CHAPTER XXII CHICAGO (1893)

[Kent Mueller]

Good question, I wouldn't want the task of finding references to it in print
from the era, but I'd think it'd be commonly recognized at the time. The
phrase was certainly current at the time of the Civil War, and thirty years
after that Civil War vets still dominated the political scene at least, in
the same way that WWII vets dominated through the 1970s. It had probably
fallen from press references and so on for the most part. Adams seemed like
a man from an earlier era, as you note, and his might well be one of the
last references in print in a non-historical way. I've never read him, but I
understand he spoke and wrote of himself in the third person. I think I
picked that up from Pynchon actually...

Kent Mueller 

> From: Paul Mackin <paul.mackin at verizon.net>
> Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2006 02:43:28 -0400
> To: pynchon-l at waste.org
> Subject: Re: CHAPTER XXII CHICAGO (1893)
> 
> 
> On Jul 18, 2006, at 11:38 AM, Kent Mueller wrote:
> 
>> The Northwest as a reference for this region has just about faded from
>> American memory, disappearing as the country expanded westward,
>> probably not
>> long after Adams made his comment. There are only a few remnants,
>> such as
>> Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.
> 
> Would anyone besides Henry Adams still  be thinking of the Mid-West
> as the  North-West as late as 1893? After all Oregon had achieved
> statehood in 1859. Adams always seemed a half century or so behind .
> Still living in the  early 19th Century,  as my little quip  would
> have it.  He had the reputation for being an odd sort  of historian.
> Was chided for writing his book on the Middle-ages only a few years
> after  he discovered that there  WAS a  Middle-ages. But that's OK.
> Pynchon found good  things to like in him. Mainly recognition that
> Adams like himself was a supreme master of prose.
> 
> 
>> 
>> For anyone intrigued by surveying, etc. after reading M & D, the
>> Ordinance
>> also established the township system as a standard of
>> administration that
>> persisted as the country grew. The standard township was 36 square
>> miles,
>> divided into sections of (I think) a square mile, and thence into
>> quarter
>> sections. Here's a typical legal description that all titles of deed
>> (ownership) must contain in much of the US west of Pennsylvania:
>> 
>> "...with reference to title to lot 41 (being Franke's Subdivision) in
>> Section No. 16, Township No. 7 north, of range No. 22 east
>> [16-7-22], in the
>> Sixth Ward of the City of Milwaukee, in the County of Milwaukee and
>> State of
>> Wisconsin..."
>> 
>> It was strict grid with no allowance for geography other than for
>> large
>> bodies of water, and replaced the hodge-podge system that existed
>> out east.
>> Exceptions would include the pre-existing Parishes of Louisiana and
>> probably
>> the original Spanish land grants of the Southwest.
>> 
>> Kent
>> 
>>> From: Dave Monroe <monropolitan at yahoo.com>
>>> Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 12:49:49 -0700 (PDT)
>>> To: rich <richard.romeo at gmail.com>, Tim Strzechowski
>>> <dedalus204 at comcast.net>
>>> Cc: Pynchon-L <pynchon-l at waste.org>
>>> Subject: Re: CHAPTER XXII CHICAGO (1893)
>>> 
>>> The Northwest Territory, also known as the Old
>>> Northwest and the Territory North West of the Ohio,
>>> was a governmental region within the early United
>>> States and is still sometimes (as the Northwest)
>>> considered a geographical region; the term "Pacific
>>> Northwest" disambiguates it from the regular
>>> Northwest. Passed by the Continental Congress on July
>>> 13, 1787, the Northwest Ordinance provided for the
>>> administration of the territories and set rules for
>>> admission as a state. On August 7, 1789, the U.S.
>>> Congress affirmed the Ordinance with slight
>>> modifications under the Constitution. The territory
>>> included all the land of the United States west of
>>> Pennsylvania and northwest of the Ohio River. It
>>> covered all of the modern states of Ohio, Indiana,
>>> Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin, as well as the
>>> northeastern part of Minnesota. The area covered more
>>> than 260,000 square miles (673,000 km²)
>>> 
>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northwest_Territory
>>> 
>>> --- rich <richard.romeo at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> I wonder what Adams is talking about when he refers
>>>> to the 'Northwest'--is this code for Chicago?
>>> 
>>> __________________________________________________
>>> Do You Yahoo!?
>>> Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
>>> http://mail.yahoo.com
>>> 
>> 
>> 
> 
> 
>