Eisenhower National Historic Site, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

For Your Consideration: The Greatest American

Some time ago, on a long-forgotten internet message board, someone posed a question: who was the greatest American in history?

Of course, the internet being the internet, the argument soon disolved into a flame war (I’m sure someone mentioned “abortion” somewhere and it just devolved from there). Somewhere in the fray, however, I made a case for Dwight D. Eisenhower as the Greatest American. Now you can’t answer a question without understanding a question so, as I did on that tiny little  message board, I’ll start off explaining my interpretation of that particular question.

Most folks, upon hearing that question, will instinctively think only in terms of America itself, as in “which American did the most for America”. A logical answer here would be Abraham Lincoln, a man who not only kept the Union from dissolving, but also had the guts and fortitude to fight the greatest evil America has ever wrought: the continuation of slavery nearly 9 decades into its existence. Slavery was an unholy abomination that should have been extinguished when Thomas Jefferson put the last period on the Declaration of Independence, but it was allowed to exist through the sheer audacity (and utter cowardice) of founders and legislators and presidents alike. No President stood up to slavery until Lincoln, and his actions saved our country. We were not only saved literally (by stopping secession), but also morally. We had no moral fiber as a nation until slavery was abolished. It is as simple as that.

The only problem I have with proclaiming Lincoln as the “greatest American” is his actions really only saved the country. When I hear “greatest American”, I think globally: which American did the most for the world? Now that is an entirely different question. Sure, some could extrapolate “well, America is the greatest country, and Lincoln saved America, so Lincoln is the greatest”. That not only shows a grotesque level of hubris, it’s not really accurate. America wasn’t a world player for nearly a century after Lincoln’s time. We were an isolationist nation. We were protected on two fronts by mighty oceans, and only had two neighbors. No threats = no conflict = no interest in the world. Plus we were a nation of immigrants, collectively giving Europe the big middle finger as we went on our way, making our own prosperity (and driving the native population into their graves, but that’s the subject for yet another post). Saying Lincoln was a great world figure is simply disingenuous.

So, if we honestly answer “which American did the most good for the world”, well, you can come up with a lot of answers. Many (and perhaps rightly) say medical pioneers like Jonas Salk or inventors like Thomas Edison or scientists like Robert Oppenheimer deserve the title.  I appreciate these picks, but I have to ask: is science purely an American endeavor? Isn’t science simply the discovery and application of facts, principles and theorems? What makes it uniquely American? Doesn’t science transcend nationality? Jonas Salk could just have easily have been German, or Spanish, or Japanese. I’m not at all denigrating the work of these individuals in making my pick, I’m actually elevating them beyond simply being Americans.  Well, I suppose Edison was truly American: he was an incredibly shrewd businessman and power broker who set out to destroy his competitors, but, again, that’s a subject for another post …

This leads me to my own approach to the “Greatest American” question. First, did the individual have a postive, global impact; and second, did the individual act with the best of our core American principles (life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, etc.)? I say Ike deserves serious consideration as the Greatest American under that context, and I say it for one big reason: World War II.

World War II was the greatest conflagration the world has ever known. Never before, and thankfully never since, has the globe ever been covered in carnage and evil as horrid as during the period between 1939 and 1945. I don’t even know if people can comprehend that evil. I’m fairly convinced Americans can’t, we simply haven’t experienced war firsthand on our own soil since 1865. Let me tell you, it was nasty-horrid. And the Nazis, the Nazis were the worst. They epitomize evil to this very day. Every tyrant since 1945 is judged against Hitler, every evil movement has been compared to Nazism. These people were cold, heartless butchers; utterly disinterested in freedom and liberty; technocrats and bullies of the worst kind; the filthiest type of genetic bigots and medical torturers this world has ever seen. America saw this evil and (after much prodding by FDR) finally decided to confront it. But we brought more than men and equipment to Europe, we brought a secret weapon. We brought Ike.

I don’t know if I’ll make many friends with this paragraph, and I don’t mean any disrespect to any man or woman who ever served in our Armed Forces, but an army isn’t worth a damn unless it has good, strong leadership. Throughout history, there are lots of stories of brave armies led to their defeat and slaughter by lousy generals; and plenty of other stories of underpowered armies led to victory by great generals. Anyone who’s read about our Civil War knows stories like these, and they occur in European history as well. Victory and defeat don’t rest on the shoulders of the soldier, they reside in the brains of the generals.

