April 28th, 2008 · Comments Off
An Email From Jim Sand About Allan Truax
I recently received an unsolicited email from Jim Sand (who was previously unknown to me) about Allan Truax. The pertinent portion of that message follows:
When I was 8 years old (1957) my family moved into a house across the alley from Mr. Truax. His yard was fenced and had more tree’s and bush’s that any other yard I can remember. I did not know he had lost an arm in a railroad accident, but do remember being somewhat frightened by the black glove that was always one of his hands. My best friend and I would sometimes crawl over the fence to see what was in his yard. We never stayed long, but I remember that it seemed his yard was a forest. Since in that part of North Dakota, the only trees were those planted by farmers as shelter belts or the cottonwood trees along Long Creek about 5 miles north of town.
Why An Email From Jim Sand To Heck of a Guy About Allan Truax Is Important
I’ve featured the email from Mr. Sand in this post for two reasons:
1. The content confirms and clarifies an important detail about Allan Truax. In Evelyn and Allan Truax Journey Through Life Together, I wrote “Allan Truax’s interest in horticulture, for example, resulted in his planting trees and shrubs around the Truax home in Crosby, North Dakota, at a time when those “were about the only trees in town.” The email, describing the Truax lawn from an 8 year old boy’s perspective, is significantly more effective.
2. This email is an example of one of the genuine advantages blogs confer on humanity: mutually beneficial interactions. Obviously, interactions are hardly blog-dependent, but the accessibility of blogs and effective search engines have dramatically increased the number and quality of such connections compared to pre-internet technologies.
Even if I had, for example, written the definitive Allan Truax biography and even if Mr. Sand had read it, what are the chances he would have written me about his childhood memory? And, even if he had written, how could I have circulated that information short of publishing another edition of the biography?
Further, this is no fluke. Some readers may recall the The Great Ozark Folk Festival Flood of 1973 adventure. I have heard from at least two readers who were at that same bluegrass festival deep in the Ozarks that same weekend in 1973, one of whom has promised to write up her own story from that weekend - a story which equals if not surpasses the weirdness of the sojourn I described.
That’s why - ya gotta love the blogs.
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Identification: Allan Truax, Allen Truax, and A.L. Truax
“Allan Truax” and “Allen Truax” appear with approximately equal frequency in the written material I’ve reviewed, with “A.L. Truax” occurring somewhat less often. The name Mr. Truax inscribed in his books was “Allan” so I use it preferentially
Other Heck Of A Guy Posts About Allan Truax
Footnotes
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Tags: Allan Truax
April 13th, 2008 · Comments Off
As part of my ongoing project describing the life and times of Allan Truax, I occasionally post photos or information about Crosby, North Dakota, the town to which Allan Truax, then 37 years old, and his wife, Evelyn, moved in 1908 and where they lived until his death in 1965.
Train Depot
Allan Truax was employed as a railroad mail clerk for the Great Northern Railway which operated this depot in Crosby, North Dakota, the beginning and the termination of the daily train route Truax worked.
Healthcare In Early 1900s
According to the local newspaper, Crosby’s first physician was Dr. Blake Lancaster, a graduate of the Ontario College of Physicians and Surgeons.
… Dr. Lancaster received an X-ray machine from Chicago which, aside from being a most beautiful piece of furniture, will be widely used in his practice.
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Identification: Allan Truax, Allen Truax, and A.L. Truax
“Allan Truax” and “Allen Truax” appear with approximately equal frequency in the written material I’ve reviewed, with “A.L. Truax” occurring somewhat less often. The name Mr. Truax inscribed in his books was “Allan” so I use it preferentially
Other Heck Of A Guy Posts About Allan Truax
Footnotes
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Tags: Allan Truax
February 20th, 2008 · 1 Comment
Observations Evoked By The Heck of a Guy George Washington Carver Posts
The following notes are tangents, asides, and other remnants that percolated to the surface of my cortex while I was working on the Carver posts.
Carver’s Influence On A Child’s Perception Of Blacks
Mrs. Linklater commented on one of the George Washington Carver posts:
I discovered George Washington Carver when I was about eight years old. We had to go to our grade school library and read a biography. I was fascinated first by his accomplishments, but more because he was black. Such was life in the fifties
My parallel experience was warped by the geodemographic quirk of growing up near the George Washington Carver National Monument in a rural area with almost no blacks in the population.
Except for two years of middle school and my freshman year of college, I lived in my hometown, Diamond, Missouri, until I was 21. During that time, the only black people residing in or near that town, frequenting the local stores, attending the consolidated school that drew students from the outlying farms several miles from the facility itself, or belonging to any of the numerous churches in town were the Superintendent of the George Washington Carver National Monument or members of his family.
