In My Own Voice vol. 3 draft -

Dr. Lant passed away April 16, 2023

In My Own Voice
Reading from My Collected Works
Vol. 3 – On Water

DEDICATION

To Bill and Melinda Gates, who, amongst so many other benefits, are bringing the benefit of clean water to Africa.

INTRODUCTION
https://youtu.be/L3ZaUf6g4Q4

Good day, ladies and gentlemen. Here is the preface to our introduction, “Water Music” (1717), composed by George Frideric Handel (1685-1759). Sadly, a great percentage of Earth’s population can derive no happiness from “Water Music”, for their water resources are dwindling or are already gone, as you see from the following story. Thus, there can be no “Water Music” when there is no water.

This picture tells more than a mere thousand words. In fact, it is the clear summation of a process in which we are all caught up whether we think about it or not; whether we do anything about it or not. It involves one of the greatest rivers on Earth, the Colorado, and should you have tears, this is the place to shed them.

Millions of people approach the Colorado and its Grand Canyon with a sentiment that is little short of awe. Whether you stand at the rim and look everywhere around you, or, being a bit more adventurous, descend to dip your hand in this surging water, you feel the presence not just of Nature, but of Nature’s God. No one who approaches this river of power and primordial grace, from whatever direction, and in whatever way, comes away untouched.

But there is a stronger picture that overawes the massive canyon and swift fleeting river, and that is the picture of the river not there, and this picture does not merely awe us all, but frightens us if we have a lick of sense. It is a picture of water removed, thus life removed. It is the Colorado River, no longer God’s splendid creation, but merely a rocky water pipe.

You’ll see in this picture nothing but a riverbed. There are a hundred such miles at the end of the Colorado system… over a hundred miles of dust, dirt, rock, and an eerie feeling that God once passed this way, created its waters, and left them in our hands with what results you easily see. A hundred miles of the 1,450 mile waterway now has only the slightest memory of water, much less powerful water on a race to the great Pacific.

And you think, “Where did that massive river go?”; where are the waters that leapt high and shimmered in the sunlight? How could they there be up to a hundred feet deep, whilst here retain nothing but the memory of a majestic presence, majestic no longer, just thought-provoking, and even frightening.

For we know if the giant river can lose a hundred miles, it can lose a hundred more. And if the water level has dropped and dropped again, why so it can drop yet again and more.

This book is the story of water. It is the culmination of many streams of thought and information. My mother, for example, contributed the thought that one must write about big issues, issues which cannot be solved in a hour or day, but need a lifetime’s commitment. She would have been proud that I tackle, on so many occasions, the issue that is water.

My father contributed a joyous obsession with America’s national parks, particularly the Grand Canyon. I was a teenager at the scoffing age when my father insisted we live up to Horace Greeley’s famous line “Go West young man, go West.” And so we did, to marvel as all marvel who approach this sinuous deity, for we know we could not have created such a spectacle ourselves. We needed massive assistance from a greater being, who gave it freely.

I thank my brother, age 8 or so, for his assistance in gathering Illinois Maple seeds. We threw these tiny helicopters with abandon over the sides of the Canyon, only to discover its many ridges and ledges blocked their descent.

I added my two cents too, by studying the mudflats where once the full panoply of water possibilities fertilized the landscape, now moribund.

It might have been as notable as Egypt’s Nile based civilization. Civilization came to Egypt via the Nile. By contrast, civilization failed to reach the mudflats at the end of the Colorado because there was no water running there, and so there was no Valley of the Kings, no water-borne Pharaohs, nothing of greatness, except a clear understanding of the great loss that took place when water departed. Sadly, most people still do not understand the loss or its magnitude, but it affects them every single day.

Five views of water

We all know the old proverb, that no man puts his toe in the same river twice. Water is a thing of constant change and movement. It is not the same when I pronounce this word, as it was when I pronounced the word before. Water, then, is the ultimate metaphor for change. But change is not all good, and can be painful and ruinous. Our job must be, therefore, to understand the requirements of water, and to work with water to achieve what we must without being profligate and wasteful, as it so often is in these days which future generations will cite for our selfishness and carelessness.

In this book, I take up five water based stories. What they have in common is that each features a way that water may be presented and used, so that future generations will have less to blame us about.

Chapter 1 involves my childhood relationship to a quintessentially American form of water, “the crik”. Here, my brother and I had a first class course in damming the water and wending it to our way. At an early age, we learned how to “master”, so we thought, the meandering brook which rippled past our Midwest acres. We found out how to keep water ever present, so that our bidding need never be postponed.

We also learned how to flood the neighborhood, and so fascinating was the result of this exercise that we did it again and again, as did the great dam builders of our time, such as those who built the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze in China, the Aswan Dam on the Nile in Egypt, and the massive system of dams that soon entrapped the entire Colorado River system. And least we forget the Belle Fourche Dam, where I used to hunt for arrowheads when I was a boy, and successfully too. It is now 8,000 acres of water, and of fish that came only with that water.

One day down to Cairo

If you come from the Midwest, as I do, you will have grown up upon Old Muddy, the Mississippi. Mississippi is not just a river, not just a convenient way to divide the nation it bisects, it is instead a thing of certainty, plodding certainty. The Mississippi need never pretend to virtues it does not have, for it is the working machine of a stupendous enterprise, Old Man River. This story comprises Chapter 2.

It is a story of fear, of love, and the river that ran in everyone’s mind. My father was 8 years old when this story took place in the dark days of 1931. He was too young to know that the great river he saw, replete with its full quota of steamboats, was just at its perfect moment, just months before this entire region of the nation, along with every other region of the nation, was down, pleading on its knees.

As you read this chapter, you will feel the movement of the river that twists and turns forever in your mind, carrying you along in its inexorable flow. You will see how man and water come together and go forward, determined to reach a snug haven for both. And should you leave the Mississippi, as I have done, your memories need not weaken. The river and all its movements will move forever through your memory, for the Mississippi never dies… it lives on forever, and always takes you along to places you wish to go, and in the way you most wish to get there.

Flash cards

My next observations on the subject of water are the result of my high school habit of using flash cards to memorize language. In this connection, my box of flash cards included the word “freshet”. This you will remember means an outburst of fresh water moving into oblivion in the salty sea.

