Great Northern Railway

Great Northern Railway Depot in Harrington

By Team Shem Hanks and Tyler Robbins

     The rise and fall of railroads and railroad depots mirror the rise and fall of towns in the western United States. The town of Harrington, Washington was one of the many beneficiaries of the Great Northern Railway’s success. The Great Northern Railway stretches from Saint Paul, Minnesota to Seattle, Washington with numerous stops in between. It was in 1889 that railroad tycoon, James Hill, who was appropriately nicknamed the Empire Builder, purchased a small railroad company in Saint Paul and started his dream project of building a transcontinental railroad line to the Pacific Ocean. Four, relatively short, years later, his dream became a reality and Hill’s railroad became the first privately funded transcontinental railroad in United States history stretching 8,316 miles with its completion on January 6,^th 1893. Since Hill’s expenditure was privately financed, he looked to cut costs by using cheap immigrant labor, primarily men of Asian descent, to construct the rail line. The building of the Great Northern Railway is one of the great stories in railroad history, and this rail line became the catalyst for the economic expansion of small towns across the upper half of the country including Harrington.

     Harrington, a town founded predominately on wheat production, was instantly able to reap the financial rewards of having a train depot in their town. No longer did the farmers of this area have to transport their product to Sprague, Walla Walla, or Spokane to find a market.  The railroad made sending wheat to a port, such as the one in Seattle, a reality, therefore Harrington wheat was shipped across the Pacific to foreign markets. The depot in Harrington also served as a watering and coaling station for every train that passed through the area whether it was freight or passenger trains.

     During the construction of the railroad, Harrington was a classic wild west town. The year was 1892 and with hundreds of workers being forced to spend time in the area until the completion of the railroad, the town of Harrington sprang up with boarding houses, restaurants, saloons, dance halls, and gambling halls to support not only the workers, but also the eventual passenger trains that would be making its way through the depot. These passenger trains not only made it possible for farmers to escape their daily lives and take their family on a much needed weekend vacation after the wheat harvest, but it also made it possible for vacationers to stop in a quintessential Northwest wheat town and experience all the amenities that a town like Harrington supplies. Upon the railroad’s completion at Harrington in November of 1892, wheat solidified itself as the backbone of the local economy as farmers used the benefits of the railroad to make their fortunes.

     Once the depot located within this town was closed in the 1960's, Harrington, regrettably, became the victim of the decline that results when a railroad is removed from a hamlet such as this. There was already a decline in the population of Harrington due to the invention of farming machinery that reduced the need for manual labor, and with the depot closing, the town lost not only its passenger service, but it lost a profitable way to transport Harrington’s main cash crop. For years the depot stood as an unsettling reminder of the glory years of American westward expansion, then in the 1980’s, this monument to American innovation and willpower was torn down in Harrington. The depot for the Great Northern Railway was the reason Harrington was able to achieve success as a town since it created the economic factors that a farming city needs to be great.

Great Northern Railway logo. Image courtesy of GNR

Chinese Work Gang on the GNR. Image courtesy of
collectionscanada

GNR and Depot within the town of Harrington. Image courtesy of Harrington website

GNR Letter Head. Image courtesy of GNR

Construction of the GNR in Seattle. Image courtesy of
University of Washington University Library

The Civil War Journey Continues

This week, we continued to examine public history through the perspective of the Civil War. The class continued its reading of Tony Horwitz's "Confederates in the Attic," viewed a Ken Burns interview, and looked at some mobile history.

We pick up on Horwitz journey through Southern memory with him at the Foote of the Master. Shelby Foote, God rest his soul, may have been the greatest of the Civil War historians. His books travel from obscure battles, to the major conflicts that draw millions into the war. Horwitz discovers that this Civil War celebrity is incredibly easy to get in touch with and is able to schedule a meeting. At this meeting, Horwitz asks him a barrage of questions, all of which Foote is able to answer in a snarky way that resembles an angry grandfather. Horwitz asks him why the Civil War is such an enduring memory and Foote responds with, "If you look at American history as the life span of a man, the Civil War represents the great trauma of our adolescence. It's the sort of experience we never forget" (146).  On that same page, Foote relays that the reason why we never forget this experience is because as humans, we tend to remember the battles that we lost.

Under Foote's urging, Horwitz then goes to Shiloh on the early morning of the anniversary of the battle. His plan is to follow the battle through the course of the day and experience the power that such an endeavor could have. While he is there, he runs across a large cast of characters who show up at Shiloh for their own reasons and for their own quests for satisfaction. Horwitz observes that most Southerns view the Shiloh battlefield as a memorial to Yankee conquest and victory (171). This happens because the post-War South couldn't fund monuments on the scale and number as the Northern victor could. General Grant even said that Shiloh was the most misunderstood battle of the Civil War (179).

