A Story of the West 西部的故事.doc

A Story of the WestThe West of the United States can always remind people of the pioneers, the cowboys, the gold rush and the land rush. Do you know any figures who were typical examples of dwellers in that special area？ Well, here is a story about two famous characters in the gold-rush days.It has been over 350 years since the first settlements in the United States were made by Europeans. People can now look back upon the countrys history and the old colorful figures who, in a sense, typified a given area. The story that follows concerns two famous characters who were part of the Rocky Mountain gold-rush days.The West is traditionally the land of glamour and romance in America the land of the pioneers and the cowboys, of the gold rush and the land rush, where fortunes could be easily made and lost and made again in cattle or land or mining. Now much of the country is enclosed by fences, the covered wagon has been replaced by the automobile and modern cities have taken the place of frontier settlements. The cabins of the pioneers and miners are gone. A few “old-time” cowboys remain, but many of the cowboys sons are students at a university or state agricultural school. There are still places, however, where the spirit of the old West remains. One of these is the mining town of Leadville, Colorado. Leadville is unique in being the highest city in the United States. It is located in the Rocky Mountains and is 10000 feet above sea levels. Its most unusual feature, however, is the living picture of the past which it preserves. Leadville is not really old in years. It has existed less than a century, but it recalls an episode in the history of West. When the town was in its heyday, as late as 1890, it had a population if some 40000 living in the wooden house of similar architecture. Now only about 5000 live there and occupy the old house. Many of the buildings are in disrepair and in need of paint, and since the town is close to the timberline, there is a certain bareness to its appearance apart from the drabness of its house. Nevertheless, there is a romantic glamour there. The big hotel, the Tabor Opera House, and even some of the notorious in the day when every citizen hoped to become a millionaire.Among the more colorful characters of Leadvilles golden age were H ,A, W Tabor and his second wife, Elizabeth McCourt, better known as “Baby Doe.” Their history is fast becoming one of the legends of the old West. Horace Austin Warner Tabor was a school-teacher in Vermont. With his first wife and two children he left Vermont by covered wagon in 1855 to homestead in Kansas. Perhaps he did not find farming to his liking, or perhaps he was tempted by rumors of fortunes to be made in Colorado mines. At any rate, a few years later he moved west to the small Colorado mining camp known as a California Gulch, which he later renamed Leadville when he became its leading citizen. “Great deposits of lead are sure to be found here,” he said. As it turned out，it was silver，not lead，that was to make Leadvilles fortune and his. Tabor knew little about mining himself，so he opened a general store，which sold everything from boots to salt，flour，and tobacco. It was his custom to“grubstake”prospective miners， in other words，to supply them with food and supplies，or “grub，”while they looked for ore，in return for which he would get a share in the mine if one was discovered. He did this for a number of years，but no one that he aided ever found anything of value.Finally one day in the year 1878，so the story goes，two miners came in and asked for “grub.”Tabor had decided to quit supplying it because he had lost too much money that way. These miners were persistent，however，and Tabor was too busy to argue with them.