I liked the sound of this word, I liked the way I could roll it on my tongue, I liked the way I could use it, but most of all, because it gave me immunity from my father. I could say, for instance, when he said do such and such a thing, that I was busy doing my flash cards, freshet always included. He may have been irritated, no doubt was, but my defense could not be breached. Freshet and the other flash cards were, then, my companions when my father, through herculean effort, was able to book seats right behind the 1964 Rose Parade Grand Marshall Dwight David Eisenhower, general, president, beloved of the nation.

My father’s seats were just two rows behind the recently ex-president, and, like everyone else who could, we monitored his every movement and word…. until the Rose Bowl game began, when all eyes shifted to the gridiron. I will not share with you here more of this tale; that is the purpose of the tale itself… but I will say I only went to one football game in my entire life after that event, and that was the Harvard-Yale game of 1970. I only went to say I had gone.

Sewers

I do not believe that I have had, in my entire life, an educated discussion on the subject of sewers. Furthermore, I do not believe that the rest of humanity has had such a conversation either. As a result, from excessive fastidiousness, the water supplies of all our great cities and nations are threatened. Thus is the importance of our collective international sewer systems proven, for, of the many municipal services that exist, this one is among the very most important.

In literature, in films, sewers are portrayed as dank, smelly, distasteful, putrid, and best left to discussion at a far later date. This is wrong, and could well cost us the very roots of our civilization. In preparation for this chapter just the other day, it has occurred to me, as it has occurred to me before, that not one of our innumerable candidates for high office ever mentions the word sewer. I fell impelled therefore to stalk these candidates up to my final breath, whispering as I go… sewer, sewer, sewer. I might be construed to be a menace, a nemesis, a kook… someone with a misguided interest in the systems which carry away waste and maintain our water systems, but unless we gather together and scream at the top of our lungs “Sewer!”, we shall reap the punishment that comes from our tight-lipped fastidiousness.

And I hope, therefore, that having read this chapter, you will join the cause of sewers that work, and never ever put the need for this service out of our mind. For, to the extent that we ignore this problem, is the extent to which we will never have a solution, except a solution none of us will like.

“With malice towards none”

The film “Logan’s Run” (1976), based on the book (1967) by William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson, has a dramatic scene of the Lincoln Memorial and the Reflecting Pool. In this scene, the Lincoln Memorial is covered with giant vines and other obscuring plants, indicating acute neglect. The two protagonists stumble upon this monument, and neither it nor its sentiments have any meaning for them, for they are escaping from a culture where everyone at 30 must be liquidated. But of course, we have no such culture, and must learn to live with a far greater range of people than Logan had to.

Later in the film, Logan finds his way into the demolished Capitol Building, only to find yet another portrait of Abraham Lincoln, who even he, from another civilization, understands is a man of consequence. Such a man, having succeeded in keeping the great Union together, is entitled to every consideration. The Reflecting Pool is one such consideration, and it is a story that clearly indicates our values and what must be done to preserve our great works.

I am not going to tell you the full story here; you may read the chapter for that. I am simply going to say that water, which can so easily be fouled, creates, when better used, the beauty of reflection, where every element comes together to create and intensify the whole, which at that moment is the very essence of a never ending beauty and glamor.

Go now and enjoy this unique book, comprising as it does text, video, pictures, and music. You are one of the first people on Earth to see this singular combination of elements, and enjoy the result that together they deliver.

Chapter 1
“The Crick, a tale of boyhood long ago.”
https://youtu.be/ONfZ8rU3Sd8

by Dr. Jeffrey Lant

Author’s program note. It’s funny how memory works. One minute you’re thinking about the next article you must write regarding the still unsettled events in Kiev, the possibility of civil war and a first rate crisis of universal concern and gnawing anxiety, a real humdinger.

The next, your eye having caught sight of a shimmering puddle on the way into Harvard Square, you’re thinking of something your mind has disregarded for over a half century, and you find you’re smiling. The scene has been kept tight for all these years for just this moment… and you welcome it with a mental embrace and heartfelt joy, glad to have it again; glad to share it with you.

Moving water.

It’s the end of February hereabouts. We know the sun exists, at least by repute, but we don’t see much of it. Rather, there is a cool gray mist hovering over the slumbering land; the kind of mist that makes you daydream and drift. Who sends it to us… and why do we always wonder just what’s lurking in its watery labyrinth, a monster, the Lady of the Lake? Not the sun…

Then there’s the mud, an ocean of mud, mud in every color and with every degree of grainy or slick inconvenience. I get more than my share because when asked to take off their shoes most of my endless stream of visitors adamantly asserts, and with a touch of asperity, that while others may carry mud about, they do not and never have; that the suggestion is little short of insulting and could result in a nasty episode on the (muddy) field of honor.

Thus I reluctantly give way to allowing what I most resolutely oppose… and so the mud they carry moves forward, ever forward, telltale evidence that I must be more forceful with the next arrival… but rarely am.

There is also water in all its various late winter manifestations: droplets, flakes, slush, ice (including the killer variation in black), puddles, tiny streams and haughty rivers that say “Leave us alone for we have places to go and no time for chit chat with the likes of you, lubber.”)

I’m not talking about any of these watery options, no indeed. I am talking about a rambling stream of water called by me and my early prairie neighbors “the crick”, every byway of America has them, and they are variously called branch, brook, beck, burn, creek, gill, kill, lick, mill race, rill river, syke, bayou, rivulet, streamage and more. There is nothing more common than this, where a body of water with a current is confined within a bed and stream banks.

It is a sight that no real boy can see without itchy fingers and the glint of determination in his seasoned eye, a glint that ensures adventures and splendid triumphs.

No one has to tell us even a word about the crick and its place in our lives. I know. My brother Kevin knows… and so we go in search of the things we will need, things like the best and most durable of shovels.

Good shovels with stout handles are required after the ravages of winter. Storms and ice have moved many things which we must return to their proper places, and we are keen to know who has additional ones which may be required. Ours are often lost, taken by adults who pilfer our tools
when we are not looking, and by doting grandparents who see in our shovels projects we can do for them. On such an understanding they are happy to loan.

