenadier shot him in the face, blowing off part of his cheekbone. More regulars charged forward, impaling him with their bayonets multiple times. Deeming this insufficient to do him in, they proceeded to brutally beat him with their musket butts. At that point, the redcoats seem to have considered him reasonably dead and moved on.

Hours later, however, when local residents found Whittemore’s mangled body, he was not only still alive but (according to some accounts) still trying to load his musket. They carried him to a surgeon, who initially hesitated to treat his wounds—he was too old, he had simply sustained too many injuries. But at the behest of neighbors, Sam was patched up and carried home. Not only did he defy expectations and pull through, but within a year of recovering he enlisted for active duty in the continental army and served for short periods during the war. The muster rolls of several regiments bear his name, and at one point he held the rank of lieutenant. He witnessed his country emancipate itself from British rule, ratify its own constitution, and elect George Washington to a second term as president before finally expiring at the age of nearly 100.

Over the centuries, Samuel Whittemore, like many admired historical figures, has been subject to some mythologizing. As his fame has grown, his badges of courage have multiplied. His obit-

above left The Siege of Louisbourg in 1745, during King George’s War. Samuel Whittemore was among the Massachusetts regiment that fought this battle on Cape Breton Island, which is now part of the Canadian province of Nova Scotia. right Vintage engraving of the Battle of Lexington on April 19, 1775. The battles of Lexington and Concord marked the outbreak of open armed conflict between the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Thirteen American Colonies.

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History | Philanthropy

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Philanthropy | History

A Man of Steel and Letters Andrew Carnegie made millions in the steel industry, then spent the rest of his life giving it all away WRITTEN BY

“

Rachel Pfeiffer

T

he whole trend of your mind seemed to be towards big things,” Andrew Carnegie’s childhood friend Tom David wrote him later in life. Carnegie rarely did anything small, especially once he amassed his fortune through steel. However, the captain of industry didn’t have grand or affluent roots.

Carnegie was born in Dunfermline, Scotland, on November 25, 1835. His father’s trade was weaving, but industrialization put William Carnegie out of work. Carnegie’s mother, Margaret, hoped her husband would have better luck finding a job in the United States. The family moved to Pittsburgh, where jobs were abundant, and they didn’t face the same craft restrictions on skilled artisans that they had in Scotland.

left Andrew Carnegie, 1835–1919. above right

Andrew Carnegie (front row, fourth from left), his daughter, Margaret, and wife, Louise, at the corporation’s first board meeting, Nov. 10, 1911. right

Conveyors at the abandoned historic Carrie Blast Furnace, one of Carnegie’s Pittsburgh steel mills.

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Railroads and Steel Though William Carnegie wouldn’t have much more success earning money in the United States than he had in Scotland, his sons would profit enormously from the family’s move. At age 13, Carnegie dropped out of school and began working. Though he missed Scotland, Carnegie recognized the great opportunity he had in America.

“If I had been in Dunfermline working at the loom it is very likely I would have been a poor weaver all my days, but here I can surely do something better than that,” Carnegie wrote his uncle.

Carnegie soon found a job as a messenger boy for the city’s telegraph office. He worked his way up in the office, eventually catching the attention of Thomas Scott, who worked as a superintendent at the Pennsylvania Railroad Company. Scott made him his private secretary and telegrapher in 1853. Six years later, Carnegie succeeded Scott, becoming the superintendent of the Pennsylvania Railroad’s Pittsburgh division.

As Carnegie climbed the ladder, he made many profitable investments, including ones in 71

Learning the Ropes At Webb Institute, a tradition of giving lives on WRITTEN BY

E

Krista Thomas

very fall semester, on the North Shore of Long Island, freshmen attending Webb Institute climb into imperfect, home-grown vessels and set out on a course with hopes of winning the race without sinking. The onlookers, mostly upperclassmen, watch the voyages taking place in the harbor, immersed in their own memorable initiation as new undergraduate students studying at the private engineering college.

Junior Jacob Dillistin, a native of West Palm Beach, Florida, recalled how he and his team had just a few materials to work with for that exercise.

“Plywood, zip ties, caulk, PVC pipe, and a couple of two-by-fours—that’s all we could use,” he said. “We had to design a boat using principles learned from naval architecture class like buoyancy and stability to make sure that once we were in the boat it wouldn’t flip over!”

With a design in hand, students

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headed to the campus woodshop, using power tools to assemble the vessel before giving it a test run the day before the race. The materials used are limited, Dillistin said, but the project is designed that way. He and his teammates did their best to find any leaks and then plug them.

“For the race, we had to sail one loop around two buoys, pick up a couple of water balloons on the beach, and then sail another lap around the buoys,” he said. “I’m sure it was quite entertaining watching everyone go around.”

More than mere entertainment, the exercise is just one of many where students get their feet wet early on in their studies. It’s the only program of its kind in the United States with only one degree offered—a Bachelor of Science in dual disciplines of naval architecture and marine engineering.

