{"id":2013337,"date":"2023-08-27T05:07:02","date_gmt":"2023-08-27T09:07:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/the-ultimate-road-trip\/"},"modified":"2023-08-27T05:10:24","modified_gmt":"2023-08-27T09:10:24","slug":"the-ultimate-road-trip","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/the-ultimate-road-trip\/","title":{"rendered":"The Ultimate Journey on Wheels"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">10<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fthe-ultimate-road-trip%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2013337&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div>\n<blockquote>\n<h2>REVIEW: &#8216;American Journey: On \u200cthe Road \u2063with Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, and John Burroughs&#8217;<\/h2>\n<\/blockquote>\n<figure><figcaption>\n<p>      \u2064    \u2063Thomas \u200cEdison, John Burroughs, and Henry\u2063 Ford (Wikimedia Commons)<br \/>\n \u200c   \u200c<br \/>\n    <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>If you&#8217;re planning a\u200b road trip, it&#8217;s smart to \u200cinclude in your group someone who knows \u2062something about\u200b cars. \u2062This was even more true in the early days of motoring,\u2064 when autos were less reliable than they are now. If your \u2064road trip\u200b is going\u2062 to be a car-camping trip, during which you&#8217;ll rely on various mechanical amenities for your cooking, sleeping, \u2063safety, and comfort, you&#8217;ll be well advised\u200d to \u2064enlist a person with a \u200cknack for\u2063 gadgetry. \u200cAnd if your route is through a\u200c part of the country noted\u200c for \u200cits natural beauty, you&#8217;ll\u200b want to have \u2063with you someone\u200d who knows about flora \u200cand\u200d fauna.<\/p>\n<h3>The Dream Team of Road Travel<\/h3>\n<p>In 1918, a dream team of road travel was assembled for a journey through the\u200d southern\u200b Appalachian mountains and foothills. The principals were Henry\u2064 Ford, the creator of \u2063the Model\u200d T and the American automobile industry; Thomas Edison,\u200d the \u2064practical genius who invented the light bulb, phonograph, and other hallmarks\u2064 of the modern age; and John Burroughs, the \u200ddean of American naturalists. The three men had \u200bcome to know \u200done another during previous years, and had taken shorter road \u200ctrips to test this new version \u200cof American vacationing. They liked the \u2063experience and\u200d determined to \u200bgo longer and farther.<\/p>\n<p>Journeys have provided structure for stories since Odysseus required \u206410 years and \u206412,000\u2064 Homeric lines to travel\u200b the several hundred miles from Troy \u200dto Ithaca. Wes Davis, author of\u2063 a \u200cprevious book about partisan fighting during World \u200bWar II,\u200d makes the\u2062 most of the journey genre. Before recounting the big \u200dtrip\u200d through \u200bAppalachia\u2014a \u2063region\u2063 he knows from having grown up there\u2014he traces the earlier expeditions: through Vermont&#8217;s Green Mountains and New York&#8217;s Adirondacks, besides an\u2062 excursion by rail \u2062to San Francisco for \u200ban international exposition.<\/p>\n<h3>The Personalities Behind the \u2063Journey<\/h3>\n<p>Like Homer, \u200dDavis \u200chas more in mind\u2062 than itinerary.\u2063 His protagonists don&#8217;t have to deal with \u200dangry and jealous gods, but they\u200c do contend \u200bwith large themes of history, including \u2062the \u200babiding struggle between past and future that the present always finds itself caught up in. Burroughs was the eldest \u2062of the\u2063 three,\u200d having \u2064been born in\u200d 1837 and raised in the Catskills. With his long beard he looked and sometimes acted like his fictional neighbor Rip Van Winkle. Burroughs cut \u2063his intellectual teeth on Ralph Waldo Emerson \u200band\u200b the New England transcendentalists.<\/p>\n<p>Edison was a decade younger and, significantly, from \u2062Ohio. That\u2062 breeding ground for Civil War generals and postwar presidents had America&#8217;s future in its\u200b soil and in the bones of\u200c its residents. Edison first embraced the future in \u200bthe telegraph industry, which he stormed during his \u200bteens, and then in electricity, of\u2064 which \u200dhe became the acknowledged master.