C.C. Goodwin Forgotten By Some

C.C. Goodwin. Courtesy: Washoe Courts.

(Editor's note: For a few posts, starting with this one, I'll diverge from my review of C.C. Goodwin's "The Comstock Club." This post is a feature on Goodwin.)

by Glenn Franco Simmons

With the exception of "The War Prayer" by Mark Twain, my favorite writing of the Sagebrush School of writers is Charles C. Goodwin's "The Comstock Club" published in 1891.

At least, so far, among many writers I've read.

I find his portrayal of discussions among the men who established the fictional Comstock Club in Virginia City to be among the best prose to have come out of the Sagebrush School.

The Sagebrush School of Writers is a distinct American literary epoch composed mainly of Nevada-based writers. Until 2009, it wasn't given much thought by many in Nevada; that's when the Nevada Writers' Hall of Fame recognized the Sagebrush School. The Hall of Fame was established in 1988.

"The Sagebrush School was the literary movement written primarily by men of Nevada," according to Wikipedia's page on the Sagebrush School. "The sagebrush shrub is prevalent in the state. It was a broad-based movement and included various literary genres such as drama, essays, fiction, history, humor, journalism, memoirs, and poetry.

"The name Sagebrush School was coined by Ella Sterling Mighels, who stated: 'Sagebrush school? Why not? Nothing in all our Western literature so distinctly savors of the soil as the characteristic books written by the men of Nevada and that interior part of the State where the sagebrush grows.'"

"The roots of the movement were in the American Old West," the Wikipedia entry continues. "The Sagebrush School was the main contributor to American literature from Nevada's mining frontier during the period of 1859 to 1914. There were several characteristics of this movement that distinguished it from others, such as literary talent. These authors were known to be intelligent and accomplished writers."

The Sagebrush School's multifaceted styles are what distinguish the school from other American literary styles. The Sagebrush School's styles represent some of the richest veins of American prose ever compiled. Sadly, with the exception of a few writers, the literary school is not given the accolades it deserves, in my opinion. It is particularly frustrating because these writers collectively tower over most modern and contemporary American writers — again, my personal opinion as a voracious reader.

"The style included hoaxes, wit, audacity, or an irreverent attitude," Wikipedia notes. "The inspiration for the movement began with Joseph T. Goodman of the Virginia City, Nevada Territory's 'Territorial Enterprise' newspaper. The most notable of the Sagebrush School writers, and a Territorial Enterprise journalist, was Mark Twain. In 2009, the Sagebrush School was inducted into the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame."

I would say the Sagebrush School represents far more than hoaxes, wit, audacity or an irreverent attitude. Just read C.C. Goodwin's "The Comstock Club" to gain an appreciation for his prose in which the gentlemen of the club discuss many ideas, often waxing poetic and philosophical. That book alone is worthy of a university course for its sheer brilliance.

One really has to wonder why it took so long for the Sagebrush School to be recognized by modern-era Nevada writers. That is not to say the Sagebrush School has been totally ignored. I'm just surprised more hasn't been written about all the writers within that genre.

Furthermore, in none of my university journalism classes did any teacher ever mention The Sagebrush School. That seems odd, given the influence that these Nevada writers had — not only on American literature, but American society.

Some of the more popular writers are celebrated, as noted by the University of Nevada, Reno.

Mark Twain. Courtesy: Wikipedia.

"Sagebrush writers Mark Twain, Dan De Quillle and Alfred Doten have been previously inducted into the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame," UNR states. "2009 celebrates the 150th anniversary of The Comstock Lode and a revival of interest in the Sagebrush School of writers.

"In recognition of the significant contributions of the authors, Samuel Post Davis, Joseph Thompson Goodman, Rollin Mallory Daggett, Charles Carroll Goodwin, James W. Gally, Fred H. Hart, Arthur McEwen, Henry Rust Mighels, Denis E. McCarthy, James Townsend, Thomas Fitch, and the many other writers whose work has yet to be excavated from the archives, the Sagebrush School has been selected to be inducted into the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame. They were an extraordinary cast of characters who created a distinctive early voice in our national literature — with lasting (if hitherto unacknowledged) influence."

So it took a historic milestone of 150 years to prompt a recognition. While I realize the Hall of Fame wasn't conceived until 1988, it seems UNR or some other institution could have done more to recognize the Sagebrush School in 50, 75, 100 or 125 years.