They stood out not only because they were black but also because, in a population almost devoid of college educated individuals other than teachers and some of the clergy, the Superintendents assigned by the National Park Service were college graduates. They and their families were also well spoken, typically well traveled, and, if my recall is accurate, usually hailed from urban environments, traits which distinctly atypical in my immediate environment
Consequently, I grew up with the impression that blacks were especially well educated and sophisticated. Such was life in the 50s - in Diamond, Missouri.
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George Washington and George Washington Carver
All sources seem to agree that George Carver did not use a middle name in childhood or early adolescence.
The two prevalent accounts of how he acquired “Washington” as part of his name follow:
- Wikipedia and others state that “In order to avoid confusion with another George Carver in his classes [at Iowa State University], he began to use the name George Washington Carver.”
- Other sites, such as George Washington Carver, report that “In the spring of 1885 [6 years before attending Iowa State University], … he had given himself the middle name of Washington.” Some sources, such as George Washington Carver: From Slave to Scientist by Janet Benge, add that he used the middle initial “W” in his correspondence because mail addressed to “George Carver” was being delivered to another George Carver.
As late as the first or second grade when a teacher gently disabused me of the notion, I was convinced that the shared names denoted some special connection between George Washington Carver and George Washington.
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There are a number of photos of Henry Ford and George Washington Carver on the internet, but, as far as I can determine, this site has the only such photo emblazoned with the caption, George Washington Carver, left, and industrialist Henry Ford share a weed sandwich in this 1942 photograph.
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The two leaders of foreign nations best known for soliciting Carver’s advice on enhancing their respective county’s agricultural resources were Joseph Stalin and Mahatma Gandhi (Gandhi also asked for personal nutritional recommendations).
This is probably no more than a “how about that?” sort of coincidence, but doesn’t it seem somehow significant?
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There is a strong consensus that Carver was a talented artist and musician. It is interesting to speculate about how his life and history might have changed had he pursued a career, as he originally intended, in either of these fields instead of being persuaded by his college art teacher to change his studies and his focus to agricultural science.
If nothing else, the Tuskegee Institute would have been a very different sort of place without Carver, and it is difficult to imagine who, had Carver not been on the scene, would have carried on Booker T. Washington’s legacy after his death. On the other hand, it is appealing to wonder if Carver might personally have been happier confronting artistic challenges rather than dealing with the problems caused by abject poverty, depleted soil, and illiteracy.
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George Washington Carver (left) and Allan Truax (right)
Ongoing readers will recognize the photo of Allan Truax, an individual who has been featured in several Heck of a Guy posts. Given that Allan Truax was a contemporary of Carver’s and that Truax was well read in general, it would be surprising if he were not aware of Carver’s work. Since Truax was specifically interested in horticulture and mycology (which were also areas of focus for Carver), it is not far fetched to believe he may well have had some insight into the extent to which Carver’s accolades were exaggerated.
In any case, I find myself longing to ask Mr. Truax about his opinion of Mr. Carver.
Footnotes
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Tags: Fascinations
January 2nd, 2008 · Comments Off
Another Item Added To The Allan Truax To-Do List
In Evelyn and Allan Truax Journey Through Life Together, mention was made of the variety of projects Allan Truax pursued, including Truax family genealogy, horticulture, American History, leadership within the Masonic Lodge, and travel across the continental United States, the Canadian provinces, Alaska, Hawaii, Cuba, Mexico, England, and Scotland.
In the time he spent nearly every day alone in his private room that served as his office, den, library, and retreat, however, Allan Truax not only read, wrote, listened to opera, and worked on those projects noted in the previous paragraph, but he also pursued at least one other interest not yet listed in these posts, one, in fact, that was not revealed to anyone until the results of his efforts were discovered after his death.
Another Item Checked Off The Allan Truax To-Do List
As it turns out, he also was interested in the stock market.
Prior to his death in 1965, Allan Truax accrued the sum of $1,000,000 through his investments, a feat rendered all the more impressive when considered in the context of his retirement from his position as a railway mail clerk 30 years earlier, after which he and his wife were dependent on his railroad pension as their income.
Having sporadically researched Allan Truax’s life for almost a year now, I am convinced there are few things I could discover about him that would surprise me. Earning a million bucks with a self-taught investment strategy while living on a pension in a small town in the northwest corner of North Dakota - all without telling another human being (other than, presumably, his broker) - does, however, come close.
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Allan Truax At Heck Of A Guy
An explanation of who Allan Truax is and why he is a feature of the Heck Of A Guy Blog can be found at Who’s Allan Truax?
Identification: Allan Truax, Allen Truax, and A.L. Truax
“Allan Truax” and “Allen Truax” appear with approximately equal frequency in the written material I’ve reviewed, with “A.L. Truax” occurring somewhat less often. The name Mr. Truax inscribed in his books, one of which ended up in my hands and led to my interest in its former owner, was “Allan” so I use it preferentially
Other Heck Of A Guy Posts About Allan Truax
Footnotes
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[Read more →]
Tags: Allan Truax