<\/p>\n<p>Ford was \u200cthe\u200b youngster of the trio. He was born in Michigan amid the Civil War and came of age as America&#8217;s \u2063industrial and capitalist revolutions were kicking into <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/sick-of-communist-like-censorship-heres-a-list-of-popular-uncensored-media-options\/\" title=\"Sick Of Communist-Like Censorship? Here\u2019s A List Of Popular Uncensored Media Options\">high gear<\/a>. He \u200bfiddled \u200cwith his father&#8217;s \u200dfarm equipment and caught the motoring \u2062spirit as horseless carriages were becoming \u2063the next big thing. \u2064Better than Edison, who was no\u2062 slouch at\u200b <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/the-ultimate-road-trip\/\" title=\"The Ultimate Journey on Wheels\">monetizing good ideas<\/a>,\u2062 and \u200dinfinitely \u200bbetter than Burroughs, who couldn&#8217;t be bothered about money, Ford \u2064epitomized\u200c the marriage of \u2063inventiveness\u2064 and acquisitiveness that has characterized the cutting edge of the American economy from\u200b the 19th century\u2064 to the present.<\/p>\n<h3>An Episodic\u200d Approach<\/h3>\n<p>Davis focuses on just a few years in\u200c three eventful lives. This \u200dapproach exacts costs and yields \u200cbenefits. The chief\u2062 cost\u2063 is that readers unfamiliar\u2062 with the full lives\u2063 of Burroughs, Edison, and Ford will have some difficulty appreciating what their friendship signaled to\u2062 the country at large. If Al \u200cGore were caught consorting with\u2062 Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk \u2062on a regular basis, the surprise today\u2062 would be hardly greater than what the contemporaries\u200c of Burroughs,\u2064 Edison, and Ford experienced on reading in newspapers of the \u2062trio&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/greg-gutfeld-pans-joe-and-kamalas-awful-adventure-the-1970s-called-they-want-their-unmitigated-disasters-back\/\" title=\"Greg Gutfeld Pans \u2018Joe And Kamala\u2019s Awful Adventure\u2019: \u2018The 1970s Called, They Want Their Unmitigated Disasters Back\u2019\">road trips<\/a> together.<\/p>\n<p>The principal\u2062 benefit of \u2062the episodic approach is to reveal aspects of the temperaments of \u200dthe \u2062three that weren&#8217;t well \u200cknown at the time and have tended to be neglected by historians. Davis\u200d effectively and amusingly \u2063depicts Burroughs&#8217;s\u2063 initial resistance to automobiles, his tempting by the shiny new car Ford sent him, his acquired enthusiasm for speeding along\u200d familiar routes at speeds he hadn&#8217;t \u200cimagined \u200cpossible, and his \u2064ultimate retirement from driving after \u2064some frightening \u200dbut luckily uneventful mishaps. &#8220;I often wish I\u200c had never seen a Ford car,\u2062 or any other,&#8221; Burroughs\u200d reflected. Yet still he felt \u2062what had pulled him in. \u2064&#8221;All such things create \u2064wants which we never knew before.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Davis conveys Edison&#8217;s tactics for offsetting the\u200c hearing deficiency\u2063 he&#8217;d experienced from youth. In conversations with one person \u2063he could manage well enough, but in\u2064 meetings or \u200dat\u2064 banquets \u200dthe babble left \u200dhim lost. Edison arranged for an assistant to convert others&#8217; comments into Morse code \u2062tapped to a receiver hidden beside Edison, who could decipher the dots and dashes on the fly. \u200dThe one thing that\u2064 gave him away was the occasional lag between the punchline of a \u200djoke\u200c and his\u2063 hearty laugh.<\/p>\n<p>Ford is \u200bDavis&#8217;s most interesting character, because he is the most conflicted. In Ford the \u2064struggle between past and future \u200cwas chronic. The farm boy \u2064from Michigan never \u2064entirely accepted his role as titan of industry. He relentlessly streamlined the\u2062 production process of his automobiles, \u200bdemanding more \u2062and \u2062more from his workers, yet\u2064 he \u200cbelieved himself to be a friend of labor. And he was, at times.