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X
Bibliographic Information
Author
Auden, Wystan Hugh
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
W. H. Auden Poems
Publisher
Faber and Faber
Year of Publication
1930
Pages
65-68
Additional information
-
Get there if you can and see the land you once were proud to own
Though the roads have almost vanished and the expresses never run:
nostalgia road
Smokeless chimneys, damaged bridges, rotting wharves and choked canals,
Tramlines buckled, smashed trucks lying on their side across the rails;
infrastructure bridge truck
Power-stations locked, deserted, since they drew the boiler fires;
Pylons fallen or subsiding, trailing dead high-tension wires;
infrastructure
Head-gears gaunt on grass-grown pit-banks, seams abandoned years ago;
Drop a stone and listen for its splash in flooded dark below.
Squeeze into the works through broken windows or through damp-sprung doors;
See the rotted shafting, see holes gaping in the upper floors;
Where the Sunday lads come talking motor bicycle and girl,
Smoking cigarettes in chains until their heads are in a whirl.
motorcycle
Far from there we spent the money, thinking we could well afford,
While they quietly undersold us with their cheaper trade abroad;
At the theatre, playing tennis, driving motor cars we had,
In our continental villas, mixing cocktails for a cad.
driving
These were boon companions who devised the legends for our tombs,
These who have betrayed us nicely while we took them to our rooms.
Newman, Ciddy, Plato, Fronny, Pascal, Bowdler, Baudelaire,
Doctor Frommer, Mrs Allom, Freud, the Baron, and Flaubert.
Lured with their compelling logic, charmed with beauty of their verse,
With their loaded sideboards whispered ‘Better join us, life is worse.’
Taught us at the annual camps arranged by the big business men
‘Sunbathe, pretty till you’re twenty. You shall be our servants then.’
Perfect pater. Marvellous mater. Knock the critic down who dares —
Very well, believe it, copy; till your hair is white as theirs.
Yours you say were parents to avoid, avoid then if you please
Do the reverse on all occasion till you catch the same disease.
When we asked the way to Heaven, these directed us ahead
To the padded room, the clinic and the hangman’s little shed.
Intimate as war-time prisoners in an isolation camp,
Living month by month together, nervy, famished, lousy, damp.
On the sopping esplanade or from our dingy lodgings we
Stare out dully at the rain which falls for miles into the sea.
Lawrence, Blake and Homer Lane, once healers in our English land;
These are dead as iron for ever; these can never hold our hand.
Lawrence was brought down by smut-hounds, Blake went dotty as he sang,
Homer Lane was killed in action by the Twickenham Baptist gang.
Have things gone too far already? Are we done for? Must we wait
Hearing doom’s approaching footsteps regular down miles of straight;
Run the whole night through in gumboots, stumble on and gasp for breath,
Terrors drawing close and closer, winter landscape, fox’s death;
Or, in friendly fireside circle, sit and listen for the crash
Meaning that the mob has realized something’s up, and start to smash;
Engine-drivers with their oil-cans, factory girls in overalls
Blowing sky-high monster stores, destroying intellectuals?
resources oil engine driver sky pollution metaphor
Hope and fear are neck and neck: which is it near the course’s end
Crashes, having lost his nerve; is overtaken on the bend?
crash
Shut up talking, charming in the best suits to be had in town,
Lecturing on navigation while the ship is going down.
Drop those priggish ways for ever, stop behaving like a stone:
Throw the bath-chairs right away, and learn to leave ourselves alone.
If we really want to live, we’d better start at once to try;
If we don’t, it doesn’t matter, but we’d better start to die.
W
Bibliographic Information
Author
Sandburg, Carl
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
Chicago Poems
Publisher
Henry Holt and Company
Year of Publication
1916
Pages
96
Additional information
-
In the old wars drum of hoofs and the beat of shod feet.
In the new wars hum of motors and the tread of rubber tires.
In the wars to come silent wheels and whirr of rods not yet dreamed out in the heads of men.
car car part engine risk sound technology
In the old wars clutches of short swords and jabs into faces with spears.
In the new wars long range guns and smashed walls, guns running a spit of metal and men falling in tens and twenties.
In the wars to come new silent deaths, new silent hurlers not yet dreamed out in the heads of men.
In the old wars kings quarreling and thousands of men following.
In the new wars kings quarreling and millions of men following.
In the wars to come kings kicked under the dust and millions of men following great causes not yet dreamed out in the heads of men. +
T
Bibliographic Information
Author
Crane, Hart
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
The Collected Poems of Hart Crane
Publisher
Liveright Publishing Corporation
Year of Publication
1933
Pages
31-39
Additional information
-
animal East
The seas all crossed,
weathered the capes, the voyage done...
—WALT WHITMAN
Imponderable the dinosaur
sinks slow,
the mammoth saurian
ghoul, the eastern
Cape..
animal East
While rises in the west the coastwise range,
slowly the hushed land—
Combustion at the astral core—the dorsal change
Of energy—convulsive shift of sand...
But we, who round the capes, the promontories
Where strange tongues vary messages of surf
Below grey citadels, repeating to the stars
The ancient names—return home to our own
Hearths, there to eat an apple and recall
The songs that gypsies dealt us at Marseille
Or how the priests walked—slowly through Bombay—
Or to read you, Walt,—knowing us in thrall
West engine metaphor coast intertext
To that deep wonderment, our native clay
Whose depth of red, eternal flesh of Pocahontus—
Those continental folded aeons, surcharged
With sweetness below derricks, chimneys, tunnels—
Is veined by all that time has really pledged us...
And from above, thin squeaks of radio static,
The captured fume of space foams in our ears—
What whisperings of far watches on the main
Relapsing into silence, while time clears
Our lenses, lifts a focus, resurrects
A periscope to glimpse what joys or pain
Our eyes can share or answer—then deflects
Us, shunting to a labyrinth submersed
Where each sees only his dim past reversed...
Native American infrastructure oil technology sound
But that star-glistered salver of infinity,
The circle, blind crucible of endless space,
Is sliced by motion,—subjugated never.
Adam and Adam's answer in the forest
Left Hesperus mirrored in the lucid pool.
Now the eagle dominates our days, is jurist
Of the ambiguous cloud. We know the strident rule
Of wings imperious... Space, instantaneous,
Flickers a moment, consumes us in its smile:
A flash over the horizon—shifting gears—
And we have laughter, or more sudden tears.
Dream cancels dream in this new realm of fact
From which we wake into the dream of act;
Seeing himself an atom in a shroud—
Man hears himself an engine in a cloud!
night animal car part stars engine metaphor driving
"—Recorders ages hence"—ah, syllables of faith!
Walt, tell me, Walt Whitman, if infinity
Be still the same as when you walked the beach
Near Paumanok—your lone patrol—and heard the wraith
Through surf, its bird note there a long time falling...
For you, the panoramas and this breed of towers,
Of you—the theme that's statured in the cliff,
O Saunterer on free ways still ahead!
Not this our empire yet, but labyrinth
Wherein your eyes, like the Great Navigator's without ship,
Gleam from the great stones of each prison crypt
Of canyoned traffic... Confronting the Exchange,
Surviving in a world of stocks,—they also range
Across the hills where second timber strays
Back over Connecticut farms, abandoned pastures,—
Sea eyes and tidal, undenying, bright with myth!
intertext traffic metaphor agriculture animal
The nasal whine of power whips a new universe...
Where spouting pillars spoor the evening sky,
Under the looming stacks of the gigantic power house
Stars prick the eyes with sharp ammoniac proverbs,
New verities, new inklings in the velvet hummed
Of dynamos, where hearing's leash is strummed...
Power's script,—wound, bobbin-bound, refined—
Is stropped to the slap of belts on booming spools, spurred
Into the bulging bouillon, harnessed jelly of the stars.
