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Not the strangest thing in the world, but I'm currently on a Mark Twain reading binge. He's absolutely amazing - if all you've read of his is Tom Sawyer or Huck
by russellbeattie 4y ago
Not the strangest thing in the world, but I'm currently on a Mark Twain reading binge. He's absolutely amazing - if all you've read of his is Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn, you need to read his non-fiction travelogues. His observations were prescient almost beyond belief, and his acerbic humor is laugh out loud funny.
Here's the strange bit: His book "Roughing It" is about his experience as a young man of moving to the West, spending a few years in Nevada and San Francisco, and then visiting The Kingdom of Hawaii where he tried surfing. In 1865.
> In one place we came upon a large company of naked natives, of both sexes and all ages, amusing themselves with the national pastime of surf-bathing. Each heathen would paddle three or four hundred yards out to sea, (taking a short board with him), then face the shore and wait for a particularly prodigious billow to come along; at the right moment he would fling his board upon its foamy crest and himself upon the board, and here he would come whizzing by like a bombshell! It did not seem that a lightning express train could shoot along at a more hair-lifting speed. I tried surf-bathing once, subsequently, but made a failure of it. I got the board placed right, and at the right moment, too; but missed the connection myself.—The board struck the shore in three quarters of a second, without any cargo, and I struck the bottom about the same time, with a couple of barrels of water in me. None but natives ever master the art of surf-bathing thoroughly.
Sam embraced and exaggerated his "Southern gentleman" Mark Twain persona later in life so much, the idea that earlier in life he was in Hawaii, hanging out and surfing is quite amusing to me. Victorian surfing?? Who knew?
- geocrasher 4y ago"Roughing It" is one of my all time favorite books. I grew up around Virginia City (Reno/Carson) and will be moving back to that region in a couple of weeks. It remains one of my favorite books. I need to give it another read.
- russellbeattie 4y agoNice! I live in the Bay Area and been to Tahoe a bunch of times, though never to the Nevada side. I didn’t know anything about the Comstock Lode besides the name. It’s an amazing story. But is Virginia City just sitting on top of a massive empty mine to this day?? Twain’s descriptions of how empty Tahoe was then are pretty incredible to imagine. He guessed that they may have been the only people camping on the lake at the time. The part where he accidentally starts a raging forest fire that spreads over the mountains is much less humorous today, I have to admit. Hopefully it was one of the times he was exaggerating for effect.
- geocrasher 4y agoOh man, you have got to visit Virginia City. Yes, it's really sitting on top of mines. And you can do some mine tours. It's a bit on the touristy side, but I have a picture of me and my family visiting there in the early 80's, and then another pic from almost the same spot (quite coincidentally!) just a couple of months ago, and not a lot has changed. There are also excellent museums in Carson City. And, you can take the train from VC down to CC! Something I have yet to do, but am going to do soon. If you need a local contact, hit me up. username at gmail.
- russellbeattie 4y agoComing back to the thread later, I apparently totally misunderstood the assignment. Sorry for the wall of text, I was over eager to share.