Sarah Palin (b. 1964) is the current governor of Alaska and was
recently selected as the running-mate of US Presidential wannabe John
McCain. Her selection was seen as a curious choice by many as McCain had
never met her before her interview for selection. Others have commented that
it would be somewhat odd to elect a person to arguably the second
most-powerful job in world politics when she only obtained a passport for
the first time in 2007. Still others note that she will appeal to
conservative voters as she is pro-gun, a creationist, pro-bloodsports, an
anti-abortionist, and does not believe in single sex relationships. She has
also stated that she does not believe that global warming is caused by Man
and has opposed ‘endangered species’ status for the polar bear and beluga
whale as she states that it will adversely affect the Alaskan oil and gas
industries.
The State of Alaska is the largest – by land area – in the United
States and takes its name from the native Aleut word alaxsxaq, which
means ‘mainland’ or, more literally, ‘the object towards which the action of
the sea is directed’. It was purchased from the Russian Empire in 1867 for
the princely sum of $7.2 million. One of Alaska’s more colourful residents
was Jefferson Randolph ‘Soapy’ Smith II, arguably one of
the greatest con artists in US history. Born in 1860 into a wealthy and
educated family from Georgia, Smith was forced to uproot and move to Texas
in 1876 when his family lost all of its money and influence and decided on a
fresh start. It was in Fort Worth that Smith began to use his intelligence
and education to develop a series of confidence tricks. Most famous was the Prize
Package Soap Sell Swindle. He would set up a ‘bunko booth’ and then
proceed to sell cakes of soap for a dollar apiece. Skillfully using sleight
of hand, he would make it appear that he’d hidden anything from a dollar
bill to $100 inside the soap wrappers and would then invite one of his gang,
planted in the crowd of course, to sample the soapy lucky dip and, of
course, win. In truth, none of the cakes on display had any notes inside.
Smith and his ‘Soap Gang’ – Texas Jack Vermillion and Big Ed Burns among
them - operated this scam successfully for over 22 years, moving from town
to town. They also used other swindles like the Pea and Shell Game
and the Three Card Trick.
Smith quickly became known as ‘Soapy Smith’ and used his earnings to pay off
officials, politicians and lawmen so that he never risked jail or the
hangman’s rope. He went on to build three major criminal empires in Denver
and Creede, Colorado and later in Skagway, Alaska. Sensing big opportunities
for new cons, he and his gang followed the Klondike Gold Rush, but it was to
be his undoing. In 1898, he used a crooked card game to trick a miner called
John Douglas Stewart out of a sack of gold valued at $2,700. A short
gunfight ensued and Smith was mortally wounded. He is immortalised in some
way by the nickname ‘Soapy’ now being associated with confidence tricksters.
For example, in P G Wodehouse’s short story Pearls mean tears,
Bertie Wooster’s Aunt Agatha’s pearls are stolen by ‘Soapy Sid’. In the 1960
British comedy Two Way Stretch, con-man ‘Soapy Steven’s is played
wonderfully by character actor Wilfred Hyde-White. And Walt Disney created a
character called ‘Soapy Slick’, a con man who is after Scrooge McDuck’s
fortune … which he made during the Klondike Gold Rush, coincidentally.
The Klondike Gold Rush began in 1896 and saw thousands of prospectors
heading for Alaska in search of a fortune. Since then over 12.5 million
ounces of gold have been found. To get to Alaska from America means passing
through a substantial chunk of Canada because it is one of only two US
States that does not border another US State. The other is Hawaii.
Hawaii is the birth place of Senator Barack Obama, the Democrat
candidate for the Presidential elections on November 4th. Obama was born in
1961 in Honolulu, to a Kenyan father – also called Barack Obama – and Anne
Dunham, originally from Wichita, Kansas. Obama’s parents separated when he
was two years old and later divorced. His mother then married a man from
Indonesia and the young Obama spent several years at school in Jakarta. In a
2006 interview on the Oprah Winfrey show, he spoke about coming from a
mixed-race background and explained the extraordinary diversity of his
extended family. He has seven half-siblings from his Kenyan father's family, and a half-sister called Maya Soetoro-Ng, the daughter of his mother and her
second husband. Maya is married to a Chinese Canadian. "I've got
relatives who look like Bernie Mac, and I've got relatives who look like
Margaret Thatcher," he explained.
For the 2008 election campaign, Obama chose Senator Joseph Robinette ‘Joe’
Biden, Jr. (b.1942) as his vice-presidential running mate. His selection
was somewhat overshadowed by the selection of Sarah Palin but he is seen as
a good, solid choice because of his experience and knowledge of foreign
affairs and homeland security. Biden is currently a senior senator
representing Delaware but originally hails from Scranton in Pennsylvania.