Towards what? The forked crash of split thunder parts
Our hearing momentwise; but fast in whirling armatures,
As bright as frogs' eyes, giggling in the girth
Of steely gizzards—axle-bound, confined
In coiled precision, bunched in mutual glee
The bearings glint,—O murmurless and shined
In oilrinsed circles of blind ecstasy!
sound pollution infrastructure oil car part thunder animal
Stars scribble on our eyes the frosty sagas,
The gleaming cantos of unvanquished space...
O sinewy silver biplane, nudging the wind's withers!
There, from Kill Devils Hill at Kitty Hawk
Two brothers in their twinship left the dune;
Warping the gale, the Wright windwrestlers veered
Capeward, then blading the wind's flank, banked and spun
What ciphers risen from prophetic script,
What marathons new-set between the stars!
The soul, by naphtha fledged into new reaches
Already knows the closer clasp of Mars,—
New latitudes, unknotting, soon give place
To what fierce schedules, rife of doom apace!
night stars wind speed plane
Behold the dragon's covey—amphibian, ubiquitous
To hedge the seaboard, wrap the headland, ride
The blue's cloud-templed districts unto ether...
While Iliads glimmer through eyes raised in pride
Hell's belt springs wider into heaven's plumed side.
O bright circumferences, heights employed to fly
War's fiery kennel masked in downy offings,—
This tournament of space, the threshed and chiselled height,
Is baited by marauding circles, bludgeon flail
Of rancorous grenades whose screaming petals carve us
Wounds that we wrap with theorems sharp as hail!
intertext
Wheeled swiftly, wings emerge from larval-silver hangars.
Taut motors surge, space-gnawing, into flight;
Through sparkling visibility, outspread, unsleeping,
Wings clip the last peripheries of light...
Tellurian wind-sleuths on dawn patrol,
Each plane a hurtling javelin of winged ordnance,
Bristle the heights above a screeching gale to hover;
Surely no eye that Sunward Escadrille can cover!
There, meaningful, fledged as the Pleiades
With razor sheen they zoom each rapid helix!
Up-chartered choristers of their own speeding
They, cavalcade on escapade, shear Cumulus—
Lay siege and hurdle Cirrus down the skies!
While Cetus-like, O thou Dirigible, enormous Lounger
Of pendulous auroral beaches,—satellited wide
By convoy planes, moonferrets that rejoin thee
On fleeing balconies as thou dost glide,
—Hast splintered space!
metaphor car speed visibility driving wind car part weapon intertext technology
Low, shadowed of the Cape,
Regard the moving turrets! From grey decks
See scouting griffons rise through gaseous crepe
Hung low... until a conch of thunder answers
Cloud-belfries, banging, while searchlights, like fencers,
Slit the sky's pancreas of foaming anthracite
Toward thee, O Corsair of the typhoon,—pilot, hear!
Thine eyes bicarbonated white by speed, O Skygak, see
How from thy path above the levin's lance
Thou sowest doom thou hast nor time nor chance
To reckon—as thy stilly eyes partake
What alcohol of space...! Remember, Falcon-Ace,
Thou hast there in thy wrist a Sanskrit charge
To conjugate infinity's dim marge—
Anew...!
plane
But first, here at this height receive
The benediction of the shell's deep, sure reprieve!
Lead-perforated fuselage, escutcheoned wings
Lift agonized quittance, tilting from the invisible brink
Now eagle-bright, now
quarry-hid, twist-
-ing, sink with
Enormous repercussive list-
-ings down
Giddily spiralled
gauntlets, upturned, unlooping
In guerrilla sleights, trapped in combustion gyr-
Ing, dance the curdled depth
down whizzing
Zodiacs, dashed
(now nearing fast the Cape!)
down gravitation's
vortex into crashed
...dispersion...into mashed and shapeless débris....
By Hatteras bunched the beached heap of high bravery!
plane
*
The stars have grooved our eyes with old persuasions
Of love and hatred, birth,—surcease of nations...
But who has held the heights more sure than thou,
O Walt!—Ascensions of thee hover in me now
As thou at junctions elegiac, there, of speed
With vast eternity, dost wield the rebound seed!
The competent loam, the probable grass,—travail
Of tides awash the pedestal of Everest, fail
Not less than thou in pure impulse inbred
To answer deepest soundings! O, upward from the dead
Thou bringest tally, and a pact, new bound,
Of living brotherhood!
intertext
Thou, there beyond—
Glacial sierras and the flight of ravens,
Hermetically past condor zones, through zenith havens
Past where the albatross has offered up
His last wing-pulse, and downcast as a cup
That's drained, is shivered back to earth—thy wand
Has beat a song, O Walt,—there and beyond!
And this, thine other hand, upon my heart
Is plummet ushered of those tears that start
What memories of vigils, bloody, by that Cape,—
Ghoul-mound of man's perversity at balk
And fraternal massacre! Thou, pallid there as chalk,
Hast kept of wounds, O Mourner, all that sum
That then from Appomattox stretched to Somme!
Cowslip and shad-blow, flaked like tethered foam
Around bared teeth of stallions, bloomed that spring
When first I read thy lines, rife as the loam
Of prairies, yet like breakers cliffward leaping!
O, early following thee, I searched the hill
Blue-writ and odor-firm with violets, 'til
With June the mountain laurel broke through green
And filled the forest with what clustrous sheen!
Potomac lilies, — then the Pontiac rose,
And Klondike edelweiss of occult snows!
White banks of moonlight came descending valleys—
How speechful on oak-vizored palisades,
As vibrantly I following down Sequoia alleys
Heard thunder's eloquence through green arcades
Set trumpets breathing in each clump and grass tuft—'til
Gold autumn, captured, crowned the trembling hill!
Panis Angelicus! Eyes tranquil with the blaze
Of love's own diametric gaze, of love's amaze!
Not greatest, thou,—not first, nor last,—but near
And onward yielding past my utmost year.
Familiar, thou, as mendicants in public places;
Evasive—too—as dayspring's spreading arc to trace is:—
Our Meistersinger, thou set breath in steel;
And it was thou who on the boldest heel
Stood up and flung the span on even wing
Of that great Bridge, our Myth, whereof I sing!
Years of the Modern! Propulsions toward what capes?
But thou, Panis Angelicus, hast thou not seen
And passed that Barrier that none escapes—
But knows it leastwise as death-strife?—O, something green,
Beyond all sesames of science was thy choice
Wherewith to bind us throbbing with one voice,
New integers of Roman, Viking, Celt—
Thou, Vedic Caesar, to the greensward knelt!
And now, as launched in abysmal cupolas of space,
Toward endless terminals, Easters of speeding light—
Vast engines outward veering with seraphic grace
On clarion cylinders pass out of sight
To course that span of consciousness thou'st named
The Open Road—thy vision is reclaimed!
What heritage thou'st signalled to our hands!
infrastructure road engine car part vision
And see! the rainbow's arch—how shimmeringly stands
Above the Cape's ghoul-mound, O joyous seer!
Recorders ages hence, yes, they shall hear
In their own veins uncancelled thy sure tread
And read thee by the aureole 'round thy head
Of pasture-shine, Panis Angelicus!
Yes, Walt,
Afoot again, and onward without halt,—
Not soon, nor suddenly,—No, never to let go
My hand
in yours,
Walt Whitman—
so—
road rainbow intertext
B
Bibliographic Information
Author
Hughes, Langston
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes
Publisher
Vintage Classics
Year of Publication
pre 1930
Pages
120
Additional information
-
Albert!
Hey, Albert!
Don't you play in dat road.
You see dem trucks
A-goin' by.
One run ovah you
An' you die.
Albert, don't you play in dat road.
road car truck accident death risk traffic +
F
Bibliographic Information
Author
Auden, Wystan Hugh
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
-
Publisher
-
Year of Publication
1928
Pages
39
Additional information
-
From the very first coming down
Into a new valley with a frown
Because of the sun and a lost way,
You certainly remain: to-day
I, crouching behind a sheep-pen, heard
Travel across a sudden bird,
Cry out against the storm, and found
The year’s arc a completed round
And love’s worn circuit re-begun,
Endless with no dissenting turn.
Shall see, shall pass, as we have seen
The swallow on the tile, spring’s green
Preliminary shiver, passed
A solitary truck, the last
Of shunting in the Autumn. But now
To interrupt the homely brow,
Thought warmed to evening through and through
Your letter comes, speaking as you,
Speaking of much but not to come.
road animal storm season other mobilities car affect metaphor
Nor speech is close nor fingers numb,
If love not seldom has received
An unjust answer, was deceived.
I, decent with the seasons, move
Different or with a different love,
Nor question overmuch the nod,
The stone smile of this country god
That never was more reticent,
Always afraid to say more than it meant. +
C
Bibliographic Information
Author
Crane, Hart
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
The Collected Poems of Hart Crane
Publisher
-
Year of Publication
1926
Pages
73-74
Additional information
-
We make our meek adjustments,
Contented with such random consolations
As the wind deposits
In slithered and too ample pockets.
For we can still love the world, who find
A famished kitten on the step, and know
Recesses for it from the fury of the street,
Or warm torn elbow coverts.
town urban animal street traffic risk anthropomorphism
We will sidestep, and to the final smirk
Dally the doom of that inevitable thumb
That slowly chafes its puckered index toward us,
Facing the dull squint with what innocence
And what surprise!
And yet these fine collapses are not lies
More than the pirouettes of any pliant cane;
Our obsequies are, in a way, no enterprise.
We can evade you, and all else but the heart:
What blame to us if the heart live on.
The game enforces smirks; but we have seen
The moon in lonely alleys make
A grail of laughter of an empty ash can,
And through all sound of gaiety and quest
Have heard a kitten in the wilderness. +
O
Bibliographic Information
Author
Murphy, Thomas D.
Genre
Non-Fiction
Journal or Book
On Sunset Highways
Publisher
-
Year of Publication
1921
Pages
1-18
Additional information
-
construction infrastructure West
I. A Motor Paradise [ edit | edit source ]
(1-18)
California! The very name had a strange fascination for me ere I set foot on the soil of the Golden State. Its romantic story and the enthusiasm of those who had made the (to me) wonderful journey to the favored country by the great ocean of the West had interested and delighted me as a child, though I thought of it then as some dim, far-away El Dorado that lay on the borders of fairyland. My first visit was not under circumstances tending to dissolve the spell, for it was on my wedding trip that I first saw the land of palms and flowers, orange groves, snowy mountains, sunny beaches, and blue seas, and I found little to dispel the rosy dreams I had preconceived. This was long enough ago to bring a great proportion of the growth and progress of the state within the scope of my own experience. We saw Los Angeles, then an aspiring town of forty thousand, giving promise of the truly metropolitan city it has since become; Pasadena was a straggling village; and around the two towns were wide areas of open country now teeming with ambitious suburbs. We visited never-to-be-forgotten Del Monte and saw the old San Francisco ere fire and quake had swept away its most distinctive and romantic features—the Nob Hill palaces and old-time Chinatown.
Some years intervened between this and our second visit, when we found the City of the Angels a thriving metropolis with hundreds of palatial structures and the most perfect system of interurban transportation to be found anywhere, while its northern rival had risen from debris and ashes in serried ranks of concrete and steel. A tour of the Yosemite gave us new ideas of California's scenic grandeur; there began to dawn on us vistas of the endless possibilities that the Golden State offers to the tourist and we resolved on a longer sojourn at the first favorable opportunity.
city infrastructure urban
A week's stay in Los Angeles and a free use of the Pacific Electric gave us a fair idea of the city and its lesser neighbors, but we found ourselves longing for the country roads and retired nooks of mountain and beach inaccessible by railway train and tram car. We felt we should never be satisfied until we had explored this wonderland by motor—which the experience of three long tours in Europe had proved to us the only way to really see much of a country in the limits of a summer vacation.
affect car driving mountain nostalgia road
And so it chanced that a year or two later we found ourselves on the streets of Los Angeles with our trusty friend of the winged wheels, intent on exploring the nooks and corners of Sunset Land. We wondered why we had been so long in coming—why we had taken our car three times to Europe before we brought it to California; and the marvel grew on us as we passed out of the streets of the city on to the perfect boulevard that led through green fields to the western Venice by the sea. It is of the experience of the several succeeding weeks and of a like tour during the two following years that this unpretentious chronicle has to deal. And my excuse for inditing it must be that it is first of all a chronicle of a motor car; for while books galore have been written on California by railroad and horseback travelers as well as by those who pursued the leisurely and good old method of the Franciscan fathers, no one, so far as I know, has written of an extended experience at the steering wheel of our modern annihilator of distance.
car city coast infrastructure road road condition scenery urban
It seems a little strange, too, for Southern California is easily the motorist’s paradise over all other places on this mundane sphere. It has more cars to the population—twice over—and they are in use a greater portion of the year than in any other section of similar size in the world and probably more outside cars are to be seen on its streets and highways than in any other locality in the United States. The matchless climate and the ever-increasing mileage of fine roads, with the endless array of places worth visiting, insure the maximum of service and pleasure to the fortunate owner of a car, regardless of its name-plate or pedigree. The climate needs no encomiums from me, for is it not heralded and descanted upon by all true Californians and by every wayfarer, be his sojourn ever so brief?—but a few words on the wonders already achieved in roadbuilding and the vast plans for the immediate future will surely be of interest. I am conscious that any data concerning the progress of California are liable to become obsolete overnight, as it were, but if I were to confine myself to the unchanging in this vast commonwealth, there would be little but the sea and the mountains to write about.
car construction highway infrastructure road Southwest sublime traffic
Los Angeles County was the leader in good roads construction and at the time of which I write had completed about three hundred and fifty miles of modern highway at a cost of nearly five million dollars. I know of nothing in Europe superior—and very little equal—to the splendid system of macadam boulevards that radiate from the Queen City of the Southwest. The asphalted surface is smooth and dustless and the skill of the engineer is everywhere evident. There are no heavy grades; straight lines or long sweeping curves prevail throughout. Added to this is a considerable mileage of privately constructed road built by land improvement companies to promote various tracts about the city, one concern alone having spent more than half a million dollars in this work. Further additions are projected by the county and an excellent maintenance plan has been devised, for the authorities have wisely recognized that the upkeep of these splendid roads is a problem equal in importance with building them. This, however, is not so serious a matter as in the East, owing to the absence of frost, the great enemy of roads of this type.
asphalt construction infrastructure road road condition risk Southwest urban
Since the foregoing paragraph was first published (1915) the good work has gone steadily on and despite the sharp check that the World War administered to public enterprises, Los Angeles County has materially added to and improved her already extensive mileage of modern roads. A new boulevard connects the beach towns between Redondo and Venice; a marvelous scenic road replaces the old-time trail in Topango Canyon and the new Hollywood Mountain Road is one of the most notable achievements of highway engineering in all California. Many new laterals have been completed in the level section about Downey and Artesia and numerous boulevards opened in the foothill region. Besides all this the main highways have been improved and in some cases—as of Long Beach Boulevard—entirely rebuilt. In the city itself there has been vast improvement and extension of the streets and boulevards so that more than ever this favored section deserves to be termed the paradise of the motorist.
city construction highway infrastructure pleasure road road condition
San Diego County has set a like example in this good work, having expended a million and a half on her highways and authorized a bond issue of two and one-half millions more, none of which has been as yet expended. While the highways of this county do not equal the model excellence of those of Los Angeles County, the foundation of a splendid system has been laid. Here the engineering problem was a more serious one, for there is little but rugged hills within the boundaries of the county. Other counties are in various stages of highway building; still others have bond issues under consideration—and it is safe to say that when this book comes from the press there will not be a county in Southern California that has not begun permanent road improvement on its own account.