Assistant Professor of Naval Architecture Bradley Golden admits that there are many engineering AMERI CAN ESSE NCE

Schools | A Love of Learning

“Plywood, zip ties, caulk, PVC pipe, and a couple of two-by-fours— that’s all we could use.”

— B RA D L E Y GOL DEN

far left The Webb Institute’s founder, William Webb. above The Webb Institute campus is located on the northern shore of Long Island, N.Y.

Webb Institute freshmen take part in the school’s annual boat race. above right

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schools to choose from, but none like Webb Institute. The highly specialized shipbuilding program, small nature of the school on 26 acres, and foreign exchange program with the University of Southampton are but a few of its exceptional qualities.

“We are a close-knit community of 100 students—104 students to be exact,” stated Golden. “Faculty doors are open all the time, so students have access whenever they have a question.

Because we are highly specialized, students come here who are truly interested in this subject matter. You are in it for the long haul, or you switch schools.”

Golden was himself a graduate of the program in 1999. After working in the commercial sector, he returned to campus four years ago. The “Dream Move,” as he calls it, is evident in his enthusiasm for showing students every aspect of working in the commercial and military industry and assisting with internships and positions after graduating.

He believes the proof of success is that all graduates find jobs—and generously give back to the institution that educated them so well. “Seventy percent of our alumni donate every year.

That’s the largest percentage of any school in the nation!”

Originally, the private institution was named Webb Academy in 1889 by its founder, William H. Webb, who was

considered the “foremost shipbuilder of New York City.” Like the Naval architects who graduated before him, and after him, Golden benefited from the generosity of the founder, who was a true visionary of the times.

According to Golden, Webb started his career with wooden ships powered by sail. However, they became more complicated during his lifetime due to the launch of steam, propellers, and iron. Webb realized that working as an apprentice in the shipyard didn’t provide enough of a skill set because the industry needed better-trained ship designers. Using retired shipbuilders to teach the art of shipbuilding brought the vision to fruition at the academy’s original site in a Gothic-style mansion located in the Bronx. Later, in 1947, the academy relocated to its current location in Glen Cove, New York, on Long Island’s Gold Coast, and renamed Webb Institute in 1994.

One distinctive trait of the naval engineering school is its endowment. From its inception, Webb paid all operating expenses with further endowment assured after his death.

Full-tuition scholarships to this day are offered to all undergraduate students.

“The tuition-free concept was born out of Webb’s generosity and his commitment to give back to the community,” Golden said. “Disadvantaged students were provided for since its 91

Liberty Tree WRITTEN BY

Thomas Paine

In a chariot of light from the regions of day, The Goddess of Liberty came; Ten thousand celestials directed the way And hither conducted the dame.

A fair budding branch from the gardens above, Where millions with millions agree, She brought in her hand as a pledge of her love, And the plant she named Liberty Tree.

The celestial exotic struck deep in the ground, Like a native it flourished and bore; The fame of its fruit drew the nations around, To seek out this peaceable shore.

Unmindful of names or distinction they came, For freemen like brothers agree; With one spirit endued, they one friendship pursued, And their temple was Liberty Tree.

Beneath this fair tree, like the patriarchs of old, Their bread in contentment they ate, Unvexed with the troubles of silver and gold, The cares of the grand and the great.

With timber and tar they Old England supplied, And supported her power on the sea; Her battles they fought, without getting a groat, For the honor of Liberty Tree.

But hear, O ye swains, ’tis a tale most profane, How all the tyrannical powers, Kings, Commons, and Lords, are uniting amain To cut down this guardian of ours; From the east to the west blow the trumpet to arms Through the land let the sound of it flee, Let the far and the near, all unite with a cheer, In defence of our Liberty Tree.

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Poetry | Arts & Letters

A

large elm stood as a grand landmark on the only road leading into colonial Boston. The tree was planted in 1646 and became a common symbol of beauty and liberty in the following century. The weight of this symbol carried through the colonies, inspiring others to plant trees as similar rallying points.

In the mid-18th century, the British Crown began imposing stricter trade regulations to recoup the cost of defending American colonies in the French and Indian War (1754–63) and increase its diminishing control. These restrictions, including the Currency Act and Sugar Act of 1764, angered colonials for prohibiting any trade with the French and Dutch. In 1765, the Royal Crown issued the Stamp Act, which taxed all commercial and legal papers, newspapers, pamphlets, cards, almanacs, and dice. The Liberty Tree became the site of a theatrical protest that led to the repeal of the Stamp Act the following year. Although colonials were successful with the repeal of the Stamp Act, the sparks of revolution had been lit and set in motion the events that started the American Revolution.

A politician and advocate for trade between the colonies and other European nations, Thomas Paine was an editor for the Pennsylvania Magazine during the war. He penned this song as a tribute to the symbolism of the Liberty Tree, further solidifying its place as Boston’s rallying point.

After the war began, British loyalists chopped down the tree in solidarity with the Crown.

