Use of Rockers and Long-Toms During the California Gold Rush
As I wrote last month, the early California gold miners began with placer mining, simply picking the nuggets off the ground or from streams, with hands and pans and knives. Soon, however, they wanted to sift through more dirt faster to increase the profitability of their prospecting. One of the earliest tools they employed to speed […]
From the Perspective of a Point of View Nazi
In my critique group, I’m known as the point of view Nazi. I am usually the one to notice when a writer has crept from one character’s point of view to another’s in the same scene. And I usually push my writing partners to go deeper into their protagonist’s point of view, showing not only […]
My Grandfather’s Clock
When I was in second grade or so, my class sang the old song, “My Grandfather’s Clock,” by Henry Clay Work. The lyrics to the first verse are My grandfather’s clock was too large for the shelf, So it stood ninety years on the floor; It was taller by half than the old man himself, […]
Genealogies Found: Some Family Myths Verified, Others Not
One of the things I found in going through my father’s papers was some genealogies on various branches of our family. Readers will be hearing some of these stories in months ahead. This first installment relates to Charles N. Claudson, our ancestor who emigrated from Denmark. I wrote previously about Charles, who was born in […]
Shoe Shines and Parenting
My husband is a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy. More than forty years after he graduated, it is still the most formative experience of his life. Among the many things my husband learned at the Naval Academy was how to shine shoes. A spit-polished pair of shoes is the mark of an officer and […]
My Grandmother’s Pearls and the Nature of Memory
My father’s mother gave me a pearl necklace many years ago. I think the occasion was my high school graduation, but it could have been for my sixteenth birthday or some other milestone in my teens. It was the first “old” piece of jewelry I received. In fact, I thought the necklace looked too old-fashioned […]
Black Bean Soup for Homemade Soup Day
I recently learned a surprising factoid: Today, February 4, is Homemade Soup Day, even though January is National Soup Month. Those of us in Kansas City have been fortunate this year—our January was warm, and we had less need of soup than most winters. On January 28, as New England dug out from its massive storm, our […]
My Mother the Librarian . . . And How Libraries Have Changed!
February is Library Lovers Month. I come from a family of library lovers, and I am one myself. When I was a child, we could only check out six books from the library at a time. My mother took my siblings and me to the library almost every week during the summer, and I checked […]
A Progress Report on My First Oregon Trail Novel
January has been Creativity Month, but I haven’t been very creative. With all the family issues I’ve had to deal with surrounding my father’s death, revising my current work in progress—the first novel in my Oregon Trail series—has taken a back seat. The family work I’ve been doing has been necessary and important. But I hate […]
Placer Mining in 1848-49
Last year I recounted the story of James Marshall finding a gold nugget at Sutter’s Mill in January 1848. He looked down into the mill race and saw the bright and glittering metal. Like Marshall’s original find, many of the early gold discoveries were made by men who simply spotted the precious metal in or […]