Soon the near-by garage is filled with our gear, gloves (for rocks rend even calloused hands), long sticks with hooks, shoes that grip… and a fleet or two of boats of every kind, for our navy is multi-purpose and needs a plethora of vessels ranging from the one reminiscent of Cleopatra’s Nile barge with golden poop (though no perfume in its love-sick sails) to the replica of “Old Ironsides”, always a favorite, whose great victories were ever ready for recital.

Soon my father was complaining about our infringements to his precious garage space, but not too strenuously for he was a Navy man and knew what was necessary. About the time of his third warning, we were ready and so were the members of our audience and crew, for the Lant brothers were celebrated for their artistry with the crick and its aquatic possibilities and mischief.

George J. Quacker.

Being the oldest and most seasoned, I of course was commodore and had a cap like Humphrey Bogart wore in “The African Queen” (1951). It had withstood every ravage and bore its many wounds with deserved pride.

My rank and leadership did not, however, go unchallenged, for no watery event ever took place without the presence of George Quacker, a Pekin duck with a decided point of view on every subject, a voice that carried for miles, and a beak sharp enough to carry his determined point.

George had arrived one Easter along with his spouse, Georgia. Half a dozen or more goslings followed, a brood the parents tended with deliberate care and the assistance of the brothers who helped teach them how to swim in the bathtub (what a mess).

Sadly one night a raccoon literally frightened Georgia to death whilst looking for a way to get into her cage. We captured the murderer and shipped him off to the Children’s Zoo in Hollywood, Illinois, where many of our pets spent their declining years.

George was lonely, and even taking care of the ducklings didn’t entirely fill his time. And so he adopted… me, and became a familiar sight flying to greet me, and loudly too… or getting up at first light to summon me for (his) breakfast. He was known to follow me to school, too; the principal summoning me to take him home, while the entire school called his name, cheering him on. He loved the attention…

He also made sure that we dammed the crick just so to give him and his family the most commodious and convenient of swimming holes, the envy of his breed. And so while Kevin and I laboriously moved the flag stones into place, our intent to overawe Hoover’s Dam, George directed events… a sharp peck given if he found our attention lagging. But it rarely did, for we were as avid as he was to produce perfection… and so we worked with a will to ensure we had it.

Of course the result was magnificent… so much so that we stopped the crick running past all the houses after ours while a growing lakelet covered the culverts, drive ways, lawns and flower beds of our long-suffering up-crick neighbors who would have kept my parents on speed dial had that technology existed. “Shirley, Jeffrey and Kevin are at it again!”… and so we were, happy in our work, happy to recall it today, a day when a smile was so very timely and hard to come by..

Musical note

For the music to accompany this article, I have selected Hoagy Camichael’s 1930 gem, “Lazy River”. It conjures those blissful days when life was for living and not just for worrying about. Listen to it now and be 16 or so all over again, skin bronzed, muscles agile, and time yours to command. “Up a lazy river by the old mill stream/ That lazy, hazy river where we both can dream…”

https://www.youtube.com/watch

Chapter 2
“Of boys and the rivers they must travel.”
https://youtu.be/VBX__WbC8Es

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant

Author’s program note. If you were a real boy, like my father and like me, you never saw a river you did not want to know better. But it had to be a river… a thing of shimmering possibilities, always moving, always beckoning, never the same, not even for an instant.

This thing called to you, and sleep was always difficult when you were near a river traversed by people from far away places, who went where they liked, when they liked and had real lives like you could only imagine. And you did imagine, early and late… until the chance arrived for you to do more than imagine… to have instead the chance to see for yourself. For that is what you always wanted… and now that you are grown… you want it still, don’t you? For when the river has seized your brain (as every river aims to do)… the river owns you for life… and you can never see one, a proper river mind, that does not, siren-like and luring, call you to come see what you know so well you have missed for so long.

For this article, I might have selected as incidental music Jerome Kern’s iconic tune “Old Man River” from the 1929 film “Showboat.” But that tune is too dark and challenging for my purpose… and while Paul Robson’s rendition is brilliant, it forces you to dig deep and think about things you might not want to think about just then…. for dreaming is what you want to do on the river… a very different thing from cogitation and ponderation.

Instead, I chose a song of the late nineteenth century, “Polly Wolly Doodle”, first published at Harvard, my own alma mater, right across the street from where I am writing now. It appeared in a Harvard student songbook in 1880. It’s a bouncy tune (what else would Shirley Temple have sung in her 1935 film “The Littlest Rebel”?); the kind of organized nonsense a boy would sing with the unabashed glee of unburdened mind, thrilled as he was to be on the river and away from mom who made him wipe his feet and wash his hands before dinner.

You didn’t know what a “polly wolly doodle” was, but you knew you would like it… You’ll find the words and lyrics in any search engine. Go ahead, sing it. It’ll lift your spirits and put you in just the right mood… the river mood.

Any river, not merely some river, no matter how great.

This is a tale about rivers, all rivers, not just some river, no matter how renowned, celebrated, powerful and captivating. This may rile the spirit of “Old Man River,” the Mississippi, the greatest river on earth, but, with bold temerity, I remind this river’s spirit that it is so great because all the rivers of this great continent pay it the full tribute of their every drop. And so this, while always being homage to you, is also tribute to all who share your sinuous attributes…

River folks

The Marshalls and all their branches, for all they were kin to statesmen as great and as different as Chief Justice Marshall of undying Supreme Court fame and a much later General of the Army and saviour of Europe George C. Marshall, had the itch to go West. And so, in due course, they came to see the great Mississippi flow from the vantage point of Stronghurst, Illinois, a piddling river town which even today can call hardly a thousand souls its own. But because of the river, which could take them anywhere, they put down deep roots in a town from nowhere. And that river, its people and its cultures, bit deep.

My grandfather Harvey Lant, who died when I was young, must have felt that bite for he took his only son over ta’ Burlington, ‘cross the river, ta’ where the great river queens held raucous court. It was because such royalty (especially the casino boats and the showboats) were gawdy, meretricious, of salacious intent and always deep in the ways of river trickery and hoodwinkery that the real ladies, the God-fearing, church-social ladies, the stalwarts of our lives, never went with their menfolk when they had determined, as my ordinarily mild grandfather now had, to see the great river and its ways close at hand. The queens and the ladies did not know each other.