Pennsylvania, or ‘Penn’s forest’ was named in honour of Admiral William
Penn by the state's founder, his son William (1644-1718). Meanwhile, North
and South Carolina were named by King Charles II (1630-1685) in honour of
his father, Charles I. Washington is named after the US president and
Louisiana after King Louis XIV of France. Virginia and West Virginia were
named after Queen Elizabeth I – the so-called ‘Virgin Queen’. Most other US
states take their names from native American words such as Connecticut from
the Mohegan word quinnitukqut, meaning ‘place of long tidal river’,
Michigan from the Ojibwe term mishigami, meaning ‘large water’ or
‘large lake’ and Texas after the Hasinai word táysha
which means ‘friends’ or ‘allies’. One notable exception from the usual
naming conventions is Idaho which, I almost hesitate to say, appears
to have been named after a practical joke.
In the early 1860s, when the United States Congress was considering organising
a new territory in the Rocky Mountains, eccentric lobbyist George M Willing
suggested the name ‘Idaho’, which he claimed was derived from a Shoshone
phrase meaning ‘the sun comes from the mountains’ or ‘gem of the mountains’.
However, this later proved to be untrue and Willing admitted that he had
made up the name himself. But by then the name was in common usage and had
stuck. To further embed the name, Idaho became known as the ‘Gem State’.
In many ways, Idaho is a place of hidden treasures. Ask anyone to tell you
where the deepest river gorge is in the USA and they will probably say the
Grand Canyon. And they’d be wrong. The deepest river gorge is Idaho's Hells
Canyon - 7,900 feet deep. Highest waterfalls in North America? Nope, it’s
not Niagara. It’s the Shoshone Falls in Idaho which, at 212 feet, drop 52
feet further than their more famous northern relative. Idaho is also where
you’ll find the world’s first Alpine skiing chairlift. Built in Sun Valley
by Union Pacific Railroad engineers in 1936, it was based upon a device used
for loading banana boats. And the world’s first nuclear power plant (built
in 1953) can be found within the Idaho National Environmental and
Engineering Laboratory (INEEL), near Arco.
Idaho features in a famous palindrome: O had I nine more hero-men in
Idaho! A palindrome is a word or sentence that is entirely reversible.
Palindromic words include: kayak, sees, toot, rotavator (the longest), gig,
level, mum and refer. Palindromic sentences are difficult to create without
the sentence becoming nonsensical or non-grammatical. Good examples include:
Stressed? Desserts! and Madam, in Eden, I’m Adam. But my favourite (because
it tells a whole story) is: A man, a plan, a canal: Panama!
Panama was the birthplace of Senator John Sidney McCain III (b.
1936), the 2008 Presidential nominee of the Republican Party. He was born at
the Coco Solo Naval Air Station in the Panama Canal Zone at a time when the
Panama Canal was under American control. His choice of running mate for the
Vice Presidency is, of course, Sarah Palin. She is not a relative of Monty
Python comedian and world-travelling programme-maker Michael Palin but they
may share a common ancestry as the name allegedly originates in Pavilly,
Normandy and has been recorded as far back as 1066. It is also a Latin word.
The term ‘palindrome’ was coined by English writer Ben Jonson in the 1600s
from the Latin dromos (meaning ‘direction’) and palin (meaning ‘back’ or
‘backwards’).
Sarah Palin (b. 1964) is the current governor of Alaska and was …
Joined-Up Thinking: How To Connect Everything To Everything Else is
published on 3rd October 2008 by Macmillan; priced £12.99
um, not that clever. Couldn't anyone string together tangentially related facts in this way? What's the accomplishment here?
Wallace Fard, Carbondale, Illinois, U.S. of A.
I've got a kewl Palindrome:
'Was it a car or a cat I saw'
Cidat
Cidat, Birmingham, UK
Two palindromes that have been around for a long time:
Doc, note! I dissent! A fast never prevents a fatness--I diet on cod!
and
Dogma I: I am God.
Another oldie; now also the title of a great kid's book on palindromes:
Go hang a salami--I'm a lasagna hog!
Get the book! lol in it...:):):)!
Anne, North Andover, MA, USA
"Panlindrome" is from Greek, not Latin.
"palin" = "backward"
"dromein" = "to run": see dromedary, hippodrome
Sam Patch, Somerset, USA
Small problem at the end of Sarah Palin and the Palindromes: She is a Palin by marriage, not by birth. Thus, no common ancestry with any Palins.
Amy Dixon, Madison, WI, USA
Idaho is a fine place, but it's waterfalls can't compare to those in California. The largest fall in Yosemite Valley drops 1430 feet, Even the smaller ones are much more than 212 feet.
David Rowland, Berkeley, USA
Easily the most important book to be published this year.
And one of the funniest.
And the most thought-provoking.
But easily the most important book to be published this year
geoff williams, brentwood, uk