Victory Defeated by Death and Night. Shiloh Monument
For Southerns. Image courtesy of NPS

Once he was done with Shiloh, Horwitz took his next stop at Vicksburg. Vicksburg offered an example of people trying to mesh the past with a need for modern capitalism. The casinos of Vicksburg overwhelm the riverbank and offered a false example of the history that the Civil War provides. However, it is the first place that Coca-Cola was bottled, which I did not know. Horwitz seems to have a talent for finding interesting people in these stops that he makes. At Vicksburg, he talks to a museum curator who says, "...if it hadn't been for the Yankee occupation, we wouldn't have any good stories to tell" (201).

Victory Defeated by Death and Night. Shiloh Monument
For Southerns. Image courtesy of ShilohNick

In our final chapter of our reading, Horwitz goes back to Virginia to meet Robert Lee Hodge and some other members of the "hardcores." They go on the "Civil Wargasm." They spend a week going super speed through various battles and places that had significant meaning in the war. Something that is important to this class is when they make it to Manassas, he discusses Disney's plan and failure to establish a theme park honoring the American past. His opinion and writers voice are very much against this theme park. He states, "In the end, the park's foes prevailed in a rare triumph of high culture over low" (217).


The Ken Burn interview about his documentary series, The Civil War, brought to light the difficulty and painstaking hours it took to make something like that during a time with no internet. They had to photograph and record all of the photos that the nine part series used. These photographs were taken from archives, and even from some individual's personal collections. My favorite part was the comment section on Youtube where people were either incredible enthused by the documentary, or people were ranting about it being Northern propaganda, a controversy that Horwitz touches briefly in the Shelby Foote section.

Week 8: The Harrington Adventure

     This week, we had five main readings, the website, and the video (which I could not get to work). The purpose of these assignments were to educate and broaden our horizons on that little hamlet known as Harrington.

     Steele: History of Lincoln County Washington:

Harrington City Hall circa 1910s. Image Courtesy
of HistoryLink

One of the main themes of all of our readings for this week is that you have to take Lincoln county as a whole. It is very difficult to find information on Harrington itself. The town is usually just a fraction of the story that is Lincoln county as a whole. The Steele article is interesting because it was written in 1909. It is written in an educational manner that is designed to lure new people into the area. It starts out dismantling the myth that the Northwest is all timber, wildlife, and seafood/fishing. The article focuses on the farming aspect of Lincoln county through wheat and ranching...also strangely enough Steele mentions bee culturing, which I wouldn't think of as alluring. When discussing the city of Harrington, Steele focuses on the Northern Pacific Railroad being the lifeblood of the city since it is able to transport large amounts of wheat as a result of it. This same section also talks about the booming population of Harrington at that time. That population being 1,200. (21)

     Harrington 100 Years:
This was the most educational reading about Harrington since it was dedicated to the city of Harrington and had less to do with the other cities of Lincoln county, respectively. This gives detailed stories and history about the entirety of Harrington. The main theme is that the railroad was incredible vital to this community, as it was to all western towns, and with the railroad came wealth, population, and opportunity, and with the loss of the railroad, the city fails. There is an interesting story in here about a the big and devastating fire in Harrington. While it is not on the scale of the Chicago fires, it destroyed the main building of the Harrington Manufacturing Company, but it didn't destroy the neighborhood or community because of the concrete that the building was made with (44)

     HistoyLink's History of Lincoln County & An Illustrated History of Big Bend County:
These two articles continue the examination of Lincoln County. It continues to give insight into what made Lincoln county in the first place, and what made the small towns within it sustainable. Through wheat production and the railroad, a town of Harrington was able to survive and to thrive for a time.

     Spokesman Article & WISAARD:

"School Slow" sign from Harrington. Image courtesy of WISAARD

The Spokesman Article that I randomly stumbled across in our class research day tells the story of the fair lady being forced to give up her land to the evil "horny" man. It is an interesting story not just from the angle of fair maiden against evil-eyed villain but because it shows a female homesteader in the early 1900s. I would still very much like to know for sure what the outcome of this story was. We did find that the bad man, Joseph Drazen, moved away, so it is fair to assume that he lost his land...or did he? The website this week was WISAARD, and from it we find historical centers and buildings within Harrington and the public is able to look at photos etc of the town itself.

Once upon a Journey into the South

Week 7 readings

The Power of Place:

Biddy Mason image courtesy of
Hidden Los Angeles

     As Professor Cebula said, the section on Biddy Mason was a more engaging read than the first half of the Dolores Hayden book. It follows the process by which Hayden and her crew from The Power of Place created the landmark for Biddy Mason. Mason was a fascinating historical figure. A slave in the late 1850s and early 1860s that found her way to Los Angeles who there started a new life as midwife and founded a church in urban L.A. The wall that Hayden and her crew from The Power of Place built in honor of Biddy Mason had impressions on it of various things from her past that I thought was a cool and unique way to make an interactive connection with the viewing audience.



