1. The angle that J. William T. Youngs takes in writing the history of Spokane, with special emphasis on Expo '74, is the crucial importance of the falls. You can see this in the book's title: The Fair and the Falls: Spokane's Expo '74, Transforming an American Environment.
The first non-native people who settled in the area we now call Spokane found the falls mesmerizing.
By about the 1870's though, being mesmerized by the fall's natural beauty and power gave way to the idea that the river and the falls could be harnessed, could be a source of power for operating sawmills, flour mills, and, later, for generating electricity.
The beauty and grandeur of the falls gave way to developing capital and I'm fairly sure this will be a thread running throughout this book, especially because Expo '74's theme was environmental and in order to create a space for such an exposition, the river and the falls had to be transformed from being a railroad yard, essentially, to being a park.
2. It's probably needless to say that as Spokane, then known as Spokane Falls, began to grow as a center for commerce, preserving the original and natural beauty of the falls and river was hardly a priority and the river suffered what, at least from my point of view, were all kinds of indignities: sewage, sawmill waste, animal remains, and other sources of pollution were dumped into it and to accommodate the commercial needs for power, the course of the river and its original landscape were altered, not for aesthetic reasons, but to serve commercial interests.
In other words, Spokane was a microcosm of the entire USA as this tension between development and the worth of the natural world's original beauty developed, whether in forests, waterways, or other natural sites.
And now I've learned from this book that in October of 1890, just over a year after the great fire of 1889 reduced downtown Spokane to ashes and rubble, Spokane (Falls) hosted what amounted to a modest world's fair, the Northwestern Industrial Exposition.
Builders worked feverishly to erect a huge exposition hall at what is now the spot downtown where W. Sprague comes to an end and Riverside takes over and Cedar intersects, just east of Maple and Walnut Streets.
In contrast to Expo '74, this exposition did not have an environmental theme at all, but was a showcase of technological advances and of Spokane's mighty potential as a commercial center.
It also featured cultural demonstrations and entertainments.
It attracted thousands of people to this recovering and ambitious new city.
I find this chapter of Spokane's history especially fascinating having recently read The Devil in the White City.
3. Debbie repurposed the great enchilada casserole we had on Sunday into what I'd call a bracing sauce, adding more ground beef and other ingredients. She also made a pot of brown rice and the whole transformation was awesome, especially when I topped my bowl of transformed casserole over brown rice with generous splashes of Franks's Hot Sauce.
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I'm publishing this blog post on May 1st.
Until Stu sent me this limerick, I had no idea that May 1st was Batman Day.
Stu commemorated this big day with the following verse:
The Penguin and Joker are Wild.
The Riddler’s strange riddles beguiled.
But a “Biff” and a “Sock”,
Made their heads start to rock.
When the world of this hero they riled.
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