Furthermore, with UNR and all the students, professors and graduate students, why haven't the archives been thoroughly searched to include any writers not yet listed?

A book on the Sagebrush School of Writers was published in 2006 by the University of Missouri. UNR lists a book published by UNR in 2008 titled "Literary Nevada : writings from the Silver State." That is good news, and I purchased an inexpensive used book from Barnes & Noble for a little more than $3, although shipping was almost twice that.

In a summary of the 831-page book (plus 24 unnumbered pages of plates), UNR states, "'Literary Nevada' is the first comprehensive literary anthology of Nevada. It contains over 200 selections ranging from traditional Native American tales, explorers' and emigrants' accounts, and writing from the Comstock Lode and other mining boomtowns, as well as compelling fiction, poetry, and essays from throughout the state's history."

While it is a commendable effort, why is this book the "first comprehensive literary anthology of Nevada" — especially when the state has an excellent university in the very region where the Sagebrush School of writers flourished? It boggles the mind.

"There is work by well-known Nevada writers such as Sarah Winnemucca, Mark Twain, and Robert Laxalt, by established and emerging writers from all parts of the state, and by some nonresident authors whose work illuminates important facets of the Nevada experience," the UNR book summary continues. "The book includes cowboy poetry, travel writing, accounts of nuclear Nevada, narratives about rural life and urban life in Las Vegas and Reno, poetry and fiction from the state's best contemporary writers, and accounts of the special beauty of wild Nevada's mountains and deserts. Editor Cheryll Glotfelty provides insightful introductions to each section and author. The book also includes a photo gallery of selected Nevada writers and a generous list of suggested further readings."

Not mentioned in the summary is Goodwin. {Note: The book arrived and I still haven't found mention of C.C. Goodwin, but I will not that if I do find him mentioned.} To me, he was a better writer than Twain, although he wrote few books (I have only found three; if you know of more, please leave the title or titles in a comment). "The Comstock Club" is far superior to anything Twain wrote about The Comstock Lode, in my personal opinion, and it's better than many of Twain's books I've read — and I've read a lot of Mark Twain, with my favorite being not a novel but "The War Prayer."

So, who was Goodwin?

"Charles C. Goodwin was born in the Genesee Valley, N.Y., a few miles from Rochester," according to the Washoe Courts' website that features excellent and thorough articles on former Washoe judges. "He received an academic education, and became a wonderfully proficient mathematician. He had most of the English classics at his tongue's end when a boy, but could never surmount the barriers which lay between him and the dead languages.

"In 1852 he came to California and studied law under his brother, Jesse Goodwin, in Marysville, where he afterward became teacher in an academy. He practiced law and taught school until 1861, when he came to Nevada and built a quartz mill a few miles below Dayton. Goodwin invested a small fortune into the mill's construction. When the mill was nearly completed the owner announced a 'warming' {akin to a grand opening in the modern era}, and was making preparations to celebrate the event ... when a freshet {flash flood} swept it away."

Within minutes, his mill that represented his significant investment was gone, but that wasn't the worst part of this natural disaster.

"At the same time six of his men were drowned, one of them leaving an orphan boy to the cruel charity of the world," according to the Washoe Courts' biography. "Goodwin adopted the boy, who held the position of lieutenant in the Regular Army. His kind care and providence for the future of that child speaks of a generous, loyal nature, true and unflinching in its instincts, louder and with a more certain sound than would a eulogy.

"Selling the dismantled machinery of the mill. he paid off such of his men as were left. With a few hundred dollars in his pockets, Goodwin put up an arastra at Dayton."

"An arrastra (or arastra) is a primitive mill for grinding and pulverizing (typically) gold or silver ore," notes the Wikipedia page dedicated to arrastra. "The simplest form of the arrastra is two or more flat-bottomed drag stones placed in a circular pit paved with flat stones, and connected to a center post by a long arm. With a horse, mule or human providing power at the other end of the arm, the stones were dragged slowly around in a circle, crushing the ore. Some arrastras were powered by a water wheel; a few were powered by steam or gasoline engines, and even electricity."

In his ranching and mining ventures, it has been reported that his Achilles heel was debt in the form of compounded interest-bearing notes.

"His bad luck seemed to follow him like a shadow," the Washoe Courts' website notes.

Despite such misfortune, Goodwin staked out a ranch in Washoe County. However, even that venture resulted in a bit of bad luck.