Ike was one of the better ones. I don’t think he’s rated as the greatest American general ever (I think that title tends to fall on Lee or Patton or even George Washington), but there can be no doubt he had the greatest challenge of any of them. He had to face a highly skilled, highly entrenched opponent, who had (in some cases) superior weaponry and better planning (at least in the early parts of the war). Not only that, he had to rescue no less than an entire continent from the greatest scourge mankind has ever seen. This was an enemy unlike any faced by Americans in our entire history. This was an enemy who actually sat down, in offices, using businesslike precision, and plotted the extermination of, by some counts, 11 million people! [See link below for more on this]. This was much, much more than simple warfare. The stakes were much higher.

I’m hoping that, by now, you see why I’m nominating Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Allied Commander Europe, as the Greatest American. Yeah, he didn’t beat the Nazis all by himself (no one achieves anything by themselves). Yeah, he made a lot of blunders and mistakes and some (like the continued delay of the invasion of Europe) probably led to further deaths in the Soviet Union.  I still think his achievement earns him the title of Greatest American. He was a fine president, the 50’s were a good time in this country. He sponsored the interstate highway system, connecting us in a way we never were connected before. He started the battle against Communism (although he didn’t act to combat McCarthyism). He tried to integrate our racially divided nation (with admittedly limited success). He even tried to warn us about the growing power of the military-industrial complex, you don’t hear too many politicians doing that these days.

Most impressive, in my view at least, he was a humble man. His retirement home, now the Eisenhower National Historic Site near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, is probably the humblest house ever inhabited by any former President. Hell, it’s not much different than the farmhouse next door to my own boyhood home. Personally, I think humility is one of the best characteristics a human being can ever have. Arrogance is for assholes, humility is for great people. Personally, I think Eisenhower was more of the latter and less of the former.

[I normally don't ask for direct feedback on a post, but I'd love to hear your thoughts on the "Greatest American" question. Also, I didn't have a camera when I visited Ike's house, all pictures on this post are public domain photos taken from the NPS or Wikipedia or other sources.]

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Links:

Eisenhower National Historic Site

PowerKills, R. J. Rummel’s works on democide

Atlantic Monthly’s Top 100 Americans and a contrary list

Google map to Ike NHS

Edgar Allan Poe National Historic Site, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

American Classics

Edgar Allen Poe is a true American classic. I suspect that Poe is the second most recognized 19th Century American author (behind perennial favorite Mark Twain). Most everyone has heard of Poe through his well-known works like “The Raven”, “The Pit and the Pendulum”, “The Masque of the Red Death”, and that grade-school reader staple, “The Tell-tale Heart”. Some folks may have read one book by Herman Melville or Louisa May Alcott, and only college-level literature students have read anything by Emerson, Longfellow, or Thoreau, but most of us are familiar with Poe’s work and his influence on mystery and the macabre. I suppose it’s sad that he’s better known than his contemporaries (critically speaking Poe’s works pale in comparison to Emerson, Longfellow and Thoreau), but his visceral take on humanity made a huge impact on popular culture. You can trace so many mystery-thrillers directly back to Poe. It’s hard to imagine Hitchcock or Stephen King or even CSI would be here today without his influence.

But a visit to Poe’s old homestead in Philadelphia evokes a different sort of American classic.

Philadelphia wasn’t the only city Edgar Allan Poe called “home”.  Never a wealthy man, Poe and his family led a fairly hardscrabble life. They travelled a lot, always trying to find a new opportunity in another city. Consequently, they lived in many places, from Boston to Richmond to New York. The only Poe home that has been preserved is an old, faltering row house north of Independence Park, on the bad side of I-676. Yes, that’s right: the former home of Edgar Allan Poe, one of the premier poets and authors of his time, is a shitty house in a shitty part of town. And I find that terrific.

