Union Pacific | Andrea Downing

Tag Archives: Union Pacific

LOSING THE WEIGHT OF WORDS

Posted on March 4, 2013 | 16 comments

This past Christmas my daughter, knowing her mother’s fanaticism about owning anything to do with the Old West, bought me something that was within her budget and definitely within my scope of interest. It is a wood engraved illustration from Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, March 30^th, 1872. It depicts ‘Wyoming Territory—A Passenger Train of the Union Pacific Railroad in a Snow-Drift, Near Wyoming Station’ from a sketch by C. B. Savage. While the illustration is soon to be framed and find a place on my wall, I was also fascinated by the accompanying news article, which uses a language not often employed in modern journalism. “The actual troubles of east-bound Continue reading →

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Posted in Writing and Literature

Tagged English language and usage, Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper, Godey's Lady's Book, Peterson's Magazine, The London Opinion, Union Pacific, Wyoming

Moreton Frewen / Mortal Ruin

Courtesy of Moreton Frewen Collection, American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming

I first learned of Moreton Frewen when reading Elisabeth Kehoe’s book, Fortune’s Daughters: the Extravagant Lives of the Jerome Sisters (Grove Atlantic, Ltd., 2004). Frewen, born 1853, a younger son of a wealthy and well-connected Sussex squire,
was not originally considered suitable for oldest of the Jerome sisters, Clara, who had been brought up in Paris, virtually in the Court of Louis Napoleon. He could not expect much of an inheritance as the extensive properties held by the squire were entailed under primogeniture. Moreton, as a gentleman by birth, would normally be expected to enter the clergy, the Services or politics. Continue reading →