Confederates in the Attic:
     I read this book years ago and forgot, over the course of time how much I enjoyed it. It follows the journey of Tony Horwitz from his time as a correspondent/freelance writer overseas to the deep South in search of current Confederate sympathizer. What Horwitz is examining can be summed up when he is in Salisbury, North Carolina. He ends up, through a series of strange circumstances, at a gathering for the Sons and Daughters of the Confederacy. While he is first learning about the meeting, the man that he is talking to tells him, "In school, I remember learning that the Civil War ended a long time ago...Folks here don't always see it that way. They think it's still half-time" (22). These various people that he talks to throughout his journey seem to have similar opinions. He goes through the Carolinas, Kentucky, and Virginia and everyone seems to not be just studying the past, but trying to relive it or revive it. As anyone who has ever visited the South can attest, they believe that the "Southern Cause" was just and must be kept alive. When Horwitz is in Charleston, he feels like they kept the Old South alive while places like Atlanta went to a more "Northern" feel. Is it a good thing for the South to keep this image of defiance? Is it healthy for the descendants of a "defeated people" to still be harboring the ideals of a hundred and fifty-two years ago? Probably not, but no one should forget their heritage and where they came from, only people from the South take it above and beyond....or do they?

Web Readings and Misc:
     The article about the falsification of the two photos blew my mind. Well maybe I shouldn't go that far, it was funny more than anything how people clearly distorted and cropped a photo in order to give a visual example of black men fighting for the Confederacy. The next article I read about the white man in the Shenandoah was enlightening because he actually lived the conflict during the War of Northern Aggression. It was also a good example of Southern ignorance about slavery when he was making the case that most slaves were fine with being slaves and were treated well...except for the part where those people were SLAVES. The final article made a good point of showing that we focus on the Euro-American history in this country and we neglect most all other histories of people, not just American slavery, in preference of our own history.
Finally, this week's website was for The Sons of ConfederateVeterans. This site, much like that of the DAR or other such groups, allows for people to register if their ancestors were a part of one of the Confederate armies. You can search your genealogy through the website to see if you qualify, and you can also locate graves through their grave site registry. Professor Cebula wanted us to find their opinion on slavery in the war, and here it is.  

Week 6: The power of place

     The Power of Place:

     This week, we deal with the notion of memory in regards to location. This book, much like the 9/11 documentary that we watched last Thursday, examines memory with objects. Power of Place has more to do with buildings rather than smaller, personal objects, however. The writer, Doloras Hayden, tries to make the point that history for the public, specifically history found in urban centers, needs to be all-inclusive. She argues that there is a natural power vacuum where the wealthy get their history told while the impoverished minorities of these urban areas get historically overlooked. She believes that, "A socially inclusive urban landscape history can become the basis for new approaches to public history and urban preservation" (12).

Example of History being told exclusively about the lives of
white, wealth men as in AMC's Mad Men. Image courtesy of AMC

     She next deals with the idea of "place" and "space." She examines the work of French sociologist, Henri Lefebvre, and his notions that the production of space is the foundation for the inner workings of the political economy and that this space is defined by the first people who found themselves in that space and their need for sustenance (19-20).

     She brings up an interesting point when she looks at the work of urban planner Kevin Lynch. He believed that images from the people themselves create the portrait of the city, so when he designed new things for an urban area, he would ask the residence to give him directions or draw him maps of the city. Through the landmarks and places they told him about, Lynch would be able to know the essentials of the city. I tried this on my roommates and tried it myself, and the landmarks that you use for directions or to create a map actually do create the heart of your city. I challenge you to try it.

New York Housing circa early 1900s. Image courtesy of ECRP

     When discussing buildings to keep for historical purposes, she talks about the "typical New York tenement." She says that we don't need to focus exclusively on mansions and other fancy houses from the past, but to look into the common man's life. Such as the apartments that the sweat-shop worker or the immigrant would have lived in, or the Chinese laundry industry in the urbanized areas.

    Her point and purpose in the first section is to discuss the power that a building or an invented environment has on the memory of people. It is the purpose of public historians to access this sense of memory through physical objects as opposed to doing it through a verbal or social experience. She talks about how art has a unique way of bringing out this physical memory. It can serve as a reminder of where we have come from and where we are going as a society.

     Physical structures have meaning and purpose in history. It is difficult to know what is important when you are living the history, but it is crucial to preserve the things that we have from a past time so that we may see what past generations have experienced.