Grampa had invited his nephew Richard, my father’s cousin, to be a part of this strictly male, and as it happened unique event. The boy was anxious to go, would go, but as my father recalls, the youthful disdain and contempt abiding after 7 decades and more, he was “mollycoddled” by his stern mama Grace…. a woman of iron habits and high degrees of strictness, strictures, scriptures who made sure he would not go. My father, just 8 himself, recalls to this day the rue in that little pinched face as Richard was left behind and they set off…. Years later, when he was a wealthy man, this cousin confessed he remained deeply regretful, for the river had eaten in to him, too, at least a bit. Still… had he really wanted to go… But with the mollycoddled, you could never tell…

And so this became because of one woman’s worrying nature, a once-in-a-lifetime journey where one discovers along the way one’s father… his values… and, the most important thing of all, his love for you…

Burlington, Iowa, now boarding for all the destinations on earth.

Even today when only the vestiges of Burlington’s high-flying past remain, it is still possible to see this city as it wants to be seen… as a place of international demeanor and outlook, a place to connect anyone to anywhere he wants to go; not some hick town in the corn belt, but a grand destination, entirely familiar with gourmet foods (fresh local, too), the best wines of epoch vintages, high stepping musicales and painted ladies no better than they should be. This was possible because of the river and only because of the river. And grandfather thought my father should see it… and I admire him the more for the thought, for perhaps he left behind a smoldering spouse, who would well and surely give him her unvarnished opinion later… in dinners a little overcooked… in favorite foods suddenly unavailable.. in linens changed less frequently and sour towels left a day too long … in dark glances and meaningful asides… all this and more primordial evidences of unmistakable distaff disapproval, unanswerable, yet deeply felt and always clearly understood.

But that was later…

Now, in the midst of Depression ravaged Illinois, with the land stalked by fears of every kind, they were en route to the Burlington Iowa bridge where you could see the river, broader here, and the fleet that would sail in your mind’s eye for your whole life. And it was all happening in a place called Burlington, named after one of England’s most stylish milords, a place that launched steamboats of beauty and renown…. and the railroad grandchildren Jeffrey and Kevin would take to the zoo in Hollywood, Illinois. But that was years from now, and unimagined.

What was the name of the ship? The odds were it would be queen of…, belle of…, then one of the grand river ports whose names resonate… St. Louis, Cincinnati, Natchez, New Orleans… he thought it might have been the Delta Queen, and I hope it was; though my research showed that she was in Stockton, California those years. That was the ship presidents selected for a little cruise… and always the pictures for Life magazine.. Truman, Carter and Hoover did it… but Hoover did it later when the nation hated him less for doing so little when so much was required.

One day down to Cairo, one day back up.

You can imagine the joy of this boy, the only son, so lucky so little touched — yet — by the economic maelstrom … Here’s a hunch why his father was so insistent about going now. Like millions of fathers across the land, Harvey followed the dismal news and in this year of grace 1932, there was more to fear than fear itself. And so he decided that his son should have this treat before his ability to bestow such a gift was submerged by events. And so there was a great urgency about the matter…

Thus, from the Texas deck of a great queen, threatened like everything but majestic now, lightly passengered, theirs to enjoy, they followed the route of Huck and Jim to Cairo (Kay-Row), which made locals chuckle when the out-of-towners said Ki-Row, llinois…

Huck missed the turn to the Ohio River… and thus sent them into the Deep South, living hell for Jim as a runaway slave. This day the captain did not err; I doubt they would have minded if he had, and so they went to Cairo, a place of dark beauty and diabolic secrets.. My father remembers nothing of that but recalls his father holding his hand as they moved along the swift Ohio… and the look in his eyes that day… a look he did not understand until he had an 8 year old of his own…

Musical note

Here is the link to Shirley Temple singing “Polly Wolly Doodle”. It surely is a bouncy tune.

Chapter 3
“Freshet. 3:59 a.m. Eastern time. 65 degrees Fahrenheit. Wind SW at 11 mph. Humidity 90%. May 24, 2011.”
https://youtu.be/_YoHJcxINXs

by Dr. Jeffrey Lant

I was scheduled to write quite a different thing today from this, but when the shutters blew in and snapped against the glass with cannot-be-denied insistence, making me at once startled and alert, I knew another force, call it Nature, call it Aeolus, Greek ruler of the winds; call it anything you care to… but certainly, a greater force than I was demanding, loudly too, my complete attention. I gave it.

The air was pregnant with liquidity; the rain had pelted in the night, the ground now etched with the evidence of freshets as they danced to the sea, happy for their journey, kissing the land to bring forth the luxuries of fruit and flowers; the necessities of grain and every nutrient.

Even the least observant could tell, there was something lush about the air and its caresses, somehow reminding one of some tropical destination so fetching on fly blown papers in travel agencies… a destination you save to visit then find deeply disappointing upon going, though you’d die than ever admit it. (And never to those who have hung upon your not quite honest tales.)

The air was thick, wet, heavy… not at all oppressive, completely comforting. You feel somehow even the most rigid task master ever conceived would (you are sure) pardon the venal sin of laying abed this day, such sloth spurring no guilt at all but pronounced self-satisfaction that you have lived to feel such a day as this, and at an early hour, too.

Freshet, you think well of yourself for remembering this word, so apt, moribund now, the careless work of generations wanting more and more communication, but killing the words that make it all possible.

Freshet. You were 16 or 17 the year freshet ceased to be a factoid unknown to you one minute and became instead the embodiment of good habits and certain success, bet on it.

Flash cards

Prestigious colleges were competitive then… but not as sharply so as now. Some sage counselor (perhaps even me) had recommended improving vocabulary (so very pertinent) by copying words from the dictionary and becoming a presence in constant motion and cogitation, thus:

(flash card side 1) freshet, n.

(flash card side 2) rush of fresh water flowing into the sea.

New words added, new words mastered, and a wonderful way to torment parents and relations, one irritating but beyond punishment.

“Jeffrey, take out the garbage!”

