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[theconnoisseursus]

Henry Rowe Schoolcraft had a lot to be proud of, no question. With little formal schooling, he picked up the family glasswork business and even published an academic paper on it. On the side, he studied mineralogy under the private instruction of a local professor, who praised his scientific aptitude. When his glass business went bankrupt, he headed west and joined another Easterner in testing the Missouri territory for mining potential. This won him a gig on the Cass Expedition, exploring the wild and mysterious Upper Peninsula.

At this point, Schoolcraft developed a hubristic side gig in ethnography. He began publishing accounts of the Superior region’s native  language and lore. Despite being full of factual errors, these books established him an expert, and he was appointed as a federal “Indian agent." Tasked with advancing the United States’ appropriative interest in the Michigan territory, Schoolcraft continued publishing books on Ojibwe culture, all riddled with half truths and invented names.

At that time, most of America was adjusting to rapid urban industrialization. This change fomented an obsession with all things "Indian." People in cities longed to see their country the way its native inhabitants saw it. (Just not with those natives anywhere close by.) In the midst of the dirty, hectic city life that hadn't yet delivered on its promise of the American dream, these imaginative glimpses of the wild, untamed wilderness made their country appear great in their eyes.

The most prominent author of that time, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, wanted the same thing. European literature was full of epic poems based on ancient folklore and traditional rhyme schemes, and Longfellow  felt America ought to have such a poem of its own. Schoolcraft’s work gave Longfellow all the raw material his poetic imagination needed to produce the story he wanted. Its hero was the kind of Indian that white America loved: romantic, noble, and about to canoe his way out of town.  

When it was published in 1855, “The Song of Hiawatha” took the country by storm. Mothers named their children and ship-builders christened their vessels after the main character and his bride. In living rooms and town squares across the nation, amateur actors donned headdresses and fringed buckskin to recite the poem against a painted backdrop of wigwams and forest scenery.

Forty years later, actual anthropologists began to address the grammatical, geographic and factual errors in Schoolcraft’s and Longfellow’s publications. But the American public didn’t care that the “Song of Hiawatha” was a garbled mix of mythologies from many different tribes, nor that the places characterized as “Ojibway-land” were hundreds of miles apart. They didn’t care that the words and proper names were misspelled and mistranslated. They didn’t even care that Longfellow arbitrarily changed the main character’s name from the actual Ojibwe figure to one from Iroquois myth. (Hiawatha, he said, sounded more melodious than Manabozho.)

By the 20th century, the Upper Peninsula's new managers were still capitalizing on the poem’s cachet. Many UP landmarks, such as Tahquamenon Falls, carry names that are, at best, a jumble of Ojibwe language fragments. People like me can spend hours researching the origins of these place names before we find out that they mean nothing. Nothing, that is, except the feeling they've come to embody for us.

That’s the weirdest part of all—that Longfellow, despite working from a faulty account of a place he never visited, somehow did imbue his poem with the magic and mystery of this place. And those qualities are linked to the names he gave it, and those names help outsiders (like me) feel magic and mystery where we might otherwise feel fear at this land's vastness, its wildness, its otherness. We look at it and we imagine that we're seeing exactly what the natives saw. But we can't know for sure, because we don't know them.

Read more from The Connoisseurs.

[theconnoisseursus]

“I had to get it out, but it was too vulnerable to share with people. I didn’t want to be judged, or pigeonholed. I had sweat rings down to my waist, because it was so scary to share these lyrics.”

I first fell in fan-crush love with Leslie when I found out she sings backup for Brian Setzer. Then I read her upcoming book, The Christian Girl’s Guide to Divorce, and fell in love all over again. When it comes to heartbreak, Leslie has a voice unlike anybody else’s. It’s sharp enough to cut the one who done you wrong, yet gentle enough to soothe your wounded soul. Her poignant insight feels like a hand on your hair, while her wicked sense of humor is a needed slap on the ass. It’s bitter and hopeful and as satisfying as a plate hurled against the wall. 

And now, on the heels of her latest heartbreak, she’s finally writing her own record. Click here to get it made.

Read more.

[theconnoisseursus]

Each year, the League of American Bicyclists (a title that makes us want to curl our moustaches and don a striped jersey) assesses the 50 states through a voluntary survey and rates their “bicycle friendliness.” They go a step further and apply the same metrics to communities, businesses and universities. 

I took the survey for Kalamazoo, Mi, one of the Midwest’s coolest cities that is still suffering under an antiquated traffic hierarchy. (We’re working to change that, though. Check out @krvtrail​ to see how.)

[theconnoisseursus]

“It’s just the way of life around here. Everyone’s out, either on the canal when it freezes or on the big lake. After school, soon as you get home, you get your skates and just go and play for hours on the rink. Of course, it helps that we have winter for 90 percent of the year.”

[theconnoisseursus]

Forget whether or not you agree with the ranking. The explanations are sharp and entertaining cultural commentary. (Haha, #22.)

[theconnoisseursus]

This isn’t the first time. Same thing happened in 1976 and in 1983.

[theconnoisseursus]

It will either make you miss it, or make you so glad to be gone. 

[theconnoisseursus]

New fave website: Vintage Portland. 

Because of this 1943 trolley map and so much more. 

[theconnoisseursus]

Owner Marian Levine will continue to license Carnegie Deli outposts in Las Vegas and Bethlehem, Pa., as well as at some sports venues. Though if you ask us, a 4-inch stack of pastrami and corned beef doesn’t taste the same without a layer of NYC attitude. 

[theconnoisseursus]

O’Brien proposes that the city could even rent it out to Universal Studios. She also suggests officials might consider relocating individual letters.

"Take the letter H," she says, "Put it somewhere ... give them this letter. Let them touch it and feel it. Educate them on it. Educate them on the sensitivity of the area. Get it away from this area."

[theconnoisseursus]

What’s the best thing about living in Laurel Canyon?

“Feeling removed from a city and yet hovering over it. It feels more similar to me to the time we lived in Africa than anything else. The floor is always dirty, the doors are always open, you hear people on the street, but you’re hovering above it. I love the way the eucalyptus smells, especially in the rain. I like that we see deer and raccoons, even though we live in Los Angeles.”

What’s the worst thing about living in Laurel Canyon?

“You always have to be in your car. No one walks anywhere because there are no sidewalks.”