Its theme is the emergence of liberty in the modern world. This tour-de-force exhibition is not to be missed it is a genuinely once in a lifetime collection of some of the most important documents in the history of western civilization all under one roof and in the same room. Liberty” is a must-see show as families come to Washington looking for exciting options which are both open and free. My prayer is that those gates will soon come down too after the 2020 summer of rioting and mayhem.įreedom is returning before our very eyes.Īs if welcoming this national emergence from a year of pandemic, loss, toppling, and violence, one of Washington’s crown jewel museums has just opened one of the finest exhibitions in the history of the city. It is particularly heartening to witness all the iron gates being brought down from around the US Capitol, the US Supreme Court, the Library of Congress, the House and Senate office buildings - even as the iron gates remain wrapped around the White House. The ghost town mystique of our nation’s capital city was a difficult thing to witness, like one of those infamous scenes in the film High Noon where Gary Cooper finds himself all alone on a dusty, windswept western town’s main street – the tumbleweeds floating by as if cotton balls of loneliness and despair. After nearly a year and a half of being locked down, the world is resuming. But only from this distance, from this blank canvas of a ghost town, can I see the details of my American frontier: Helene Avenue, Merrick, N.Y., on the sofa in the den, wearing pajamas with feet and watching westerns with my father.Families are once again flocking to Washington, D.C. Think dynamite, and the deafening roar of stamp mills making bullion out of ore. But Rocha busts that myth: Bodie was a mining town. I imagine a resident coming home and staggering into bed for a "coyote-quiet" night. Historian Guy Rocha takes me to the ghost town of Bodie, Calif., named after an ill-fated prospector who staked a claim in a godforsaken landscape and froze to death before he could cash in.īodie is a heartbreaker: A main street once raucous with mule trains and stagecoaches is now Death Valley dust. Forget the steely gaze of a ruddy-cheeked cowboy looking out from under his rawhide brim the heroes and villians in this town were sallow-skinned miners - and worse yet, businessmen.īut as I head out highway 395, southbound for California, little do I know the peril still awaiting my precious myths - and all because of a sweet-talking guy. So I leave Nevada sadder, wiser and far less likely to embarrass myself on the subject of 19th century America. There weren't any famous gunfighters in Virginia City, though, and most of the women were housewives rather than Calamity Jane types. It had an opera house, a four-story hospital and a local chapter of the B'nai Brith. In 1876, when Wild Bill Hickok rode into that lawless swill of a town, Virginia City was already rebuilding itself in brick. As the site of the richest silver strike the world had ever seen, it was an opulent city that bore no resemblance to the storied Deadwood, S.D. With its gen-u-wine locomotive rides and long, wooden sidewalks, Virginia City is the rival of any TV town: shoot 'em ups on the hour, honky tonk saloons and the glitter of hard rocks.īeneath this town lie 700 miles of tunnels. So, like so much tumbleweed across the Ponderosa, I set out for Cartwright Country: Virginia City, Nev. I happen to hate the theme from Bonanza but like millions of others, I have that burning map imprinted on my brain. One stanza from Have Gun - Will Travel and I'm ready to roam. The music from Rawhide gives me "move 'em out" courage. The Wagon Train theme brings tears to my eyes.
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