“Oh，help yourself. One more time wont make any difference，”he said and went on selling shoes and hats to other customers. The two miners took seventeen dollars worth of supplies，in return for which they gave Tabor a one-third interest in their findings. They picked a barren place on the mountain side and began to dig. After nine days they struck a rich vein of silver. Tabor bought the shares of the other two men，and so the mine belonged to him alone. This mine，known as “the Pittsburg Mine，”made $1300000 for Tabor in return for his seventeen-dollar investment. Later Tabor bought the Matchless Mine on another barren hillside just outside of the town for $117,000. This turned out to be even more fabulous than the Pittsburg, yielding $35,000 worth of silver per day at one time. Leadville grew Tabor became its first mayor, and later became lieutenant governor of the state. At this time he met Baby Doe, a beautiful young girl with blonde curls and big blue eyes. His wife had too many New England virtues. She was thrifty and carefully saved the money she earned from doing laundry for the miners. She was an excellent housekeeper. She kept things neat and tidy and made Tabor wipe his feet before entering the house. He gave her $1,200,000 as a divorce settlement and secretly married Baby Doe. Later he became United States senator, and they were married publicly in a big ceremony in Washington. Mr. Chester A. Arthur, President of the United States, attended. Tabor was 53 years old at the time, and Baby Doe was 21. The honeymoon cost $10,000 a day. As a wedding gift he gave her the famed Isabella Diamond, supposed to have been sold by Queen Isabella of Spain to pay for Columbus voyage on which he discovered America. Tabor bought himself a $250 nightshirt.Leadville was too small for the Tabors. They moved to Denver, where Tabor built the city a million-dollar opera house, then the finest between St. Louis and San Francisco, but now torn down to make room for a modern office building. All went well until 1893, the year of the silver panic. The United states no longer used silver as a standard for coinage. With the price of silver down, Tabor could not afford to operate the Matchless Mine. He had spent all of his money in extravagant living and had to go to work as a day laborer in Denver. It is reported that one time when he and Baby Doe had nothing in the house to eat, his first wife, living comfortably on her $1,200,000, sent them a wagon load of food, enough to keep them all winter.During the last year of his life his friends got him a job as a clerk in the Denver post office, which his money has built. When he died in 1899, his last words to Baby Doe were “Hang on to the Matchless. It will make you a fortune.” Baby Doe did what Tabor told her, and she moved into a little shack at the entrance to the mine. The shack is still there. It has been repaired, but otherwise it is much as it was when she lived there. There is a cot, a table, and one or two chairs. A small coal stove sits in one corner. There is a Catholic altar against one wall, with some candles and a cross on it. Letters of Baby Does, Which are preserved in a case at one side of the room, indicate that in her last years she seldom left the shack for fear that someone, would try to enter the mine. Friends brought her a small supply of food and coal. To keep track of time, she marked off the days on her calendar, which still hangs on he wall, In the middle of March, 1935, the marking stopped. The frozen body of the 73-year-old woman was found a few days later, still guarding the Matchless Mine. 西部的故事美国西部总是令人想起拓荒者、牛仔、淘金热和土地热潮。你知道那片特殊土地上有哪些典型的居住人物吗？好吧，这儿有个关于淘金热中两个著名人物的故事。距第一批来到美国定居的欧洲人已经有超过350年的时间了。现在人们可以回头看这个国家的历史和古老的丰富多彩的人物。在某种意义上，这些人物是某个特定领域的代表人物。接下来故事中所提及的可以说是洛基山淘金时代的典型的两个人物。美国西部一直是充满魅力和浪漫的地方，属于拓荒者、牛仔、淘金热和土地热潮。在这里，你会一夜暴富也能倾家荡产，还可能靠着牛、土地或者矿产东山再起。而现如今这里的大部分地区都被篱笆围起来，大篷车被汽车取代，现代大都市取代了边远地区当年拓荒者和矿工的小木屋不见了，只留下一些“旧时代”的牛仔，但他们的孩子都在大学或州立的农业学校上学。即便如此，能代表西部精神的地方依然存在，其中之一便是科罗拉多州莱德维尔的一个采矿小镇。 莱德维尔的独特之处在于他是美国海拔最高的城市，坐落在海平面以上10000英尺的洛基山脉上。然而，这座城市最不寻常的的特征恰恰能生动地表现出它所保留的那段历史。莱德维尔存在还不到一个世纪，但它却能唤起人们对西部那段历史的回忆。这座城市全盛时期最迟发生在在1890年期间，人口达40000，都住在与现代建筑风格相似的木屋子里。现在只有大约5000人住的老房子里。很多房屋长年失修，需要粉刷修葺下。由于城镇很接近林木线，除了单调乏味外还显得光秃。然而，它有着浪漫的魔力大旅馆、塔博尔歌剧院，甚至还有些声名狼藉的酒吧依旧在使用中。当时，所有的市民天天都想成为百万富翁。在莱德维尔黄金时期那些光彩的人物中出彩的是H，A，W,塔博尔和他的第二任妻子，伊丽莎白，米克特（因“宝贝多依”而更为出名）。他们的事迹很快成为了那个年代西部的传奇。贺拉斯奥斯汀沃纳塔博尔是佛蒙特州的一名教师，在1855年，他和他的第一任妻子还有两个孩子用一辆货车离开了佛蒙特州，去堪萨斯州定居。也许他发现种地不和他的意，又或许他被那些传闻中的科罗拉多洲的矿山财富所诱惑，无论如何，几年后，他搬到了西边的一个被当作加州废物的科罗拉多矿物营。后来，当他成为那里的领导市民时，他将该地重命名为莱德维尔。他说：“伟大的矿物榜样将要在这儿被发现。” 结果是，影响莱德维尔和他自己命运的是银而不是铅。塔博尔自己不懂开采矿石，所以他开了一间杂货铺，出售包括从鞋子到食盐、面粉和烟草等所有商品。为未来的矿工“投资”是他的习惯，换句话说，为了回报在发现的矿里面的分享所得，他在矿工们寻找矿石的时候会提供给他们食物或其它所需要的东西。这些年他一直这样做，然而他所资助的人当中，却没有一个人发现任何有价值的东西。最后，据说事情是这样的，1878年的一天，两个矿工走进商店并请求采矿资助。但塔博尔在这方面损失了大量金钱，因此他已经决定放弃继续资助他们。可是这些矿工执意要求这些，塔博尔太忙没时间与他们争论，“好吧，随便你们。反正多投资一次也不会改变什么，”他说完又继续向其他顾客出售鞋帽。作为回报，矿工承诺把所发现的财富的三分之一分给塔博尔，因此得到了价值17美元的物资供给。他们挑选了山边一块贫瘠的土地并开始挖凿。九天之后他们发现了一条矿脉，蕴含着丰富的银。之后塔博尔从那两个矿工手里买回其余的股份，于是便拥有了整条矿脉。这条他以17美元的投资换回了130万美元的矿脉就是日后人们所知的“匹兹堡银矿”。 后来，塔博尔花了11万7千美元在城镇外的另一座荒山上买了 马彻勒斯矿，而这 比匹兹堡矿带来更多的财富，