"A lawsuit 20 miles away cut off the water supply with an injunction, and he left the ranch a howling wilderness," states the Washoe Courts' website. "Shortly afterward he was elected District Judge of Washoe County, and edited a newspaper. ...

Territorial Enterprise building in Virginia City, Nev. Courtesy University of Nevada, Reno.

"He next located a mine in Eureka, and just as his friends were expecting to see him blossom into a millionaire, the mine gave out and left him in the lurch again. Another mine opened in Nye County treated him with the same lack of devotion to his interests."

Probably more stunned by even more misfortune, Goodwin "returned to the newspaper business, where he really belonged," the Washoe Courts' website notes.

"For six years he ran The Territorial Enterprise, for a while as editor-in-chief and a portion of the time in connection with Congressman Rollin M. Daggett," the Washoe Courts' website recounts. "The judge edited the paper with a vigor that made its influence felt in Nevada, and it was recognized as a journal controlled by a man of brains and culture. While he was editor The Enterprise had nothing but gall and wormwood for the unreconstructed Bourbons. In 1880 he left that paper to accept a position as editor-in-chief of the Salt Lake Tribune.

"In private life Goodwin is a conversationalist such as one seldom meets, and his fund of quaint humor, ready repartee and good stories, seemed inexhaustible. His home was always open to his friends, and his purse at the mercy of every old tramp, dead-beat and imposter who called upon him for assistance, as he could no more resist an appeal for charity than he could change the attributes of his nature."

Goodwin's character and talent were widely respected. Carson Appeal's editor and publisher Henry Rust Mighels paid tribute to Goodwin in the Nov. 12, 1878 edition:

Henry Rust Mighels. Property of Special Collections Library, University of Nevada, Reno. via Nevada Writers Hall of Fame Pinterest page.

"In the history of Nevada journalism no such brilliant and effective assaults were ever made by any newspaper upon the enemy's line as Goodwin has been making," according to the Washoe Courts' website. "His splendid services should be most generously remembered; and he has, while making an enviable reputation for himself, placed The Territorial Enterprise in the front rank of live and powerful political newspapers.

"The people of the state have a right to be proud of their leading daily print, as his brethren of the pen-and-scissors have a right to glory in the achievements of their overworked but unflinching and faithful brother. The Appeal gives him all hail!"

Having worked in radio, web and print journalism for 33 years, I can tell you that praise from a journalist from another publication is rare.

Later in life, Goodwin would immortalize himself in the annals of Western Frontier literature with his books. "The Comstock Club" may have been his best novel and features far more literary brilliance than any of Mark Twain's literary endeavors — with the exception of Twain's "The War Prayer." Goodwin also wrote "As I Remember Them" and "The Wedge of Gold," both of which can be found on Project Gutenberg and "The Wayback Machine" (Archive.org), respectively.

(Editor's note: The Washoe Courts' biography of C.C. Goodwin had grammatical errors in it that have been corrected, as well as a different style than AP Style, and I changed the present tense to the past tense. Changes include capitalization changes, grammatical corrections, spelling corrections, etc. The Wikipedia information quoted has also had slight edits for clarity. Thank you to Washoe Courts and Wikipedia for providing such historically significant information that should not be forgotten. Disclosure: I subscribe to The Nevada Appeal. I do not accept and have not received any monetary or other incentives to write any articles on this blog.)

'Artist's' Mastery Discussed

Idaho lava fields. Stephen Conn. CC BY-NC 2.0.

by Glenn Franco Simmons

The Comstock Club gentlemen were a well-traveled group, with extensive knowledge of the Western and Northewestern United States that added to their knowledge about the East Coast and the Northeast.

In this post, Mr. Strong tells Mr. Ashley that in any discussion about the Columbia River, one must follow it farther north, to the Idaho lava beds.

The discussion meanders to Niagara Falls and waxes poetic regarding the immensity of creation and the presence of God in His creations.

"The Columbia is very grand, but you must follow it up to its chief tributary if you would find perfect glory —  follow it into the very desert. You have heard of the lava beds of Idaho. They were once a river of molten fire from 300 feet to 900 feet in depth, which burned its way through the desert for hundreds of miles.

"To the east of the source of this lava flow, the Snake River bursts out of the hills, becoming almost at once a sovereign river, and flowing at first south-westerly, and then bending westerly, cuts its way through this lava bed, and, continuing its way with many bends, finally, far to the north merges with the Columbia.

"On this river are several falls.