But the-best-mother-in-the world quickly learned the inevitable response.

“Mom, I can’t now. I’m working on my flash cards.”

It was unanswerable… and one took pride in one’s skill, for developing another useful talent, sure to come in handy with the she-who-must-be-obeyed certain to make her inevitable appearance in due course.

My parents never captured and reduced this irksome citadel, though on one memorable day, things reached a Crisis… and in front of Dwight David Eisenshower, too, his high and mighty duties at an end, shedding his celebrity and sharing his elder statesman years as grand marshal of a vastly honored Tournament of Roses, one new year’s day.

Eisenhower brought his international renown and grandfatherly assurances. I brought my flash cards. The forces were nicely matched.

My father, a serving sailor in World War II, venerated Eisenhower (as who did not at that day’s splendid Rose Parade?) as the leader of freedom’s army, our bulwark for goodness, the American Way, and the values and virtues of the great heartland of the nation where “I like Ike” was not merely a motto but an irrefutable mantra.

My father had moved mountains to ensure that his family sat so close to the former president we could see, quite clearly too, every move he made; had we been lip readers not a single word he uttered would have gone unknown. Alas, we did not have that skill.

Soon, however, it was time to turn our attention from the casual conversation of a legend to the day’s truly important business, the football game. But I never thought that sport or any sport, no matter how agilely played, nearly as exciting as a single word of our word-blessed language… for a football player may move a ball… but a single word can move the world and the path of humanity.

Now as the teams kicked, ran, shouted, huddled, and caressed each other every now and again, I sat immersed in my flash cards, scarcely looking up. I think this day I brought the Latin flash cards. These were store bought, unlike the English language cards; I had several other sets for different subject areas, too. Eisenhower, the great magistrate of a great republic, surely would understand my priorities; preferring stern duty over mere recreation. Thus, I had no difficulty rationalizing my choice.

After all (though I didn’t know it then), Eisenhower himself had given up the great love of his life and the divorce from Mamie, because his friend and commander General George Marshall reminded him in no uncertain terms of where his duty lay and the heavy price the republic would pay losing him, as it would should he choose love. Perhaps the general was reminded of his chere amie that day. It might easily happen…

In any event, I soon became aware that my football crazed father was casting glances my way packed with aspersions and the promise of Serious Words, even a Lecture. I knew the harbinger’s signs…

And soon came the preliminary salvo, along these lines etched in memory:

“Jeffrey Ladd…!” The exasperated tone.

Sotto voce to the stranger sitting next to him, “my son the intellectual…” Eyes skyward, touch of theatrics.

And then, not right away perhaps but as sure as sun, “Jeffrey, I am NEVER going to take you to a football game again.”

And so he delivered the coup de grace… that made me grateful then, and laugh today; to be deprived for life of a thing both onerous and dull, the better to arrange my legions of words, to play the most interesting game of all, the one you play within the world without walls, your own head.

But while I exulted then, for I was free! Free! I little knew or comprehended the pain this gave my father or the fact he thought such sentence meaningful, when I did not. The sad fact is, getting my way through disappointing my father cut one avenue producing shared experiences… and I regret this now as only an adult of some wisdom and insight can… and hardly an adolescent since the dawn of creation is equipped to handle.

It all came pouring out early this morning at the moment when the night hangs on for dear life because it knows so well its time is nigh… and that this night is about to be gone forever, replaced by a new day, fresh-as-paint, not content to wait a moment; pushing the old aside without compunction or regret.

One strong breeze so laden with moisture you could wring it out like a towel; one rap of the shutters on the glass… and the freshets of memory run strong and true to the immemorial sea, never stopping, always replenishing. Let them run as they will… and be thankful.

Musical note

For the music to this chapter, I have had no difficulty whatsoever choosing “Illinois Loyalty”, the first such song in the Great Republic.

My father never graduated from U of I, but, in the college tradition, once an alumn, always an alumn. I, too, have a connection with U of I. I supposedly spent several days as an infant sleeping in a drawer of my father’s fraternity. While I cannot precisely vouch for this tale’s complete accuracy, I do know that my godfather, Melvin Pipes, removed all the cutlery from the fraternity and gave it to my parents as a wedding present. I know it’s true, because some pieces are still extant and in my collection. No, I will not return them.

Note: In this 1964 Rose Bowl year, its golden jubilee, Illinois comfortably polished off the Washington Huskies 17-7. I wouldn’t know, of course, for that day I was focusing on amo, amas, amat.

Chapter 4
“Aging sewer lines could create service disruptions and turn us all into ‘les miserables.'”
https://youtu.be/HYJS9nDfNpU

by Dr. Jeffrey Lant

Author’s program note. Quick! Can you name a hugely popular Broadway musical which partly takes place in the ancient, fetid sewers of Paris? That would be Andrew Lloyd Webber’s 1980 mega-hit “Les Miserables”, a tale of love, fate, comradeship… and of the spirit of freedom and liberty that cannot be crushed and obliterated, no matter how many Inspector Javerts are set to the task.

The musical, of course, is based on the celebrated book by Victor Hugo (published in 1862). Hugo was a master story teller, a man able to get in your head and etch impressions that would last a lifetime. Here is his description of the great sewers of Paris…

“… Paris has another Paris under herself; a Paris of sewers; which has its streets, its crossings, its squares, its blind alleys, its arteries, and its circulation, which is slime, minus the human form.”

And so a great artist sketches the terrain for the words that will arise and grab you by the throat, forcing you to look, taking you where you do not want to go… but will go… where you will see things you never saw… in a place you hoped to avoid but which you must now confront… such is the mastery of this man and his vision.

The sad thing is, Hugo only wrote about the sewers of Paris… because every sewer system in the world needs his help to get people to focus on the crumbling lines within their midst, systems we never, ever think about but which are essential, absolutely essential, to our way of life.

How essential? Well, consider this: sewer and water systems, inextricably linked, 2 sides of the same coin, give us the water we drink, the toilets we flush, the H2O that runs factories, keeps offices open and enables firemen to do their dangerous, essential work. Therefore, when sewer systems fail cities cannot function, and epidemics break out. Thus, the importance of sewers and the water systems with which they are connected could scarcely be greater. Which is why their deterioration constitutes a problem of the first magnitude.

