Families such as Anna and Johann Kaufmann belonged to a sect popularly known as Schweizers, as they had German roots but took a religious stance against infant baptism, ostracizing them from other Protestants. For example, the Norwegian couple Ole and Gro Rollag settled in Iowa because their family farm was going to be partitioned with each successive generation, and they feared not having land to bequeath to their children. According to Laskin, many of these families chose to immigrate because of the economic circumstances in their home countries. The book goes back in time several centuries before the blizzard to the decades leading up to it, examining the extended experiences of individual families, from their local cities to major shipping centers in London, and finally to New York’s immigration center at Garden Castle-an overwhelming hub of city officials, transportation services, and money exchangers, as well as the vast numbers of families with children using the services. In the subsequent chapters, Laskin observes that between 18, 16.5 million people immigrated from Europe-especially Norwegians, Germans, and Ukrainians who ventured beyond East Coast cities to the Midwest, often meeting relatives there. The timing of this anomalous blizzard was such that the population of the region it struck was especially dense as a result of the Homestead Act of 1862 that dramatically increased the population of this “Great American Desert.” In the prologue, Laskin records that between 250 and 500 children died in the blizzard, famous for the schoolchildren sent home from school that the storm claimed as casualties. The introduction explains how on January 12, 1888, a cold front traveled south from Montana through North Dakota to Nebraska, dropping temperatures 18 degrees Fahrenheit in three minutes. He also writes for the travel section of The New York Times. Laskin has since written on other historical topics including The Long Way Home: An American Journey from Ellis Island to the Great War (2010) about American immigrant soldiers. The Children’s Blizzard by David Laskin (2004) is a riveting work of nonfiction detailing the events of the infamous blizzard of 1888 that blighted the Great Plains region of the United States.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |