Comic History of the United States by Bill Nye (book series for 10 year olds txt) 📗

Governor Altgeld, of Illinois, an amateur American, in the summer of 1893 pardoned two of the Anarchists who had escaped death by imprisonment.

August 31, 1886, in Charleston, occurred several terrible earthquake shocks, which seriously damaged the city and shocked and impaired the nerves and health of hundreds of people.

The noted heroism and pluck of the people of Charleston were never shown to greater advantage than on this occasion.

Mr. Cleveland was again nominated, but was defeated by General Benjamin Harrison. Hon. James G. Blaine, of Maine, was made Secretary of State, and Wm. Windom, a veteran financier, Secretary of the Treasury. Secretary Windom's tragic death just as he had finished a most brilliant address to the great capitalists of New York after[Pg 326] their annual dinner and discussion at Delmonico's is, and will ever remain, while life lasts, a most dramatic picture in the author's memory.

Personally, the administration of President Harrison will be long remembered for the number of deaths among the families of the Executive and those of his Cabinet and friends.

Nebraska, the thirty-seventh State, was admitted March 1, 1867. The name signifies "Water Valley." Colorado, the Centennial State, was the thirty-eighth. She was admitted July 1, 1876. Six other States have been since admitted when the political sign was right. Still, they have not always stuck by the party admitting them to the Union. This is the kind of ingratitude which sometimes leads to the reformation of politicians supposed to have been dead in sin.

President Harrison's administration was a thoroughly upright and honest one, so far as it was possible for it to be after his party had drifted into the musty catacombs of security in office and the ship of state had become covered with large and expensive barnacles.

As we go to press, his successor, Grover Cleveland, in the first year of his second administration, is paying a high price for fleeting fame, with the serious question of what to do with the relative coinage of gold and silver, and the Democrats in Congress, for the first time in the history of the[Pg 327] world, are referring each other with hot breath and flashing eye to the platform they adopted at the National Convention.

Heretofore among the politicians a platform, like that on the railway cars, "is made for the purpose of helping the party to get aboard, but not to ride on."

The Columbian Exposition and World's Fair at Chicago in the summer of 1893 eclipsed all former Exhibitions, costing more and showing greater artistic taste, especially in its buildings, than anything preceding it. Some gentle warfare resulted from a struggle over the question of opening the "White City" on Sunday, and a great deal of bitterness was shown by those who opposed the opening and who had for years favored the Sunday closing of Niagara. A doubtful victory was obtained by the Sunday openers, for so many of the exhibitors closed their departments that visitors did not attend on Sunday in paying quantities.

Against a thousand odds and over a thousand obstacles, especially the apprehension of Asiatic cholera and the actual sudden appearance of a gigantic money panic, Chicago, heroic and victorious, carried out her mighty plans and gave to the world an exhibition that won golden opinions from her friends and stilled in dumb wonder the jealousy of her enemies.

In the mean time, the author begs leave to[Pg 328] thank his readers for the rapt attention shown in perusing these earnest pages, and to apologize for the tears of sympathy thoughtlessly wrung from eyes unused to weep, by the graphic word-painting and fine education shown by the author.

It was not the intention of the writer to touch the fountain of tears and create wash-outs everywhere, but sometimes tears do one good.

In closing, would it be out of place to say that the stringency of the money market is most noticeable and most painful, and for that reason would it be too much trouble for the owner of this book to refuse to loan it, thereby encouraging its sale and contributing to the comfort of a deserving young man?

[Pg 329]

The idea of an appendix to this work was suggested by a relative, who promised to prepare it, but who has been detained now for over a year in one of the public buildings of Colorado on the trumped-up charge of horse-stealing. The very fact that he was not at once hanged shows that the charge was not fully sustained, and that the horse was very likely of little value.

The Author.