"First, the American Falls, are very beautiful. Sixty miles below are the Twin Falls, where the river, divided into two nearly equal parts, falls one hundred and eighty feet. They are magnificent.

"Three miles below are the Shoshone Falls, and a few miles lower down the Salmon Falls. It was of the Shoshone Falls that I began to speak.

"They are real rivals of Niagara. Never anywhere else was there such a scene; never anywhere else was so beautiful a picture hung in so rude a frame; never anywhere else on a background so forbidding and weird were so many glories clustered.

"Around and beyond there is nothing but the desert, sere, silent, lifeless, as though Desolation had builded there everlasting thrones to Sorrow and Despair.

"Away back in remote ages, over the withered breast of the desert, a river of fire one hundred miles wide and four hundred miles long, was turned. As the fiery mass cooled, its red waves became transfixed and turned black, giving to the double desert an indescribably blasted and forbidding face.

"But while this river of fire was in flow, a river of water was fighting its way across it, or has since made the war and forged out for itself a channel through the mass. This channel looks like the grave of a volcano that has been robbed of its dead.

American Falls & Bridal Veil. Robert F. Tobler. CCBY-SA4.0.

"But right between its crumbling and repellant walls a transfiguration appears. And such a picture! A river as lordly as the Hudson or the Ohio, springing from the distant snow-crested Tetons, with waters transparent as glass, but green as emerald, with majestic flow and ever-increasing volume, sweeps on until it reaches this point where the august display begins.

"Suddenly, in different places in the river bed, jagged, rocky reefs are upraised, dividing the current into four rivers, and these, in a mighty plunge of eighty feet downward, dash on their way. Of course, the waters are churned into foam and roll over the precipice white as are the garments of the morning when no cloud obscures the sun. The loveliest of these falls is called 'The Bridal Veil,' because it is made of the lace which is woven with a warp of falling waters and a woof of sunlight. Above this and near the right bank is a long trail of foam, and this is called 'The Bridal Train.' The other channels are not so fair as the one called 'The Bridal Veil,' but they are more fierce and wild, and carry in their furious sweep more power.

"One of the reefs which divides the river in mid-channel runs up to a peak, and on this a family of eagles have, through the years, may be through the centuries, made their home and reared their young, on the very verge of the abyss and amid the full echoes of the resounding boom of the falls. Surely the eagle is a fitting symbol of perfect fearlessness and of that exultation which comes with battle clamors.

"But these first falls are but a beginning. The greater splendor succeeds. With swifter flow the startled waters dash on and within a few feet take their second plunge in a solid crescent, over a sheer precipice, two hundred and ten feet to the abyss below. On the brink there is a rolling crest of white, dotted here and there, in sharp contrast, with shining eddies of green, as might a necklace of emerald shimmer on a throat of snow, and then the leap and fall.

"Here more than foam is made. Here the waters are shivered into fleecy spray, whiter and finer than any miracle that ever fell from India loom, while from the depths below an everlasting vapor rises— the incense of the waters to the water's God.

American Falls. Flickr R.A. Killmer CCBY-NC-ND2.0.

"Finally, through the long, unclouded days, the sun sends down his beams, and to give the startling scene its crowning splendor, wreaths the terror and the glory in a rainbow halo. On either sullen bank the extremities of its arc are anchored, and there in its many-colored robes of light it stands outstretched above the abyss like wreaths of flowers above a sepulcher. Up through the glory and the terror an everlasting roar ascends, deep-toned as is the voice of Fate, a diapason like that the rolling ocean chants when his eager surges come rushing in to greet and fiercely woo an irresponsive promontory.

"But to feel all the awe and to mark all the splendor and power that comes of the mighty display, one must climb down the steep descent to the river's brink below, and, pressing up as nearly as possible to the falls, contemplate the tremendous picture. There something of the energy that creates that endless panorama is comprehended; all the deep throbbings of the mighty river's pulses are felt; all the magnificence is seen.

"In the reverberations that come of the war of waters one hears something like God's voice; something like the splendor of God is before his eyes; something akin to God's power is manifesting itself before him, and his soul shrinks within itself, conscious as never before of its own littleness and helplessness in the presence of the workings of Nature's immeasurable forces.

"Not quite so massive is the picture as is Niagara, but it has more lights and shades and loveliness, as though a hand more divinely skilled had mixed the tints, and with more delicate art had transfixed them upon that picture suspended there in its rugged and sombre frame.