 

Week 5 Thoughts

Book Readings:

Gardner and LaPaglia: 
     This weeks essay in G&L dealt with the September 11th Digital Archives. This essay focused on the development of the internet in creating an outlet for people to experience history. In the essay, the writer, James Sparrow, quotes Randy Bass in saying, "the web makes possible, 'the novice in the archive'" (400). This is what the internet has done for us. It has opened the gateway for anyone to be able to comment and influence what history was. This is both a good and bad thing. An example of how it is good is the September 11th Digital Archives. The creators had the difficult task of balancing the need for contemporary history with the emotions of a current disaster (403). They created a website where people could tell their first-hand accounts of what happened in their lives on that morning in September. This was an excellent essay and look into creating an historical portal for modern events.

Mickey Mouse. Image Courtesy of When in Time

Mickey Mouse History: 
     This week, Mike Wallace, keeps up his onslaught of the Reagan administration and their attempts to destroy history. He throws out examples of this such as Reagan removing the old portraits of Jefferson and other founders and replacing them with pre-New Deal presidents such as Calvin Coolidge (250). Then Wallace focuses on Reagan's view of history through the lens of Hollywood. Wallace believes that Reagan only wanted the history that Hollywood created for him The last section was an interesting examination of the controversy surrounding the Enola Gay bomber plane. This was the aircraft that dropped the "little boy" on the city of Hiroshima. This plane and the exhibition that the NASM made were bombarded with controversy and was an example of public history gone wrong.

Web Readings:
      Digital keys and the video Big Data showed how modern data control and advanced analytics are becoming the perfect tool for history. They are not only tools for business or sports such as baseball and basketball, but can be used to create reasons why Civil War battles were won based on geography, or they can be used to recreate a digital version of Rome such as one of the readings told us. The final reading was about the Flickr initiative with the Library of Congress. This seems like a good idea in theory. Expose the public to these historical photos and generate interest in our collective past. However, like so many good ideas, this went array  The public gains access to these photos and creates rude and inappropriate comments on these photos. Also the public lacked the historical context for many of these photos.

There are still two videos that I have not yet touched on. The first exposed me to the reality that the Fuhrer was very interested in academic articles and blogs on the Internet. The second was a look at how dumb stuff that people record now will haunt them at a later date. I simple don't let people record me doing anything. This is how I avoid that embarrassing fate. For people take videos on a completely different route than their original intent...

     

Week 4 Readings and the Excitement it Brings

     The two book readings were very appropriate for each other due to the fact that both were focusing on historical preservation and the costs, rewards, and failures that come with it.
   
     Essays from the Field:
     In Gardner and LaPaglia, the first essay writer, Antoinette Lee, takes us through the life of a preservationist. Lee makes the point that historical preservationists are tasked with taking boring facts about a location and presenting them to government boards in an energetic and passionate manner in order to keep historical sites from being destroyed. The next essay was by Mark Howell who dealt with the topic of interpreters. Howell took a more casual approach with writing this essay and I don't believe that it is necessarily a bad thing. As a profession, historical interpreters are tasked with being personable and approachable and I felt like he conveyed that about himself. He believed that as a museum interpreter, he and his peers were tasked with being able to teach both children and adults. This becomes a difficult task of being able to filter what you can say to both groups.

    Mickey Mouse History:
     In this, Mike Wallace takes the reader through a journey of the development of historical preservation starting from the 1880s. Each subsequent generation had its own opinion and role in historical preservation, but a common theme is that if the rich are interested in history, then it is easy to preserve history. During the 50s-70s, there was a mass tourism boom as a result of better transportation and communication. The development of the car sent people across the country and these people wanted attractions to draw them out of their urbanized cities and places like Colonial Williamsburg  and Greensfield Villiage would reap the financial benefits until the development of other parks. There was an update to Wallace's essay in which he updated the ideas of historical preservation for the 80s and 90s. This was used mostly to tear the Reagan administration and Republicans a new one.
   
     Web Readings: This was an interesting examination of critique and critique taken the wrong way. I did feel like Dr. Cebula presented his case and complaints in a respectful and professional manner while acknowledging that his tour guide at the Baron Von Munchausen house was a volunteer. The manager of the historical site did not seem too happy about any critique that was directed their way. It is a classic battle between a worker in the field and an academic...who is also a worker in the field of public history.

Terror behind the Walls. Image courtesy of

     Websites and Video: The two websites were very bland. It seems to be a recurring theme that the blogs are nice and classy with good content and interesting links while the historical websites are in desperate need of a makeover. It would seem like the National Park Service would be able to afford a web designer who could make the website look more desirable and with better content. The video was weird but well done. The students at Temple did work. It was a very creepy looking prison, but in order to keep it well funded they turn it into a haunted house at night. This is actually a genius idea to get extra interest and revenue for the historical site.  The academics didn't seem overly excited by this however. This feature is similar to what the "cannon-ball parks" do with their ghost tours of the battlefield. 

Example of one of the many ghost tours at Gettysburg
and other battlefields. Image courtesy of