highway infrastructure road condition
I say “on its own account” because whatever it may do of its own motion, nearly every county in the state is assured of considerable mileage of the new state highway system, now partially completed, while the remainder is under construction or located and surveyed. The first bond issue of eighteen million dollars was authorized by the state several years ago, a second issue of fifteen millions was voted in 1916, and another of forty millions a year later, making in all seventy-three millions, of which, at this writing, thirty-nine millions is unexpended. Counties have issued about forty-two millions more. It is estimated that to complete the full highway program the state must raise one hundred millions additional by bond issues.
construction highway infrastructure law
The completed system contemplates two great trunk lines from San Diego to the Oregon border, one route roughly following the coast and the other well inland, while lateral branches are to connect all county seats not directly reached. Branches will also extend to the Imperial Valley and along the Eastern Sierras as far as Independence and in time across the Cajon Pass through the Mohave Desert to Needles on the Colorado River. California's wealth of materials (granite, sand, limestone, and asphaltum) and their accessibility should give the maximum mileage for money expended. This was estimated by a veteran Pittsburgh highway contractor whom I chanced to meet in the Yosemite, at fully twice as great as could be built in his locality for the same expenditure.
desert law mountain reasources road
California was a pioneer in improved roads and it is not strange that mistakes were made in some of the earlier work, chiefly in building roadways too narrow and too light to stand the constantly increasing heavy traffic. The Automobile Club of Southern California, in conjunction with the State Automobile Association, recently made an exhaustive investigation and report of existing highway conditions which should do much to prevent repetition of mistakes in roads still to be built. The State Highway Commission, while admitting that some of the earlier highways might better have been built heavier and wider, points out that this would have cut the mileage at least half; and also that at the time these roads were contracted for, the extent that heavy trucking would assume was not fully realized. Work on new roads was generally suspended during the war and is still delayed by high costs and the difficulty of selling bonds.
construction highway infrastructure road road condition traffic
At this writing (1921) the two trunk lines from San Diego to San Francisco are practically completed and the motorist between these points, whether on coast or inland route, may pursue the even tenor of his way over the smooth, dustless, asphalted surface at whatever speed he may consider prudent, though the limit of thirty-five miles now allowed in the open country under certain restrictions leaves little excuse for excessive speeding. It is not uncommon to make the trip over the inland route, about six hundred and fifty miles, in three days, while a day longer should be allowed for the coast run.
asphalt driver driving highway law road condition speed
In parts where the following narrative covers our tours made before much of the new road was finished, I shall not alter my descriptions and they will afford the reader an opportunity of comparing the present improved highways with conditions that existed only yesterday, as it were.
Road improvement has been active in the northern counties for several years, especially around San Francisco. I have gone into the details concerning this section in my book on Oregon and Northern California, and will not repeat the matter here, since the scope of this work must be largely confined to the south. It is no exaggeration, however, to say that to-day California is unsurpassed by any other state in mileage and excellence of improved roads and when the projects under way are carried out she will easily take first rank in these important particulars unless more competition develops than is now apparent. Thus she supplies the first requisite for the motor enthusiast, though some may declare her matchless climate of equal advantage to the tourist.
construction road condition
If the motor enthusiast of the Golden State can take no credit to himself for the climate, he is surely entitled to no end of credit for the advanced state of affairs in public highway improvement. In proportion to the population he is more numerous in Southern California than anywhere else in the world, and we might therefore expect to find a strong and effective organization of motorists in Los Angeles. In this we are not disappointed, for the Automobile Club of Southern California has a membership of more than fifty thousand; it was but seven thousand when the first edition of this book was printed in 1915—a growth which speaks volumes for its strides in public appreciation. Its territory comprises only half a single state, yet its membership surpasses that of its nearest rival by more than two to one. It makes no pretense at being a “‘social’’ club, all its energies being devoted to promoting the welfare and interests of the motorist in its field of action, and so important and far-reaching are its activities that the benefits it confers on the car owners of Southern California are by no means limited to the membership. Practically every owner and driver of a car is indebted to the club in more ways than I can enumerate and as this fact has gained recognition the membership has increased by leaps and bounds. I remember when the sense of obligation to become a member was forced upon me by the road signs which served me almost hourly when touring and this is perhaps the feature of the club’s work which first impresses the newcomer. Everywhere in the southern half of California and even on a transcontinental highway the familiar white diamond-shaped signboard greets one’s sight—often a friend in need, saving time and annoyance. The maps prepared and supplied by the club were even a greater necessity and this service has been amplified and extended until it not only covers every detail of the highways and byways of California, but also includes the main roads of adjacent states and one transcontinental route as well. These maps are frequently revised and up-to-the-minute road information may always be had by application to the Touring Department of the club.
highway infrastructue map navigation road traffic sign
When we planned our first tour, at a time when road conditions were vastly different from what they are now, our first move was to seek the assistance of this club, which was readily given as a courtesy to a visiting motorist. The desired information was freely and cheerfully supplied, but I could not help feeling, after experiencing so many benefits from the work of the club, that I was under obligations to become a member. And I am sure that even the transient motorist, though he plans a tour of but a few weeks, will be well repaid—and have a clearer conscience—should his first move be to take membership in this live organization.
We found the club an unerring source of information as to the most practicable route to take on a proposed tour, the best way out of the city, and the general condition of the roads to be covered. The club is also an authority on hotels, garages and “objects of interest’’ generally in the territory covered by its activities. Besides the main organization, which occupies its own building at Adams and Figueroa Streets, Los Angeles, there are numerous branch offices in the principal towns of the counties of Southern California, which in their localities can fulfill most of the functions of the club.
The club maintains a department of free legal advice and its membership card is generally sufficient bail for members charged with violating the speed or traffic regulations. It is always willing to back its members to the limit when the presumption of being right is in their favor, but it has no sympathy with the reckless joy rider and lawbreaker and does all it can to discourage such practices. It has been a powerful influence in obtaining sane and practical motor car legislation, such as raising the speed limit in the open country to thirty-five miles per hour, and providing severer penalties against theft of motor cars. One of the most valuable services of the club has been its relentless pursuit and prosecution of motor car thieves and the recovery of a large percentage of stolen cars. In fact, Los Angeles stands at the head of the large cities of the country in a minimum of net losses of cars by theft and the club can justly claim credit for this. The club has also done much to abate the former scandalous practices of many towns in fixing a very low speed limit with a view of helping out local finances by collecting heavy fines. This is now regulated by state laws and the motorist who is willing to play fair with the public will not suffer much annoyance. The efforts of the club to eliminate what it considers double taxation of its members who must pay both a horse power fee and a heavy property tax were not successful, but the California motorist has the consolation of knowing that all taxes, fines and fees affecting the motor car go to the good cause of road maintenance.
accident car driver law risk speed
Another important service rendered by the club is the insurance of its members against all the hazards connected with operation of an automobile. Fire, theft, liability, collision, etc., are written practically at cost. The club also maintains patrol and trouble cars which respond free of cost to members in difficulty.
law risk
Besides all this, the club deserves much credit for the advanced position of California in highway improvement. It has done much to create the public sentiment which made the bond issues possible and it has rendered valuable assistance in surveying and building the new roads. It has kept in constant touch with the State Highway Commission and its superior knowledge of the best and shortest routes has been of great service in locating the new state roads.