I visited Poe NHS on a crappy, drizzly day. I spent the prior gorgeous, sunny day strolling Independence NHS, the well-manicured core of touristy Philadelphia, with its horse-drawn carriages and Ben Franklin impersonators. But the day I visited Poe’s House was sodden and sopping. Rain doesn’t bother me, I threw on a raincoat and headed out. Of course, I didn’t realize I’d be walking about a mile into the slums of Philadelphia. Honestly, that part of town isn’t that bad, but I clearly stood out like a sore thumb. I have to admit I was pretty nervous, but I didn’t run into any trouble. In hindsight, I think it was a very appropriate walk. Too many of us, myself included, stick to the “good” parts of America, and daren’t venture into the rougher sections. A brilliant thing about my National Park Site collection is you see virtually all of America, including some slums. You get a pretty complete picture that way, in my opinion.

By the time I got to the Poe house I was pretty soaked. I entered and took off my coat, leaving puddles in my wake. A retired couple were there, their Lincoln parked in the lot, water beaded from a fresh waxing. We were just in time for a tour. Our guide (a really sharp and well-versed lady, a credit to the NPS) took us through the outwardly rickety building, and told us of Poe. A troubled man, a restless man, a man who struggled with success (both commercial and in life). A man who always tried to find his way, a man who seemingly lost his mind and eventually died a very mysterious death, yet a man who left us with some of the most beloved works in American literary history.

Poe’s story was intriguing, but what I found more intriguing was the relationship the Poe site and the NPS has with the local residents. Obviously that part of Philadelphia has a typical, urban, African-American population: undereducated, underemployed, living their own hardscrabble lives built on single-parent households, gang warfare, drug abuse, and a collage of government entities that don’t give a crap about them. But the folks at Poe NHS have worked really hard to get in touch with the community. They are constantly hosting children from local schools for tours and storytelling and events, and that ranger clearly loved to do it. There was no pretension or hypocrisy in her voice when she told those stories, even when she was talking to three Whiteys from the ‘Burbs. Her love of her job and the locals was pretty evident, and appreciated. She also pointed out the brilliant mural of Poe on a nearby building, and the fact that it has never been defaced by graffiti in all the years it’s existed. That is a telling factoid and really shows that either Poe’s works unites us on a fundamental level, or that if you respect people, they will respect you back.

Poe NHS doesn’t just tell the story of a famous American author, it tells the story of a rough life, a life led by many millions of Americans before and many more millions who came after. Rough living in a rough house in a rough neighborhood, a life lived by more of us than we care to think about. I doubt my tour companions really got the point of Poe NHS. The retired gentleman, who was supposedly making a coffee table book about “homes of great Americans”, clearly missed it when he said “I doubt this house will make my book.” We all didn’t grow up in marble mansions, doofus.

If you want to experience America, you need to experience all of it, including tilting houses in seedy neighborhoods. That is an idea worthy of a coffee table book.

[Pics on this post are mine and copyrighted thusly, except for the mural. I didn't get a good picture of it (crappy photog that I am), so I had to pirate one.]

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Links:

Edgar Allan Poe National Historic Site

Poe Museum (Richmond, Virginia)

Tabula Rasa’s History of Horror

Google map to Poe NHS

Devils Tower National Monument, Devils Tower, Wyoming

G, A, F, (octave lower) F, C? B flat, C, A flat, (octave lower) A flat, E flat!!

In 1977, I was twelve years old, smack-dab right in the middle of the target audience for a blockbuster movie. A movie about two people whose mundane lives are interrupted by visitations from extraterrestrial beings and the government conspiracy to cover it up. Close Encounters of the Third Kind was a huge experience for me back then. Mega-huge!!! I was all over those ads with the bright light at the end of the deserted highway. “Close encounters of the first kind: visual sighting. Close encounters of the second kind: physical evidence. Close encounters of the third kind: CONTACT!”.

Oof, cue the chills down the spine! The posters, the collectible cards, all that sweet, sweet geeky goodness. Ambrosia! It’s almost as if Steven Spielberg woke up one morning and said “Hmmm, I think I’ll write a movie that’ll appeal to that scrawny kid with the Coke-bottle glasses from Western Massachusetts.”  I was all over that film like stink on roadkill. A couple of years later, we were one of the first houses in town to get cable TV, and my dad bought all the pay channels. I watched Close Encounters 18 times in one month, and was damned proud of myself for it!

