1840

__________ 

“I believe… that all the measures of the Government are directed to the purpose of making the rich richer and the poor poorer.” 

William Henry Harrison, October 10, 1840

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January 25: Captain Charles Wilkes and his expedition (six ships) sight land in eight places, suggesting that an Antarctic continent exists. 

Finley suggests, in passing, that his claims were not believed, and he was dubbed “the biggest liar in the navy.” (113/86) 

According to Wikipedia, Wilkes, a harsh task master in regard to his crew, and obsessive in his explorations, may have been Melville’s model for Captain Ahab in Moby Dick.

 

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By this time, gas is used in lighting the homes of a lucky few, but the service is available in only four cities: Baltimore, Boston, New York, and Philadelphia. (113/167)

 

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Longfellow.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow publishes the following poem:

 

The Village Blacksmith 

Under a spreading chestnut-tree
The village smithy stands;
The smith, a mighty man is he,
With large and sinewy hands;
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are strong as iron bands. 

His hair is crisp, and black, and long,
His face is like the tan;
His brow is wet with honest sweat,
He earns whate’er he can,
And looks the whole world in the face,
For he owes not any man. 

Week in, week out, from morn till night,
You can hear his bellows blow;
You can hear him swing his heavy sledge,
With measured beat and slow,
Like a sexton ringing the village bell,
When the evening sun is low. 

And children coming home from school
Look in at the open door;
They love to see the flaming forge,
And hear the bellows roar,
And catch the burning sparks that fly
Like chaff from a threshing-floor. 

He goes on Sunday to the church,
And sits among his boys;
He hears the parson pray and preach,
He hears his daughter’s voice,
Singing in the village choir,
And it makes his heart rejoice. 

It sounds to him like her mother's voice,
Singing in Paradise!
He needs must think of her once more,
How in the grave she lies;
And with his hard, rough hand he wipes
A tear out of his eyes. 

Toiling, – rejoicing, – sorrowing,
Onward through life he goes;
Each morning sees some task begin,
Each evening sees it close
Something attempted, something done,
Has earned a night’s repose. 

Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend,
For the lesson thou hast taught!
Thus at the flaming forge of life
Our fortunes must be wrought;
Thus on its sounding anvil shaped
Each burning deed and thought.

 

NOTE TO TEACHERS: I wonder if modern students might find this interesting. Is there any worker they can think of, where they live, who has a central role in community life? Could they write a poem about some modern day businessperson or employee? 

Satire might result. 

As far as the “smithy,” what kind of man is he? Is he a role model?

 

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In 1830 there were thirty miles of rails in the country, by 1840 there were three thousand. “It is no wonder that men were induced to build air castles.” (56/337)

Canals were still doing a booming business.

 

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“The people’s party.” 

Horace Greeley admits, during the 1840 campaign: “We have nothing here in politics but large and numerous swarms of office-hunting locusts, sweeping on to Washington daily.” (56/349) 

The election was one of great excitement. The people, as never before, entered with unbounded enthusiasm into the contest. There was little calm discussion of principles. In the race for popular favor the Democrats were left far in the background by the Whigs, who claimed to be the people’s party and made every appeal to popular sympathy. Monster meetings, long processions, campaign songs, took the place of argument. “Every breeze says change,” said [Daniel] Webster. “The time for discussion has passed,” exclaimed [Henry] Clay. “Tippecanoe and Tyler too” was the watchword of the jubilant party, which had never yet tasted success, but expected now to be triumphant. The most was made of the fact that Harrison was a simple Westerner. Throughout the campaign live coons and barrels of cider were always in evidence; log cabins were reared as emblems in town and city, or were drawn on carts in long processions to mass meetings, which the newspapers said contained “acres of men.” Enthusiasm for Harrison, strongly aided by the hard times, for which the Democrats had to bear the blame, easily carried the day for the Whigs. They were wild with elation and overcome with joy. Nineteen States out of twenty-six cast their electoral votes for Harrison and Tyler.

 

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Abolitionists spoke of the Constitution as “a covenant with death and an agreement with hell.” 

This rests on Isaiah 28:18: “And your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not stand; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, then ye shall be trodden down by it.” McLaughlin (56/347) 

“Harrison was an honest, straightforward, simple man, of moderate ability.” (56/348) 

McMaster adds his take. When Democrats mocked Harrison as better suited to sit at home in a log cabin drinking cider than be elected to go to the White House, the Whigs turned the tables. 

In the West, men came to these [campaign] meetings in huge canoes and wagons of all sorts, and camped on the ground. At one meeting the ground covered by the people was measured, and allowing four to the square yard it was estimated about 80,000 attended. Dayton, in Ohio, claimed 100,000 at her meeting. At Bunker Hill there were 60,000. In the processions, huge balls were rolled along to the cry, “Keep the ball a-rolling.” … More than a hundred campaign songs were written and sung to popular airs. Every Whig wore a log-cabin medal, or breast pin, or badge, or carried a log-cabin cane. (97/298)

 

In A Popular History of Indiana, we have this song from a Whig rally: 

The times are bad and want curing;

They are getting passt all enduring;

Let us turn out Martin Van Buren,

And put in old Tippecanoe.

The best thing we can do,

Is to put in old Tippecanoe.

 

It’s a business we all can take part in,

So let us give notice to Martin

That he must get ready for sartin [certain],

For we’ll put in old Tippecanoe.

The best thing we can do,

Is to put in old Tippecanoe.

 

We’ve had all of their humbugs aplenty;

For now all our pockets are empty;

We’ve a dollar now where we had plenty,

So we’ll put in old Tippecanoe.

The best thing we can do,

Is to put in old Tippecanoe. (91/160)