My story is to deal with several sojourns in the Sunset State during the months of April and May of consecutive years. We shipped our car by rail in care of a Los Angeles garage and so many follow this practice that the local agents are prepared to receive and properly care for the particular machines which they represent and several freight-for-warding companies also make a specialty of this service. On our arrival our car was ready for the road and it proved extremely serviceable in getting us located. Los Angeles is the logical center from which to explore the southern half of the state and we were fortunate in securing a furnished house in a good part of the city without much delay. We found a fair percentage of the Los Angeles population ready to move out on short notice and to turn over to us their homes and everything in them—for a consideration, of course.
car garage train
On our second sojourn in the city we varied things by renting furnished apartments, of which there are an endless number and variety to choose from, and if this plan did not prove quite so satisfactory and comfortable as the house, it was less expensive. We also had experience on several later occasions with numerous hotels—Los Angeles, as might be expected, is well supplied with hotels of all degrees of merit—but our experience in pre-war days would hardly be representative of the present time, especially when rates are considered. The Alexandria and Angelus were—and doubtless are—up to the usual metropolitan standards of service and comfort, with charges to correspond. The Gates, where we stopped much longer, was a cleanly and comfortable hotel with lower rates and represents a large class of similar establishments such as the Clark, the Stillwell, the Trinity, the Hayward, the Roslyn, the Savoy, and many others. One year we tried the Leighton, which is beautifully located on Westlake Park and typical of several outlying hotels that afford more quiet and greater convenience for parking and handling one’s car than can be found in the business district. Others in this class are the Darby, the Hershey Arms, the Hollywood, and the Alvarado. Los Angeles, for all its preeminence as a tourist city, was long without a resort hotel of the first magnitude, leaving the famous Pasadena hostelries such as the Green, Raymond, Maryland and Huntington, to cater to the class of patrons who do not figure costs in their quest for the luxurious in hotel service. This shortage was supplied in 1920 by the erection of the Ambassador Hotel on Wilshire Boulevard—one of the largest resort hotels in the world. The building is surrounded by spacious grounds and the property is said to represent an investment of $5,000,000. It is one of the “objects of interest’’ in Los Angeles and will be visited by many tourists who may not care to pay the price to become regular guests. After our experience with hotels, apartments and rented houses, we finally acquired a home of our own in the “Queen City of the Southwest,” which, of course, is the most satisfactory plan of all, though not necessarily the cheapest.
city construction infrastructure parking
Prior to the Great War Los Angeles had the reputation of being a place where one could live well at very moderate cost and hotels and restaurants gave the very best for little money. This was all sadly changed in the wave of profiteering during and following the war. The city acquired a rather unenviable reputation for charging the tourist all the traffic would bear—and sometimes a little more—until finally Government statistics ranked Los Angeles number one in the cost of living among cities of its class. The city council undertook to combat the tendency to “grab” by passing an ordinance limiting the percentage of rental an owner might charge on his property—a move naturally contested in the courts. At this writing, however, (1921), the tendency of prices is distinctly downward and this may reasonably be expected to continue until a fair basis is reached. It is not likely, however, that pre-war prices will ever return on many items, but it is certain that Los Angeles will again take rank as a city where one may live permanently or for a time at comparatively moderate cost.
Public utilities of the city never advanced their prices to compare with private interests. You can still ride miles on a street car for a nickel and telephone, gas and electric concerns get only slightly higher rates than before the war. Taxes have advanced by leaps and bounds, but are frequently excused by pointing out that nowhere do you get so much for your tax money as in California.
Naturally, the automobile and allied industries loom large in Los Angeles. Garages from the most palatial and perfectly equipped to the veriest hole-in-the-wall abound in all parts of the town. Prices for service and repairs vary greatly but the level is high—probably one hundred per cent above pre-war figures. Competition, however, is strong and the tendency is downward; but only a general wage lowering can bring back the old-time prices. Gasoline is generally cheaper than in the East, while other supplies cost about the same. The second-hand car business has reached vast proportions, many dealers occupying vacant lots where old cars of all models and degrees brave the sun—and sometimes the rain—while waiting for a purchaser. Cars are sold with agreement to buy back at the end of a tour and are rented without driver to responsible parties. You do not have to bring your own car to enjoy a motor tour in California; in fact this practice is not so common as it used to be except in case of the highest-grade cars.
car garage gasoline infrastructure maintenance
Another plan is to drive your own car from your Eastern home to California and sell it when ready to go back. This was done very satisfactorily during the period of the car shortage and high prices for used cars following the war, but under normal conditions would likely involve considerable sacrifice. The ideal method for the motorist who has the time and patience is to make the round trip to California in his own car, coming, say, over the Lincoln Highway and returning over the Santa Fe Trail or vice versa, according to the time of the year. The latter averages by far the best of the transcontinental roads and is passable for a greater period of the year than any other. In fact, it is an all-year-round route except for the Raton Pass in New Mexico, and this may be avoided by a detour into Texas. This route has been surveyed and signed by the Automobile Club of Southern California and is being steadily improved, especially in the Western states.
driving East highway train
Although California has perhaps the best all-the-year-round climate for motoring, it was our impression that the months of April and May are the most delightful for extensive touring. The winter rains will have ceased—though we found our first April and a recent May notable exceptions—and there is more freedom from the dust that becomes troublesome in some localities later in the summer. The country will be at its best—snow-caps will still linger on the higher mountains; the foothills will be green and often varied with great dashes of color—white, pale yellow, blue, or golden yellow, as some particular wild flower gains the mastery. The orange groves will be laden with golden globes and sweet with blossoms, and the roses and other cultivated flowers will still be in their prime. The air will be balmy and pleasant during the day, with a sharp drop towards evening that makes it advisable to keep a good supply of wraps in the car. An occasional shower will hardly interfere with one’s going, even on the unimproved country road.
driving plant pleasure rain road road condition scenery sublime summer winter
For there is still unimproved country road, despite all I have said in praise of the new highways. A great deal of our touring was over roads seldom good at their best and often quite impassable during the heavy winter rains. There were stretches of “adobe” to remind us of “gumbo” at home; there were miles of heavy sand and there were rough, stone-strewn trails hardly deserving to be called roads at all! These defects are being mended with almost magical rapidity, but California is a vast state and with all her progress it will be years before all her counties attain the Los Angeles standard. We found many primitive bridges and oftener no bridges at all, since in the dry season there is no difficulty in fording the hard-bottom streams, and not infrequently the streams themselves had vanished. But in winter these same streams are often raging torrents that defy crossing for days at a time. During the summer and early autumn months the dust will be deep on unimproved roads and some of the mountain passes will be difficult on this account. So it is easy to see that even California climate does not afford ideal touring conditions the year round. Altogether, the months of April, May, and June afford the best average of roads and weather, despite the occasional showers that one may expect during the earlier part of this period. It is true that during these months a few of the mountain roads will be closed by snow, but one can not have everything his own way, and I believe the beauty of the country and climate at this time will more than offset any enforced omissions. The trip to Yosemite is not practical during this period over existing routes, though it is to be hoped the proposed all-the-year road will be a reality before long. The Lake Tahoe road is seldom open before the middle of June, and this delightful trip can not be taken during the early spring unless the tourist is content with the railway trains.
adobe bridge construction infrastructure mountain rain risk road road condition snow spring summer weather winter
Our several tours in California aggregated more than thirty thousand miles and extended from Tia Juana to the Oregon border. The scope of this volume, however, is confined to the southern half of the state and the greater part of it deals with the section popularly known as Southern California—the eight counties lying south of Tehachapi Pass. Of course we traversed some roads several times, but we visited most of the interesting points of the section—with some pretty strenuous trips, as will appear in due course of my narrative. We climbed many mountains, visited the endless beaches, stopped at the famous hotels, and did not miss a single one of the twenty or more old Spanish missions. We saw the orange groves and palms of Riverside and Redlands, the great oaks of Paso Robles, the queer old cypresses of Monterey, the Torrey Pines of LaJolla, the lemon groves of San Diego, the vast wheatfields of the San Joaquin and Salinas Valleys, the cherry orchards of San Mateo, the great vineyards of the Napa and Santa Rosa Valleys, the lonely beauty of Clear Lake Valley, the giant trees of Santa Cruz, the Yosemite Valley, Tahoe, the gem of mountain lakes, the blossoming desert of Imperial, and a thousand other things that make California an enchanted land. And the upshot of it all was that we fell in love with the Golden State—so much in love with it that what I set down may be tinged with prejudice; but what story of California is free from this amiable defect?
agriculture architecture lake plains mountain road road side scenery Southwest topography tree
A
Bibliographic Information
Author
Frost, Robert
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
-
Publisher
-
Year of Publication
1914
Pages
118-126
Additional information
-
Lancaster bore him—such a little town,
Such a great man. It doesn’t see him often
Of late years, though he keeps the old homestead
And sends the children down there with their mother
To run wild in the summer—a little wild.