If this is so… and it most assuredly is… why do we hear nothing about this subject… why has nary a presidential candidate, or the president himself, offered a single word, or any concern, about the matter? For make no mistake about it, sewers are terra incognita for all, never, ever mentioned, much less discussed in what was once called “polite society”… Why is that anyway?

Sewers immediately conjure up images that no one except the few professionals involved in their efficient operation wants to consider. For the bulk of us, sewers are dark, creepy places, full of stinks and disgust which no “nice” person wants to know about, much less think about and discuss. They are the places where the colossal stench of mankind is somehow dealt with, without any bother at all to the rest of us. This is, of course, a prescription for disaster, the disaster that comes closer and closer as the systems on which our lives are based grow old and perilous.

“All the big cities have these problems, and to me it’s the unseen catastrophe,” says George Hawkins, general manager of the District of Columbia Water and Sewer Authority. “At least with bridges or a road, people have some idea of what it is because they drive on them and see them.” But with our crucial but aging sewer system, it’s out of sight, out of mind…

How big is this problem?

The plain fact is, the vast majority of the country’s water systems are in urgent need of repair and replacement. At a recent Senate hearing, it was estimated that, on average, 25 percent of drinking water leaks from water system pipes before reaching the faucet. The same committee was told it will take some $335 billion to resurrect water systems and $300 billion more to fix sewer systems.

These numbers are staggering, unimaginable, and have absolutely no chance of realization. My fellow countrymen, you see, reckon thus: if we don’t know about it, never discuss it, and make a concerted effort to ignore it, this problem, by definition, doesn’t exist and need never disturb our slumbers… no matter how many Senate and House panels and commissions composed of cadres of experts weigh in on the matter. Ignorant we are, and ignorant we intend to remain.

Just as we are ignorant about and intend to stay ignorant about the other aspects of our crumbling infrastructure where experts now reckon we need at least the $7 trillion it will cost to restore and repair roads, bridges, aviation, and transit in the next decade alone. Here, too, we have collectively decided to know little, do less… hoping against hope our increasingly inadequate systems will at least last our time and so become yet another essential thing we can blithely leave our hapless children and their staggering must-do list. We can only hope they’ll forgive us as they get bill after bill drawn on their inadequate accounts.

The need is pressing… the concern casual… the sense of immediacy and a need for prompt and thorough action non-existent. This being the case, what can we lotus-eaters, practitioners all of la dolce far niente expect, since we are adamant in our refusal to see?

Well here for openers is a pocketful of jarring thoughts:

* without necessary, overdue repairs to the system, water prices will experience constant increases;

* without necessary, overdue repairs, about 900 billion gallons of raw sewage will flow into waterways, spreading sickness and disgust;

* without necessary, overdue repairs over a trillion gallons of water a year will leak from pipes no longer up to the job.

Contact the water man.

“People count on turning on the faucet and having clean water come out,” says Senator Benjamin Cardin (D-Maryland), chairman of the subcommittee on water, “but that’s not true anymore.” Worse, without prompt, thorough, comprehensive action it may never be true again. Are you helpless in the face of this impending crisis? Certainly not.

Write Senator Cardin in Washington. Let him know you support the need for action and action now and want to be kept up-to-date on proposed reforms and their progress. If every reader of this article did this small thing, it would empower the senator in his important work and help the repairs and reforms we must have.

Musical note

Here is the link for Susan Boyle’s magnificent rendition of “I Dreamed A Dream” from “Les Miserables”; hers is a voice that makes you believe dreams are important and can come true:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aeo86iOS0QU

“There was a time when men were kind./ When their voices were soft/ And their words inviting./ There was a time when love was blind/ And the world was a song/ And the song was exciting/There was a time/ Then it all went wrong…”

Then consider this. No matter how wrong things went before, that will be as nothing when compared to the day that dawns without water and with an ocean of sewage submerging our land and everyone in it with filth. That disgusting day is drawing nigh and quickly, too, and if we do not act, this couplet from “Les Miserables” will be our fate:

“I had a dream my life would be/So different from this hell I’m living,” a hell where Susan Boyle’s voice might be the last sweetness on Earth.

Chapter 5
“Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool reopens. Thoughts on the man, his enduring greatness, and why over 24 million people visit annually and come away refreshed in mind and spirit.”
https://youtu.be/nALXsXVIA8Y

by Dr. Jeffrey Lant

Author’s program note: I am amongst the most vociferous critics of excessive government spending and waste, but today I am proud of the overdue restoration of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, a key part of what makes the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. such a serene and pleasing place, an absolutely essential destination for all citizens; a place which like Mecca, one must visit at least once in one’s life, thoughtful, respectful, yearning to be touched and uplifted by its lofty presence, never disappointed or let down.

The $34 million spent to restore the reflecting pool, the largest in the capital, is chump-change by Washington standards… but even if the cost was far more than it is, it would be money well spent…for the role of Abraham Lincoln, 16th president, is fundamental to understanding our Great Republic and reminding us just who we are and what we stand for.

Start by seeing and feeling what you see.

One of the several excellent vantage points for this revered tableau is from the Washington Monument. From this grand obelisk forever pointing up, the only suitable direction for our great endeavors, you see the long, rectangular pool which punctuates the National Mall. No true American, indeed no lover of freedom anywhere, can see this sight without a pang, for to walk the Mall and regard its monuments is to be touched by the greatest people of the nation, their exalted deeds and, always, their searing words which moved multitudes, inspiring the people, opening their minds and shaping our mission for bettering not just our lives but the lives of people worldwide, for that is a crucial and essential aspect of our national work.

How it all began.

There is a deep irony about the Lincoln Memorial and its jewel, the reflecting pool. If he had lived to complete his second term, it is unlikely Lincoln would have had such a monument. Instead, it might have been something like the nearby Jefferson Memorial, respectful to be sure but without the impact of what exists today. But a Southern sympathizer named John Wilkes Booth assassinated the president, and a nation riven by anger, rage, revenge, and a determination that this man and his mission be remembered forever, impelled the creation of an unparalleled civic temple which could not fail to impress and awe every visitor.

