99. Telephones

            All Americans should be grateful for the telephone. Most of us now carry one in our pockets, no longer relying upon wires to connect us. But we also know that that is not how it started. Our initial connections were very dependent upon wires, little boxes and our voices. It was a step beyond the telegraph which was another step beyond the mail that had been our primary distance communication since ancient times.

            Now here we are in the twenty first century communicating with one another over vast distances with little pocket computers that we even use to broadcast our visual forms to others far away. Now we have combined our desktop computers, our televisions, our cameras, our radios, and that ancient mail system into that little pocket computer. And we tie all that together with our discoveries of radio waves and satellites so that we don’t even have to bother with connecting wires. Harry Potter’s wand has nothing over our cell phones!

            Of course, the phone part all started with our good friend Alexander Graham Bell, that very American of inventors. He’s the one who gave us the telephone. Obviously our little cell phone-computer-radio combinations were a collection of other inventions that we now carry around in our pockets. Most of it really is a conglomeration of American ideas, but the telephone is the basis of that little pocket computer and I’m quite glad to have one. It’s a nice step forward from the eight party land line I remember as a kid, but then I probably would not waste my money on a cell phone where I grew up in the Salmon River Canyon. They don’t get much in the way of cell service there. But, thank you very much, Mr. Bell, even there the telephone is still available and because of those wires so are computers and the internet. The telephone is, in fact, a great American invention that I am quite happy to use and I am thankful that it is available to me and a part of my American heritage.

98. Airplanes

        

           A teacher in Britain with whom I was working during my Fulbright exchange asked me, in a somewhat condescending tone, why we (Americans) called airplanes airplanes and not the more correct term of aeroplanes, as they are aerodynamic. This was in the spring of the year and I had come to realize the Brits often resent American English feeling we have somehow corrupted the language. As a native speaker of English and one who has spent a great deal of time studying the language I answered him in a proactive way: “We invented the bloody (yes, I inserted a British swear word) things. We can all them whatever we want.”  To this my British colleague responded, “Touché.”

            Of course I got to Britain by plane, even if it was a Canadian owned, American made airplane (which the Canadians also call aeroplane). The things really are American, and while they may be aerodynamic, the proper term is still airplane and that can’t really be taken from us thanks to those   famous brothers from Ohio who first took flight in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Orville and Wilbur Wright. Thanks to them we are able to get from one part of the globe to another in a matter of hours instead of weeks or months.  Because of these very American inventions we can experience the discombobulation of being in Seattle one evening and then London at noon of the next day within a third of a day. So if we had stayed in Seattle we would still be in bed. While jet lag can be a bit disconcerting, it’s overcome fairly quickly and we can quickly relinquish biscuits and gravy for beans and toast all because of this amazing invention that we know as airplanes/aeroplanes. (Beans and toast are not an appropriate breakfast food, but alas…) So yes, I am a love of the American invention that has made it possible to see other parts of the world for a few weeks and other parts of my own country for a few days. Thank you Wright brothers for your American ingenuity and your airplanes.

97. Television

           

           I was born and raised in Idaho, so was Philo Farnsworth. I make no claims to being anywhere as intelligent as Mr. Farnsworth but I am one who enjoys the invention of that somewhat famous Idaho inventor. I don’t know a lot about the man and I suspect, since he spent a great deal of time in Utah, that Utah might actually be the place he worked on his invention that we call television. But Mr. Farnsworth was from Idaho and his invention is American, though I have no doubt that others probably also worked on similar inventions. (As I recall, I drove through a town in Scotland that made similar claims to television.) At any rate, I like TV.

            I don’t wish to claim that television isn’t like every other technological invention mankind makes. I know its purposes can be both good and evil, but I try to enjoy its better purposes. I like how it can bring books to life. It can take real things happening one place in the world into another part of the world. I like all of those things. I’m part of the Baby Boomer generation, so I’m in that first generation of people who actually grew up with television. It probably is no great surprise that I like it.

            I wouldn’t say I’m a television addict because I don’t spend tons of time watching it. I am also very capable of living without it. I can easily entertain myself with a garden and books and, in fact, that’s what I usually do. But it’s still nice to spend some time watching some police show like “Blue Bloods” or a drama like “This is Us.” And I’m not shy about admitting to having been a fan of the old shows like “Sanford and Son” and “All in the Family.” Those are aspects of television and American culture that I have always been steeped in and I don’t have any problem with taking pride in that cultural heritage. So from one Potatohead to another, I thank you, Mr. Farnsworth, for inventing television.

96. Western Red Cedars

There are many beautiful trees in Idaho and northern Idaho is draped with forests nearly everywhere. This is my home and I love the forest. Growing up on the Salmon River made me realize that that river is a boundary in Idaho, not only for the time zone but also types of trees. You don’t see Western Red Cedar south of that river.

            Now I live north of the Salmon and cedar trees are everywhere. There are ancient cedar groves scattered throughout the state. The largest tree in the United States that is not on the Pacific coast or in the mountains of the west coast states is an old cedar tree in the Clearwater country just out of Elk River. While it is in an isolated area and doesn’t get the visitors of the Redwoods, it does command some respect. It’s not alone either. There are several giants surrounding it, but if you go you will know you’ve found the right one by the boardwalk that has been built around it. It’s over 3,000 years old.

            I love going to these old cedar groves that are scattered around the northern part of Idaho. Most of them are in fairly remote areas which explains why the lumber barons of the early twentieth century didn’t log them off. These groves always feel like you’re entering a cathedral. The scent of the trees is like incense, the tree trunks themselves are the vaults that raise your eyes to the fretted canopy of the ceiling through which you can often see the heavens. These groves provide a refuge from everything, so it’s no wonder I am in awe of them. Everyone should be.

            So there are varieties of trees that sprinkle our country that make our country particularly unique. One of those happens to be the Western Red Cedar, a tree that is especially prolific in the forests of the inland Pacific Northwest. Just one more thing to be particularly proud of in this beautiful country of ours.