Sometimes he joins them for a day or two
And sees old friends he somehow can’t get near.
They meet him in the general store at night,
Preoccupied with formidable mail,
Rifling a printed letter as he talks.
They seem afraid. He wouldn’t have it so:
Though a great scholar, he’s a democrat,
If not at heart, at least on principle.
Lately when coming up to Lancaster
His train being late he missed another train
And had four hours to wait at Woodsville Junction
After eleven o’clock at night. Too tired
To think of sitting such an ordeal out,
He turned to the hotel to find a bed.
town urban train night
“No room,” the night clerk said. “Unless——”
Woodsville’s a place of shrieks and wandering lamps
And cars that shock and rattle—and one hotel.
car night sound
“You say ‘unless.’“
“Unless you wouldn’t mind
Sharing a room with someone else.”
“Who is it?”
“A man.”
“So I should hope. What kind of man?”
“I know him: he’s all right. A man’s a man.
Separate beds of course you understand.”
The night clerk blinked his eyes and dared him on.
“Who’s that man sleeping in the office chair?
Has he had the refusal of my chance?”
“He was afraid of being robbed or murdered.
What do you say?”
“I’ll have to have a bed.”
The night clerk led him up three flights of stairs
And down a narrow passage full of doors,
At the last one of which he knocked and entered.
“Lafe, here’s a fellow wants to share your room.”
“Show him this way. I’m not afraid of him,
I’m not so drunk I can’t take care of myself.”
The night clerk clapped a bedstead on the foot.
“This will be yours. Good-night,” he said, and went.
“Lafe was the name, I think?”
“Yes, Layfayette.
You got it the first time. And yours?”
“Magoon.
Doctor Magoon.”
“A Doctor?”
“Well, a teacher.”
“Professor Square-the-circle-till-you’re-tired?
Hold on, there’s something I don’t think of now
That I had on my mind to ask the first
Man that knew anything I happened in with.
I’ll ask you later—don’t let me forget it.”
The Doctor looked at Lafe and looked away.
A man? A brute. Naked above the waist,
He sat there creased and shining in the light,
Fumbling the buttons in a well-starched shirt.
“I’m moving into a size-larger shirt.
I’ve felt mean lately; mean’s no name for it.
I just found what the matter was to-night:
I’ve been a-choking like a nursery tree
When it outgrows the wire band of its name tag.
I blamed it on the hot spell we’ve been having.
’Twas nothing but my foolish hanging back,
Not liking to own up I’d grown a size.
Number eighteen this is. What size do you wear?”
The Doctor caught his throat convulsively.
“Oh—ah—fourteen—fourteen.”
“Fourteen! You say so!
I can remember when I wore fourteen.
And come to think I must have back at home
More than a hundred collars, size fourteen.
Too bad to waste them all. You ought to have them.
They’re yours and welcome; let me send them to you.
What makes you stand there on one leg like that?
You’re not much furtherer than where Kike left you,
You act as if you wished you hadn’t come.
Sit down or lie down, friend; you make me nervous.”
The Doctor made a subdued dash for it,
And propped himself at bay against a pillow.
“Not that way, with your shoes on Kike’s white bed.
You can’t rest that way. Let me pull your shoes off.”
“Don’t touch me, please—I say, don’t touch me, please.
I’ll not be put to bed by you, my man.”
“Just as you say. Have it your own way then.
‘My man’ is it? You talk like a professor.
Speaking of who’s afraid of who, however,
I’m thinking I have more to lose than you
If anything should happen to be wrong.
Who wants to cut your number fourteen throat!
Let’s have a show down as an evidence
Of good faith. There is ninety dollars.
Come, if you’re not afraid.”
“I’m not afraid.
There’s five: that’s all I carry.”
“I can search you?
Where are you moving over to? Stay still.
You’d better tuck your money under you
And sleep on it the way I always do
When I’m with people I don’t trust at night.”
“Will you believe me if I put it there
Right on the counterpane—that I do trust you?”
“You’d say so, Mister Man.—I’m a collector.
My ninety isn’t mine—you won’t think that.
I pick it up a dollar at a time
All round the country for the Weekly News,
Published in Bow. You know the Weekly News?”
“Known it since I was young.”
“Then you know me.
Now we are getting on together—talking.
I’m sort of Something for it at the front.
My business is to find what people want:
They pay for it, and so they ought to have it.
Fairbanks, he says to me—he’s editor—
Feel out the public sentiment—he says.
A good deal comes on me when all is said.
The only trouble is we disagree
In politics: I’m Vermont Democrat—
You know what that is, sort of double-dyed;
The News has always been Republican.
Fairbanks, he says to me, ‘Help us this year,’
Meaning by us their ticket. ‘No,’ I says,
‘I can’t and won’t. You’ve been in long enough:
It’s time you turned around and boosted us.
You’ll have to pay me more than ten a week
If I’m expected to elect Bill Taft.
I doubt if I could do it anyway.’“
“You seem to shape the paper’s policy.”
“You see I’m in with everybody, know ’em all.
I almost know their farms as well as they do.”
“You drive around? It must be pleasant work.”
driving affect pleasure
“It’s business, but I can’t say it’s not fun.
What I like best’s the lay of different farms,
Coming out on them from a stretch of woods,
Or over a hill or round a sudden corner.
I like to find folks getting out in spring,
Raking the dooryard, working near the house.
Later they get out further in the fields.
Everything’s shut sometimes except the barn;
The family’s all away in some back meadow.
There’s a hay load a-coming—when it comes.
And later still they all get driven in:
The fields are stripped to lawn, the garden patches
Stripped to bare ground, the apple trees
To whips and poles. There’s nobody about.
The chimney, though, keeps up a good brisk smoking.
And I lie back and ride. I take the reins
Only when someone’s coming, and the mare
Stops when she likes: I tell her when to go.
I’ve spoiled Jemima in more ways than one.
She’s got so she turns in at every house
As if she had some sort of curvature,
No matter if I have no errand there.
She thinks I’m sociable. I maybe am.
It’s seldom I get down except for meals, though.
Folks entertain me from the kitchen doorstep,
All in a family row down to the youngest.”
“One would suppose they might not be as glad
To see you as you are to see them.”
“Oh,
Because I want their dollar. I don’t want
Anything they’ve not got. I never dun.
I’m there, and they can pay me if they like.
I go nowhere on purpose: I happen by.
Sorry there is no cup to give you a drink.
I drink out of the bottle—not your style.
Mayn’t I offer you——?”
“No, no, no, thank you.”
“Just as you say. Here’s looking at you then.—
And now I’m leaving you a little while.
You’ll rest easier when I’m gone, perhaps—
Lie down—let yourself go and get some sleep.
But first—let’s see—what was I going to ask you?
Those collars—who shall I address them to,
Suppose you aren’t awake when I come back?”
“Really, friend, I can’t let you. You—may need them.”
“Not till I shrink, when they’ll be out of style.”
“But really I—I have so many collars.”
“I don’t know who I rather would have have them.
They’re only turning yellow where they are.
But you’re the doctor as the saying is.
I’ll put the light out. Don’t you wait for me:
I’ve just begun the night. You get some sleep.
I’ll knock so-fashion and peep round the door
When I come back so you’ll know who it is.
There’s nothing I’m afraid of like scared people.
I don’t want you should shoot me in the head.
What am I doing carrying off this bottle?
There now, you get some sleep.”
He shut the door.
The Doctor slid a little down the pillow.
Bibliographic Information
Author
Oppenheim, James
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
Songs for the New Age
Publisher
The Century Co.