Its objective was to glorify Lincoln and the federal union he preserved. The resulting monument must, all agreed, make this abundantly clear, unmistakable, resounding through the years to come. Thus must Lincoln and his great deeds be remembered and raised high. The living Lincoln may not have wanted so much, probably would not… but for the martyred president the grieving, adamant nation would have it so and so it was.

Squabbles.

But, of course, nothing in Washington then or now can be accomplished without disagreement, argument, posturing and rancor. Lincoln, for all that he was the savior of the Great Republic, was the first Republican president and as such anathema to the gentlemen of the defunct Confederacy and the Northern Democrats who relied on their votes and block support. Monument to Lincoln there might ultimately be, but the road to that end would be as acrimonious and obstructed as the defeated Confederates could make it and as unimpressive as their potent congressional power could influence.

Thus, starting in 1867, Congress passed the first of many bills designed to advance matters, this time by creating a commission to erect a Lincoln monument. But it and a plethora of similar legislation were stalled, not just for years but for decades, most notably by House Speaker (and Democrat) Joe Cannon who between 1901 and 1908 made sure every such bill was defeated. Great Lincoln had defeated these rebels and their pernicious notions in life. They would do what they could to defeat him in death. But even here they failed, and at long last in 1910 the necessary legislation was passed, funds voted, design and location approved. Now the great work could be started in earnest…

And so a classic Greek temple featuring Yule marble from Colorado arose. It had 36 fluted Doric columns, one for each of the 36 states in the Union at the time of Lincoln’s death. Above the colonnade, inscribed on the frieze, are the names of the 36 states in the Union when Lincoln died. Every aspect of this graceful monument of simplicity even severity, elegance and restrained grandeur reinforced just one concept: the integrity of our federal union, united, indissoluble, eternal. And there, in solemn majesty, the one man who more than any other made these words a reality.

There, as rendered by sculptor Daniel Chester French, Abraham Lincoln, 19 feet tall from head to foot, resides for the numberless ages, a man of power, determination, resolution, contemplation… and most important a man of mercy, empathy, and love as evidenced by the words selected to adorn the walls and make it clear to posterity who he was and what he believed.

Of course, the Gettysburg Address, once known by every school child (but not today), was inscribed. And so were the immortal words from Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address (1865): “With malice towards none; with charity for all… to do all which may achieve and cherish a just, and a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.”

Now it was time for the Reflecting Pool.

Along the way, it was decided that this temple as much to the Great Republic as to Lincoln, could be made glorious with a reflecting pool that would dramatically show the treasures of the National Mall while magnifying in its waters the Mall’s trees and an expansive sky seemingly without limit. And so the Reflecting Pool of 2,029 feet (over a third of a mile) was added, modeled on the grand canals of Versailles and Fontainebleau, to be dedicated along with the Memorial itself in 1922.

The last surviving Lincoln was present that notable day, eldest son Robert Todd, more a Todd than a Lincoln. He never said what he thought about the apotheosis unto civic saint of the rough, ungainly, uncouth father who had so often embarrassed him. Whatever it was went with him to the grave.

Glorious again.

Over the years, this grand conception went steadily downhill, fetid, fouled with dirt, duck droppings, and trash. It was a monument to nothing more than poor management and oversight and because of its decaying fabric the loss of 500,000 gallons of city water a week, 30 million gallons a year. Now, thanks to public outrage and good old American technology and expertise, these problems are solved, not least the pool’s water supply which has been updated to eliminate stagnant water (and those noxious smells) by circulating water from the Tidal Basin. This place of a nation’s veneration is now magnificent again, ready for its unending stream of visitors, all needing Lincoln’s message of humanity and harmony, more necessary now than ever.

Author’s program note. For the music to accompany this article, I have selected “Dixie” written by Dan Emmett in 1859. Why this song, the finest reel ever written? Because of Lincoln himself. In 1865, he said “I have always thought that ‘Dixie’ was one of the best tunes I ever heard.” And so it is…

About the Author

Dr. Jeffrey Lant is known worldwide. He started in the media business when he was 5 years old, a Kindergartner in Downers Grove, Illinois, publishing his first newspaper article. Since then Dr. Lant has earned four university degrees, including the PhD from Harvard. He has taught at over 40 colleges and universities and is quite possibly the first to offer satellite courses. He has written over 50 books, thousands of articles and been a welcome guest on hundreds of radio and television programs. He has founded several successful corporations and businesses including his latest at …writerssecrets.com

His memoirs “A Connoisseur’s Journey” has garnered nine literary prizes that ensure its classic status. Its subtitle is “Being the artful memoirs of a man of wit, discernment, pluck, and joy.” A good read by this man of so many letters. Such a man can offer you thousands of insights into the business of becoming a successful writer. Be sure to sign up now at www.writerssecrets.co

More can be found on Dr. Lant on his author page at: http://www.amazon.com/author/jeffreylant/

SPECIAL WRITERS SECRETS CATALOG
“A Connoisseur’s Journey: Being the artful memoirs of a man of wit, discernment, pluck, and joy”
A multi-awards winning, gloriously written and unique memoir by Dr. Jeffrey Lant.
Awarded FIRST in Class at Southern California Book Festival.
FIRST in Class Great Southwest Book Festival
FIRST in Class Great Southeast Book Festival
SECOND in Class at the Great Midwest Book Festival.
SECOND in Class Great Northwest Book Festival
THIRD in Class at the London (England) Book Festival.
THIRD in Class at the New England Book Fare.
THIRD in Class at the Paris France Book Festival

Dr. Lant also was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award with a focus on “A Connoisseur’s Journey” with this citation.
“Dr. Jeffrey Lant. On behalf of the citizens of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, I congratulate you on the release of your Memoir, ‘A Connoisseur’s Journey’. Your work is a groundbreaking experiment into the use of musical citations in literature, adding depth and nuance to the reading experience.”
(signed) Charles D. Baker, Governor and Karyn E.Polito, Lieutenant Governor
“A Connoisseur’s Journey” available at: http://writerssecrets.co/products/a-connoisseurs-journey-being-the-artful-memoirs-of-a-man-of-wit-discernment-pluck-and-joy

Treasures From The Lant Collection Series
– One of the most personal book ever written on art, artifacts,
auctions, conservators, and the great yarns that constitute the better part of provenance.
– Written by a man who has been privileged to visit many of the world’s great museums.
– A man who has had an interested in arts, its attributions, conservations, and sheer beauties since he was a young boy.
– What was written here is the result of constant exploration, research, gut hunches, and downright blind luck.
Dr. Lant can honestly say he has enjoyed every
moment in his quest to find not just objects of beauty, but objects of history, often fleshed out by himself, who is, after all, a history Ph.D. from Harvard.