\u2063 He boosted pay to the unheard-of rate of five dollars per day, bringing down on his head the wrath of other manufacturers\u200b who\u200c couldn&#8217;t compete at \u200bthat level. Ford&#8217;s revolutionary concept was that\u200c his workers ought to be able to afford \u200cthe product they made. Not only did\u200c this\u200d transform the\u200d auto industry, which had previously catered to the rich, but it laid the \u2063basis for the \u2064high-wage, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/report-u-s-immigrant-population-hits-record-46-6-million\/\" title=\"Report: U.S. Immigrant Population Hits Record 46.6 Million\">high-productivity economy<\/a> that\u200c catapulted\u200d America \u200cto national wealth and \u200dworld power.<\/p>\n<p>Like some other brilliantly \u2064successful entrepreneurs, Ford judged\u200d that \u200chis acumen in \u2064business would extrapolate to other fields. In an episode Davis might have done \u200dmore with, not \u2064least since it\u200b took place during the period \u200che covers, Ford tried to broker a peace \u2063between the European belligerents in World War I before the United States became involved. He engaged a\u200c ship to carry \u2063himself and other antiwar activists \u2062across the Atlantic; he and\u2062 they presumed \u200cthey\u2063 could talk \u2064sense\u200c into the leaders of\u2062 the \u2064warring countries. Instead they fell to \u200cfighting among themselves and the &#8220;Peace Ship&#8221; initiative proved \u200ca fiasco.<\/p>\n<p>No wonder\u2063 a road trip appealed to \u200dFord on his \u2063return. Davis\u200c shows\u2063 him \u2063acting like that farm boy again. Sitting around a \u200dcampfire, \u200dFord suddenly announced he could leap over the flames. \u200dHe proceeded to\u200d do just that. &#8220;He was as nimble and lively as a boy of eighteen,&#8221; \u200drecorded \u2064a\u2062 member \u200bof the group that accompanied the trio. &#8220;All of his cares \u200bhad been\u200d left behind.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The \u2063cares would catch up to Ford and the others. Life \u2063wins in the end. But for the duration of the\u2064 trip, \u200cthey kept life at a distance. That&#8217;s what road trips are for.<\/p>\n<p>Ford and friends had fun. We have fun \u2062too, as Davis takes us along\u2063 for\u200b the ride.<\/p>\n<p><i>American Journey: On the Road with Henry Ford, Thomas\u2062 Edison, and \u200dJohn \u200dBurroughs<\/i><br \/>  by Wes Davis<br \/> \u200dW.W. Norton, 384 pp., $30<\/p>\n<p><i>H.W. Brands teaches history at\u2063 the University of Texas at Austin. His\u2062 latest book \u2064is <\/i>The Last Campaign<i>; his next \u2062book, \u2062to be published \u200din November, is<\/i> Founding\u2062 Partisan<i>s<\/i>. <i>He\u200d can\u200b be\u200b followed on <\/i><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hwbrands\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><i>Twitter<\/i><\/a><i>  and on <\/i><a href=\"https:\/\/hwbrands.substack.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><i>Substack<\/i><\/a><i>.<\/i><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>were still a novelty. In &#8220;American Journey: On the Road with Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, and John Burroughs,&#8221; the author explores the adventures of these three iconic figures as they embarked on a road trip together. With their expertise and passion for automobiles, they paved the way for future generations of travelers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1658,"featured_media":2013338,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[544],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2013337","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-free-beacon"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2013337","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1658"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2013337"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2013337\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2013338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2013337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2013337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2013337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}