Year of Publication
1914
Pages
7-8
Additional information
-
Why did you hate to be by yourself,
And why were you sick of your own company?
Such the question, and this the answer:
I feared sublimity:
I was a little afraid of God:
Silence and space terrified me, bringing the thought of
what an irritable clod I was and how soon death
would gulp me down...
This fear has reared cities:
The cowards flock together by the millions lest they
should be left alone for a half hour...
With church, theater and school,
With office, mill and motor,
With a thousand cunning devices, and clever calls to
each other,
They escape from themselves to the crowd...
urban car engine technology
Oh, I have loved it all:
Snug rooms, the talk, the pleasant feast, the pictures:
The warm bath of humanity in which I relaxed and
soaked myself:
And never, I hope, shall I be without it—at times...
But now myself calls me...
The skies demand me, though it is but ten in the
morning:
The earth has an appointment with me, not to be
broken...
I must accustom myself to the gaunt face of the Sub-
time...
I must see what I really am, and what I am for,
And what this city is for, and the Earth and the stars
in their hurry...
To turn out typewriters,
To invent a new breakfast food,
To devise a dance that was never danced until now,
To urge a new sanitation, and a swifter automobile—
Have the life-surging heavens no business but this?
car technology +
M
Bibliographic Information
Author
Reynolds, Elsbery Washington
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
AutoLine o'Type
Publisher
The Book Supply Company
Year of Publication
1924
Pages
150-151
Additional information
-
He went to war and gained renown,
In every fight he stood his ground,
Bullets passed him thick and fast,
Not a scratch from first to last.
We now relate this sorry fact,
He’s been a month upon his back,
On both his cheeks he’ll have a scar,
He stepped in front of a motor car.
car risk +
S
Bibliographic Information
Author
Reynolds, Elsbery Washington
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
AutoLine o'Type
Publisher
The Book Supply Company
Year of Publication
1924
Pages
52
Additional information
-
At a certain round-table a good-natured bunch
Of finest of fellows met daily for lunch.
An hour’s interchange of thoughts and ideas,
All would depart each feeling at ease.
They talked of the weather careless and free,
A topic on which they did all agree.
When one would mention the income tax,
It was an occasion to give it some whacks.
Golf came in for a share of discussion,
There’s nothing in golf to cause any fussin’,
If business was good or if it was bad,
They tackled the matter and never got mad.
When they discussed our time parking limit,
All were agreed on keeping within it.
But when they brought up our boulevard stop,
Not one but said it was all tommy-rot.
parking slowness
Around this table without any jars
They freely debated on all motor cars.
They praised or condemned without any heat,
Each claiming his car did all others beat.
car model
Things they discussed to no one was vital,
Subjects were chosen for safety of title
Till they took up a question a million years old
Of vital concern to every one’s soul.
time
Of God each took a different stand,
Divided on Nature, Spirit and Man,
While one did declare God didn’t exist,
The good-natured bunch has since been missed.
religion
On most every subject when men don’t agree,
They smile, shake hands and part cheerfully.
There’s danger in topics of soul and heart,
Talk Six Studebaker and friends you will part.
car model
—The Car with Character.
T
Bibliographic Information
Author
Oppenheim, James
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
Songs for the New Age
Publisher
The Century Co.
Year of Publication
1914
Pages
90-91
Additional information
-
city urban
Where may she of the hall bedroom hold the love-hour?
In what sweet privacy find her soul before the face of the belovéd?
And the kiss that lifts her from the noise of the shop,
And the bitter carelessness of the streets?
Neither is there garden nor secret parlor for her:
And cruel winter has spoiled the shores of the sea;
The benches in the park are laden with melting snow,
And the bedroom forbidden...
But ah, the love of a woman! She will not be cheated!
Up the stoop she went to the vestibule of the house,
And beckoned to me to come to that darkness of doors:
Here in a crevice of the public city the love-hour was spent...
Outside rumbled the cars between drifts of the gas-lit snow,
And the footsteps fell of the wanderers in the night...
Within, the dark house slept...
But we, in our little cave, stood, and saw in the gleaming dark
Shine of each other’s eyes, and the flutter of wisps of hair,
And our words were breathlessly sweet, and our kisses silent...
car sound night snow
Where is there rose-garden,
Where is there balcony among the cedars and pines,
Where is there moonlit clearing in the dumb wilderness,
Enchanted as this doorway, dark in the glare of the city? +
X
Bibliographic Information
Author
Williams, William Carlos
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
Spring and All
Publisher
Frontier Press
Year of Publication
1923
Pages
49-50
Additional information
-
In passing with my mind
on nothing in the world
but the right of way
I enjoyed on the road by
road law
virtue of the law –
I saw
law
an elderly man who
smiled and looked away
to the north past a house –
a woman in blue
who was laughing and
leaning forward to look up
into the man’s half
averted face
and a boy of eight who was
looking at the middle of
the man’s belly
at a watchchain –
The supreme importance
of this nameless spectacle
sped me by them
without a word –
speed
Why bother where I went?
for I went spinning on the
driving
four wheels of my car
along the wet road until
car car part road road condition
I saw a girl with one leg
over the rail of a balcony +
T
Bibliographic Information
Author
Jamison, Roscoe C.
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
Negro Soldiers (“These Truly are the Brave”) and other poems by Roscoe C. Jamison
Publisher
Press of the Gray Printing Company
Year of Publication
1918
Pages
-
Additional information
-
metaphor metaphysics death
Along the Road of Human Life,
So very near, on either side,
With winds and storms and billows rife,
There is a sea that's wide;
And woe to him who trips and falls
Into that darkening tide.
road metaphor affect death
Oh! it is all that Hope can do
To keep lifted our eyes
And day by day our strength renew
With visions and dream-lies;
To lead us by that awful flood
From which no soul may rise.
affect
Despair! Despair! That is the sea
Which ever is at our feet,
Seeks to envelop you and me,
In ruin full, complete,
Cause us to deem this life a curse
And make death's name sound sweet.
affect coast death
Work, Laugh and Love! Thus only can
The trembling spirit hold,
Its journey true across the span
Of years that doth unfold,
Amid earth's barren scenery
Until life's tale is told!
affect scenery +
Bibliographic Information
Author
Sandburg, Carl
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
Chicago Poems
Publisher
Henry Holt and Company
Year of Publication
1916
Pages
99
Additional information
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I shall foot it
Down the roadway in the dusk,
Where shapes of hunger wander
And the fugitives of pain go by.
I shall foot it
In the silence of the morning,
See the night slur into dawn,
Hear the slow great winds arise
Where tall trees flank the way
And shoulder toward the sky.
metaphor pedestrian road sound sky tree wind
The broken boulders by the road
Shall not commemorate my ruin.
Regret shall be the gravel under foot.
I shall watch for
Slim birds swift of wing
That go where wind and ranks of thunder
Drive the wild processionals of rain.
metaphor roadside scenery animal wind rain
The dust of the traveled road
Shall touch my hands and face.
road road condition dust +
F
Bibliographic Information
Author
Hughes, Langston
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
Langston Hughes: Poems
Publisher
Alfred A. Knopf Inc.
Year of Publication
1927
Pages
158-159
Additional information
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infrastructure class
Hey, Buddy!
Look at me!
I'm makin' a road
For the cars to fly by on,
Makin' a road
Through the palmetto thicket
For light and civilization
To travel on.
construction road speed metaphor
I'm makin' a road
For the rich to sweep over
In their big cars
And leave me standin' here.
construction car road
Sure,
A road helps everybody.
Rich folks ride —
And I get to see 'em ride.
I ain't never seen nobody
Ride so fine before.
driving road
Hey, Buddy, look!
I'm makin' a road! +
P
Bibliographic Information
Author
Moore, Marianne
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
Observations
Publisher
Farrar , Straus and Giroux
Year of Publication
1924
Pages
65-66
Additional information
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They answer one’s questions,
a deal table compact with the wall;
in this dried bone of arrangement
one’s “natural promptness” is compressed, not crowded out;
one’s style is not lost in such simplicity.