What follows will sure to delight you.
Found in the Kindle Store at Amazon.com

Insubstantial Pageant: Ceremony and Confusion at Queen Victoria’s Court by Dr. Jeffrey Lant
269 pages
Both Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Charles read and liked “Insubstantial Pageant” and found it to be a very interesting book indeed especially since it was written by an American.
The author Dr. Jeffrey Lant was given unique access to the Royal Archive at Windsor Castle for his research of the material contained in this book.
A book that has always been and remains to be the most detailed book about the British Royal Events.
Throughout the reign of Queen Victoria, confusion and uncertainty marked the great ceremonials of the English Court. The young sovereign was, at her Coronation, recalled from refreshments to complete the service because a significant part of the ritual had been left out.
During her wedding, her bridegroom, Prince Albert, was wracked by nervous embarrassment about what he was supposed to do, while at the marriage of sir son the Prince of Wales troopers with drawn sabres charged into milling crowds and titled guests elbowed each other for a place.
As the Court’s at first limited ceremonies grew during the nineteenth century into great national pageants matters did not improve, exacerbating the situation after the Prince consort’s death was the Queen’s rooted position to display and royal pomp which gave her officials no chance to gain efficiency in organizing ceremonial. Matters came to a head in 1887, at the greatest royal pageant since the Coronation: the Queen’s Golden Jubilee had to be pulled together from scratch, in circumstances of the utmost dedication.
The next great royal event, the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee ten years later, had precedents to draw on and things went so much better that optimists thought the additional muddle had been laid to rest forever. Their expectations were confounded at the arrangement of Queen Victoria’s funeral, an event which in many respects converted to the traditional disorder.
In this remarkable book, Jeffrey L. Lant sees behind the scenes to set out in rich detail how great Victorian royal events developed. Drawn from a wide range of previously unpublished sources, the final result is a perceptive and rollicking piece of crucial history, which many of those involved might have hoped would go unrecorded, authoritative and thorough, this book will fascinate all who have ever marveled at the impressive discretion of Court officials.
Available at: http://writerssecrets.co/products/insubstantial-pageant-ceremony-confusion-at-queen-victorias-court

CASH COPY – This isn’t just a book.

It’s a cash machine that will put money in your pocket
every time you use it
for the rest of your life.

Welcome to

CASH COPY

How To Offer Your Products And Services
So Your Prospects Buy Them… NOW!

The money-making blockbuster by America’s
master wordsmith

DR. JEFFREY LANT.

EVERY page of this unparalleled unique resource will produce money….
and has been doing so for tens of thousands already. CASH COPY is the
real deal, and you will bless the day you got it and USED IT.
Go to: http://writerssecrets.co/products/cash-copy

Don’t copy writers. Become a copywriter.

Order from Writerssecrets.com NOW!

Select the package you like and start profiting online now… for never-to-be-
repeated offers.

The Silver Package. Just $29.95.

Includes One Year Membership

50 one-hour interactive lectures by Dr. Jeffrey Lant on how to profit online.
Included are unique details on copy writing, creating your e-book empire,
and everything you need to know to profit online… and we do mean everything!
You may attend the live program and/or listen to the video recordings… or both.

Available at: http://writerssecrets.co/products/writers-secrets-silver-package

The Gold Package $49.95.

Includes everything in the Silver Package PLUS

Your digitized copy of ”CASH COPY: How to offer your products and services
so your prospects buy them NOW!” 480 pages. The most important book on
copywriting ever written. $9.95 retail value. If you can’t make a million dollars
plus with this book, YOU DIDN’T READ IT!

Your copy of Dr.Lant’s autobiography. 396 pages. $29.95 retail value. “A
Connoisseur’s Journey: Being the artful memoirs of a man of wit, discernment,
pluck, and joy”). The most detailed book on becoming a multi-millionaire and
living like one! Already has earned 8 literary prizes for excellence!
Available at: http://writerssecrets.co/products/writers-secrets-gold-package

Platinum Package $79.95

Includes EVERYTHING in the Silver & Gold Packages AND

500 articles by Dr. Lant you can use to build traffic. Publish them in your blogs,
online or off, (just credit Dr. Lant as author).

“How to make a whole lot more than $1,000,000 writing, commissioning,
publishing and selling ‘how to’ information.” 548 pages. $9.95 retail.
‘
Platinum Membership entitles you to sell our products and packages and earn
big commission bucks now.

EVEN MORE! PLATINUM is where it’s at! Look see…

Order immediately and get a FREE COPY of Dr. Lant’s best-selling
book “The Unabashed Self-Promoter’s Guide: What every man, woman, child
and organization needs to know about getting ahead by exploiting the media.”
$9.95 retail value. 366 pages

EVEN MORE! Bring on the Jamboree. Want to tap into our database and make
influential book publishing, marketing and promotional contacts WORLDWIDE.
>From time to time, Dr. Lant hosts the Jamborees where you are welcome to share
contacts with your prospects worldwide. These informal meetings deliver money-
making contacts you can use daily!

And STILL MORE! When you get your Platinum Package, you get a key to The Vault,
the special area where Dr. Lant keeps a trove of incredible money-making items. There
is so much in The Vault for your benefit, we can confidently predict you will never get
through it all!
Platinum Package available at: http://writerssecrets.co/products/writers-secrets-platinum-package

MONEY MAKING MARKETING COURSE with Dr. Jeffrey Lant
Back by Popular Demand…

The Original Money Making Marketing Course!

The FIRST LIVE satellite marketing program!

In My Own Voice vol. 3 draft

Leave a Comment Cancel Reply

©2025. Dano Enterprises. All Rights Reserved.