Centuries later, the tree that stood on what was once Orange Street is commemorated with a plaque at 630 Washington Street bearing the inscription, “Sons of Liberty 1766.” •

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Arts & Letters | Hudson River School

American artist at the time. Church would show his large works at the annual exhibitions of the National Academy of Design, the American Art Union, and the Boston Art Club. He shared the stage with such luminaries of the Hudson River School as Thomas Cole, Jasper Cropsey, John F. Kensett, and Asher Brown Durand.

Frederic Church married Isabel Carnes in 1860.

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He preferred to develop his painting with a subtle human presence, often barely visible.

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Hudson River School | Arts & Letters

the war years. While he himself did not serve, he lost a close friend in the conflict. His two children died of diphtheria in March 1865. When the war ended, most everyone in the country had been touched by the tragedy. Thomas Jefferson’s Capitol Building in Richmond rose above a scene of desolation—a desolation that spoke of the fragility of civilization.

In the aftermath of the war, Frederic Church became fascinated with the study of past civilizations. In 1867, he made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and the Middle East, traveling with his family. His sketches and studies there and later in Europe allowed him to paint large canvases—one a year for the next few years. These paintings were not the pristine natural scenes he composed early in his career; they were the portrayal of the ruins and artifacts of ancient civilizations. He studied Persian architecture and the Greek and Roman ruins. They became the subject matter for a new set of works that departed from the innocence of his earlier work.

According to Kenneth Meyers, curator at the Detroit Institute of Arts, “Church painted six major paintings, basically one a year in the years following his trips. “Syria by the Sea” (the fifth painting), unlike some of his earlier ones, is a totally made up landscape. Church combines architectural ruins that reflect early GrecoRoman ruins, late Roman ruins, Ottoman ruins, and Crusader-era ruins. He brings them all together in one painting in a way that seems to invite us to read this painting as being about the passage of time.” Meyers continues:

“The Parthenon” by Frederic Edwin Church, 1871. Oil on canvas. Metropolitan Museum of Art. above

He bought a farm in Hudson, New York, and built his “Cosy Cottage,” a relatively modest home, as a retreat for his family. Church’s life was changing—and the world around him was changing as well. In the 1860 painting entitled “Twilight in the Wilderness,” Church’s landscape reflects the great turbulence of the country that would erupt in the Civil War. Church did not travel during

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The foreground is filled with architectural remnants. I think it would have looked to Church’s original viewers much like photographs they had seen of Fredericksburg, or Richmond, Virginia after the Civil War when the cities were lying in ruins. So, these paintings I think are about the horrors of history, the destructiveness of history, and yet, as always in Church’s major finished paintings, you have this glorious sunlight that shines over everything. This suggests that despite the pain and agony of human life which is real, and the fact that we all are born to die, nonetheless there’s a purpose to life and a purpose to history. • 117

The Great Outdoors | National Parks

director of the National Park Service, Horace Albright, changed the park’s name to Zion. This appeased the relative newcomers who felt that they had forged this new home through great hardship and as a testament to their faith.

It wasn’t until 1917 that visitors began to be able to access Zion Canyon in the way that we take for granted today. Prior to then, roads were rough, and the nearest railroad station was 100 miles away. The Union Pacific Railroad extended a railway to neighboring Cedar City in 1919. Zion Canyon can now also be accessed from the east on Mt. Carmel Highway, thanks to a remarkable 1.1-mile-long tunnel that was cut through solid sandstone and completed in 1930. This incredible tunnel is so long that its darkness is periodically interrupted by six large windows that artistically frame views of Zion Canyon. The highway connects Utah’s 89 and 91 highways and provides a bridge to other magnificent destinations such as Bryce Canyon National Park and Grand Canyon National Park. Southern Utah is home to many incredible destinations that are a popular itinerary for a quintessentially American road trip.

Visiting Zion In the modern day, Zion National Park is a wellknown and highly-visited feature of the U.S. National Park system. During the busy summer season, the park now sees an average of half a million visitors monthly. A century ago, Zion was relatively unknown and saw only a few thousand visitors annually in stark contrast to the roughly 4 million visitors it now receives every year. The mission of the National Park system is to make these majestic places accessible to people while also maintaining and preserving them for future generations. This noble pursuit requires a delicate balance that presents practical challenges in terms of accommodating increasingly large numbers while also protecting the park’s natural wilderness and wildlife. Some of the park’s deer don’t seem to mind the crowds and often frequent the campgrounds and riverside near the Zion Canyon’s busy visitor center.

The majority of the park’s visitors seek out mainly the 15-mile-long Zion Canyon, which is only a small section of the 229-square-mile National Park. Due to the large number of visitors to this area, a limited-availability tram (or other commercial tour) is generally required to access the main canyon by vehicle. Other options include riding a bike into the canyon or trekking it on foot. After getting past the gates, visitors have access to numerous hikes including the famed “Angel’s Landing,” a potentially dangerous hike infamous for its incredible views straight 120

Southern Utah is home to many incredible destinations that are a popular itinerary for a quintessentially American road trip.

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A rainy day at Zion National Park.

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