The palace furniture, so old-fashioned, so old-fashionable;
Sèvres china and the fireplace dogs—
bronze dromios with pointed ears, as obsolete as pugs;
one has one’s preferences in the matter of bad furniture,
and this is not one’s choice,
The vast indestructible necropolis
of composite Yawman-Erbe separable units;
the steel, the oak, the glass, the Poor Richard publications
containing the public secrets of efficiency
on paper so thin that “one thousand four hundred and twenty pages make one inch,”
exclaiming, so to speak, When you take my time, you take something I had meant to use;
the highway hid by fir trees in rhododendron twenty feet deep,
the peacocks, hand-forged gates, old Persian velvet,
roses outlined in pale black on an ivory ground,
the pierced iron shadows of the cedars,
Chinese carved glass, old Waterford, lettered ladies;
landscape gardening twisted into permanence;
highway infrastructure plant tree garden
straight lines over such great distances as one finds in Utah or in Texas,
where people do not have to be told
that a good brake is as important as a good motor;
where by means of extra sense-cells in the skin
they can, like trout, smell what is coming—
those cool sirs with the explicit sensory apparatus of common sense,
who know the exact distance between two points as the crow flies;
there is something attractive about a mind that moves in a straight line—
the municipal bat roost of mosquito warfare;
the American string quartet;
these are questions more than answers,
road car part car haptic smell sense
and Bluebeard’s Tower above the coral reefs,
the magic mousetrap closing on all points of the compass,
capping like petrified surf the furious azure of the bay,
where there is no dust, and life is like a lemon leaf,
a green piece of tough translucent parchment,
where the crimson, the copper, and the Chinese vermilion of the poincianas
set fire to the masonry and turquoise blues refute the clock;
this dungeon with odd notions of hospitality,
with its “chessmen carved out of moonstones,”
its mockingbirds, fringed lilies, and hibiscus,
its black butterflies with blue half circles on their wings,
tan goats with onyx ears, its lizards glittering and without thickness,
like splashes of fire and silver on the pierced turquoise of the lattices
and the acacia-like lady shivering at the touch of a hand,
lost in a small collision of the orchids—
dyed quicksilver let fall
to disappear like an obedient chameleon in fifty shades of mauve and amethyst.
Here where the mind of this establishment has come to the conclusion
that it would be impossible to revolve about oneself too much,
sophistication has, “like an escalator,” “cut the nerve of progress.”
technology
In these noncommittal, personal-impersonal expressions of appearance,
the eye knows what to skip;
the physiognomy of conduct must not reveal the skeleton;
“a setting must not have the air of being one,”
yet with X-ray-like inquisitive intensity upon it, the surfaces go back;
the interfering fringes of expression are but a stain on what stands out,
there is neither up nor down to it;
we see the exterior and the fundamental structure—
captains of armies, cooks, carpenters,
cutlers, gamesters, surgeons and armorers,
lapidaries, silkmen, glovers, fiddlers and ballad singers,
sextons of churches, dyers of black cloth, hostlers and chimney-sweeps,
queens, countesses, ladies, emperors, travelers and mariners,
dukes, princes and gentlemen,
in their respective places—
camps, forges and battlefields,
conventions, oratories and wardrobes,
dens, deserts, railway stations, asylums and places where engines are made,
shops, prisons, brickyards and altars of churches—
in magnificent places clean and decent,
castles, palaces, dining halls, theaters and imperial audience chambers.
technology factory infrastructure engine car part
T
Bibliographic Information
Author
Newsome, Mary Effie Lee
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
Golden Slippers: An Anthology of Negro Poetry for Young Readers
Publisher
Harper & Row
Year of Publication
1927
Pages
26
Additional information
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The baker's boy delivers loaves
All up and down our street.
His car is white, his clothes are white,
White to his very feet.
I wonder if he stays that way.
I don't see how he does all day.
I’d like to watch him going home
When all the loaves are out.
His clothes must look quite different then,
At least I have no doubt.
car road whiteness +
Bibliographic Information
Author
Reynolds, Elsbery Washington
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
AutoLine o'Type
Publisher
The Book Supply Company
Year of Publication
1924
Pages
25
Additional information
-
nostalgia
Nothing can make our heart so warm,
As visions of where we first were born,
As the memory of that first Christmas tree,
Where the old homestead used to be.
The smile and song and the merry laughter,
That rang from the cellar clear to the rafter,
Each loved one's face we yet can see,
Where the old homestead used to be.
The fires were burning the coals were glowing,
From all of our hearts affection was flowing,
In honor of Him was our Christmas tree,
Where the old homestead used to be.
Pictures of those long passed away,
Hung on the walls and watched our play,
They shared with us in all our glee,
Where the old homestead used to be.
Those hearts of the long ago we treasure,
In the memory with unstinted measure,
All gathered around that Christmas tree,
Where the old homestead used to be.
The beauty that gathered in that dominion,
Was though it had dropped from angel pinion,
For the birth of Him who made us free,
Where the old homestead used to be.
The place to us was one of splendor,
And cherished yet in our memory tender,
And the glory of that first Christmas tree,
Where the old homestead used to be.
Some day again we will see the place,
And, too, in our memory each one's face,
In a Six Studebaker so easy and free,
Where the old homestead used to be.
car model
—The Car with Character. +
P
Bibliographic Information
Author
McKay, Claude
Genre
Poetry
Journal or Book
Constab Ballads
Publisher
London Watts & Co.
Year of Publication
1912
Pages
40-42
Additional information
-
When you want to meet a frien',
Ride up to Papine,
Where dere's people to no en',
Old, young, fat an' lean:
When you want nice gals fe court
An' to feel jus' booze',
Go'p to Papine as a sport
Dress' in ge'man clo'es.
When you want to be jus' broke,
Ride up wid your chum,
Buy de best cigars to smoke
An' Finzi old rum:
Stagger roun' de sort o' square
On to Fong Kin bar ;
Keep as much strengt' dat can bear
You do'n in de car.
car
When you want know Sunday bright,
Tek a run up deh
When 'bout eight o'clock at night
Things are extra gay :
Ef you want to see it cram',
Wait tell night is dark,
An' beneat' your breat' you'll damn
Coney Island Park.
night
When you want see gals look fine,
You mus' go up dere,
An' you'll see them drinkin' wine
An' all sorts o' beer :
There you'll see them walkin' out,
Each wid a young man,
Watch them strollin' all about,
Flirtin' all dem can.
When you want hear coarsest jokes
Passin' rude an' vile,
Want to see de Kingston blokes,—
Go up dere awhile:
When you want hear murderin'
On de piano,
An' all sorts o' drunken din,
Papine you mus' go.
Ef you want lost póliceman,
Go dere Sunday night,
Where you'll see them, every one
Lookin' smart an' bright :
Policeman of every rank,
Rural ones an' all,
In de bar or on de bank,
Each one in them sall.
Policeman dat's in his beat,
Policeman widout,
Policeman wid him gold teet'
Shinin' in him mout';
Policeman in uniform
Made of English blue,
P'liceman gettin' rather warm,
Sleuth policeman too.
Policeman on plain clo'es pass,
Also dismissed ones;
See them standin' in a mass,
Talkin' 'bout them plans:
Policeman "struck off de strengt'
Physical unfit,"
Hear them chattin' dere at lengt'
'Bout a diffran' kit.
When you want meet a surprise,
Tek de Papine track;
Dere some things will meet you' eyes
Mek you tu'n you' bac:
When you want to see mankind
Of "class "family
In a way degra' them mind,
Go 'p deh, you will see.
When you want a pleasant drive,
Tek Hope Gardens line;
I can tell you, man alive,
It is jolly fine:
Ef you want to feel de fun,
You mus' only wait
Until when you're comin' do'n
An' de tram is late.
road condition affect train