"As one watches it is not difficult to fancy that away back in the immemorial and unrecorded past, the Angel of Love bewailed the fact that mortals were to be given existence in a spot so forbidding, a spot that apparently was never to be warmed with God's smile, which was never to make a sign through which God's mercy was to be discerned; that then Omnipotence was touched, that with His hand He smote the hills and started the great river in its flow; that with His finger He traced out the channel across the corpse of that other river that had been fire, mingled the sunbeams with the raging waters and made it possible in that fire-blasted frame of scoria to swing a picture which should be, first to the red man and later to the pale races, a certain sign of the existence, the power and the unapproachable splendor of the Great First Cause.

"And as the red man through the centuries watched the spectacle, comprehending nothing except that an infinite voice was smiting his ears, and insufferable glories were blazing before his eyes; so through the centuries to come the pale races will stand upon the shuddering shore and watch, experiencing a mighty impulse to put off the sandals from their feet, under an overmastering consciousness that the spot on which they are standing is holy ground.

"There is nothing elsewhere like it; nothing half so weird, so wild, so beautiful, so clothed in majesty, so draped with terror; nothing else that awakens impressions at once so startling, so winsome, so profound. While journeying through the desert to come suddenly upon it, the spectacle gives one something of the emotions that would be experienced to behold a resurrection from the dead.

"In the midst of what seems like a dead world, suddenly there springs into irrepressible life something so marvelous, so grand, so caparisoned with loveliness and irresistible might, that the head is bowed, the strained heart throbs tumultuously and the awed soul sinks to its knees."

The whistles had sounded while Strong was speaking, and as he finished the good nights were spoken and the lights put out.

Glory Of Earth: The Columbia River

Columbia River. Flickr. Bonnie Moreland. Public domain.

by Glenn Franco Simmons

In my previous two posts, the gentlemen of The Comstock Club discussed their admiration for the majesty of Mount Shasta in what is now California and Lake Tahoe, which is now in California and Nevada. In this post, they talk further of equally beautiful and compelling natural wonders wrought by the skilled craftsmanship of the almighty Creator of all in heaven and on Earth.

Their discussion features a Manifest Destiny theme of American sovereignty, no matter that Native Americans were the rightful inhabitants of the land so described and a people who should have been consulted rather than nearly annihilated.

Mr. Ashley also finds a symmetry with the "fight" of the river on its march to the ocean, much like a worker on his journey through life.

C.C. Goodwin weaves this narrative with a mastery and wisdom that can only come with having had many life experiences that cause such reflection and contemplation.

"But while on grand themes, have you ever seen the Columbia River?" Mr. Ashley asked. "To me it is the glory of the earth. It is a great river fourteen hundred miles above its mouth, and from thence on it rolls to the sea with increasing grandeur all the way. Where it hews its way through the Cascades a new and gorgeous picture is every moment painted, and when the mountain walls are pierced, with perfect purity and with mighty volume it sweeps on toward the ocean.

Mount Hood. Flickr. Public domain.

"It is, through its last one hundred and fifty miles, watched over by great forests and magnificent mountains. There are Hood and St. Helens and the rest, and where, upon the furious bar, the river joins the sea, there is an everlasting war of waters as beautiful as it is terrible.

"It makes a man a better American to go up the Columbia to the Cascades and look about him. He is not only impressed with the majesty of the scene, but thoughts of empire, of dominion and of the glory of the land over which his country's flag bears sovereignty, take possession of him. He looks down upon the rolling river and up at Mount Hood, and to both he whispers, 'We are in accord; I have an interest in you,' and the great pines nod approvingly, and the waterfalls babble more loud.

"The Mississippi has greater volume than the Oregon, the Hudson makes rival pictures which perhaps are as beautiful as any painted in the Cascades; but there is a power, a beauty, a purity and a wildness about the river of the West which is all its own and which is unapproachable in its charms.

"More than that. To me the river is the emblem of a perfect life. Through all the morning of its career it fights its way, blazing an azure trail through the desert. There is no green upon its banks, hardly does a bird sing as it struggles on. But it bears right on, and so austere is its face that the desert is impotent to soil it. Then it meets a rocky wall and breaks through it, roaring on its way. Then it takes the Willamette to its own ample breast, and it bears it on until it meets the inevitable, and then undaunted goes down to its grave.

"It fights its way, it bears its burdens, it remains pure and brave to the last. That is all the best man that ever lived could do." As Ashley concluded Strong said: "Why, Ashley! that is good."