You can be damned sure that visiting Devils Tower (no apostrophe, contrary to popular belief) was high on my list of must-see sites in the National Park Service. And when I rounded that corner of State Highway 14 and saw that great monolith sticking out of the low eastern Wyoming hills, I was as giddy as a 12-year-old boy in a movie line the night of the big premier (after months of soaking in shameless & targetted Hollywood promotion). I’m actually glad I was alone, I could just revel in the giddiness without apologizing to anyone. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it was a pure geek fantasy come to life, and I was enjoying every rapturous moment of it!!

Devils Tower is truly a wonder to behold, even if you’re not into movies. It’s an enourmous volcanic extrusion that not only towers above the surrounding countryside but seems so alien to that landscape. It looks like it doesn’t belong, it’s like those Sesame Street clips: “one of these things is not like the other ones…” It’s almost as if those extraterrestrials placed it here millions of years ago as a signpost: “Gateway to the Stars — Free Anal Probes to the First 10,000 customers.”

It’s easy to see how mankind has marvelled at it since the Bering Land Bridge first allowed humans to cross into North America. It’s held special significance to Native Americans for hundreds of years. The Cheyenne, the Arapaho, the Lakota Sioux, the Eastern Shoshone, and many other plains tribes revered the spot, and gave it names such as “Bear’s Lodge”, “Tree Rock”, and “Mythic Owl Mountain”. To this day, their descendants return to Bear Lodge for ceremonies and to tie prayer offerings to the trees.

Later, when European settlers and their descendents crisscrossed the west looking for furs, or gold, or a path to the Pacific, they gave it the dramatic name “Devils Tower”, and eventually the greatest environmental president, Teddy Roosevelt, signed the law protecting it as America’s first National Monument. How could you not?? To this day, I have yet to see a natural wonder of such singular, unique stature in the United States.

Nowadays, people think of Devils Tower and think of Spielberg’s film, and I guess that’s OK too. A nation’s culture is defined by its arts, and in America’s case, our arts is really defined by our films. So I’m cool with the fact that this great wonder of nature has been immortalized by a blockbuster movie and not by the simple fact that it’s so fascinating.

Of course, some people can’t separate film from reality: when I came back to tell folks of my visit, a lot of people asked “did you see any aliens when you were there?” Um, well, no, that was a movie. But I did dream up a sequel to Close Encounters called Close Encounters: The Return, wherein the extraterrestrials come back to Earth and return Richard Dreyfuss. “Please, take him back. His liberal politics and sappy, pedantic movies are ruining our culture!”

I don’t see that appealing to any 12-year-old kids.

[All photos, except the Close Encouters poster, are mine and thusly copyrighted. Please do not use without my permission. More of my Devils Tower pics are here.]

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Links:

Devils Tower National Monument

Close Encounters of the Third Kind on IMDB

Lakota Archives: Bear Mountain

Google map to Devils Tower

Recommendation: Grizzly Man

I meant to post this immediately after my Denali posts, but forgot. Life kinda gets in the way of blogging, ya know? Anyway, Grizzly Man is a film, by noted director Werner Herzog, about Timothy Treadwell, a surfer-turned-actor-turned-grizzly activist who decided to spend several summers living amongst bears in Alaska, to “bring awareness to their plight”.

This recommendation dovetails not only into Denali, but also into my Chiricahua post. That post was about man’s stupidity (specifically my own stupidity) in the face of nature. That post and this film tell a valuable story: nature is not to be trifled with. It doesn’t care who you are, or what you do, or how “in tune” you think you are with it: when nature needs you to be food, you will become food, regardless of how high-minded you think you are or how many trees you hug.

So here’s the spoiler: Treadwell eventually gets eaten. Well, it’s not that big of a spoiler really, it’s pretty much said right up front this story is a tragedy. What makes this film so compelling is you see what’s coming, the ending is so patently obvious, yet Treadwell plods right along to that ending, making bad decision after bad decision, all leading up to a certain, gruesome fate. I won’t spoil it any more, it does have to be seen to be believed.

Some watch Grizzly Man and feel sadness for a poor, kindhearted soul who only wanted to do the best for the poor bears and paid the ultimate price. I see this as the story of an egotistical idiot who, like Steve Irwin, though nature was his playground, mealticket, and the means to inflate his own arrogant self-worth. In his case, like Irwin’s, nature turned its mighty claw and gave him a swipe.

Just to remind him, and us, who’s boss, I suppose.