Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1911-04-05
NEW NEVIS OF YESTERDAY
Man Who Gave Up His Life for
an Idea.
Hinton Rowland Helper Devoted
Years to Scheme for Pan-American
Railway That Is Now Near
ing FuIflIIment.
Ry E. j. EDWARDS.

uOCu1uS more, Is growing 1uCO du &C
complished fact, and there are those
in authority in the world Of railroad
transportation who are of the opinion
that approximately by the time the
Panama Canal is thrown open to the
worlds traffic the final links in the
! steel ribbon binding the three Amer
icas together will have been spiked
into place. This belief is based on
the assumption that the canal will be
completed in 1915 and that the pres
ent rate Of progress Of building the
railroad in question is continued.
When the full and impartial history
of this great railway undertaking
comes to be written, the name Of
| Hinton Rowland Helper will loom
as large as the first dreamer Of a Pan
American railway-the man whose
I tenacity of purpose IS gradually max
ing the dream reality-the man
who practically staryed himself to
death in behalf of his pet idea.
Those who survive the exciting
days of the Civil war and few years
earlier can hardly fail to remember
! the widespread interest aroused by
book, published in 1857, called "The
Impending Crisis in the South, and
How to Meet It." Written by South
erner, a native Of North Carolina, it
was dedicated to the non-slaveholding
whites Of the South, and after at
tempting to prove that slavery was an
economic curse, wholly aside from
its immortality, the author worked out
! with what proved to be amazing
prophecy what the effect of slavery
uD;~~n the South would ultimately be
and what the result of an armed con-
hict between South and North would
inevitably be. "The Impending Crisis"
as the beck was popularity called, had
a sale and an inIH"Ance surpassed
only by Uncle Toms Cabin" It's
sale, in fact, was enormous, and in
1860 the book was widely circulated
as a campaign textbook by the Re-
publican national committee.
During LincoIns administration 1i.'-s :11
ard part of Johnson's, the author
Of THE Impending Crises" served as
United States consul at Buenos Aires.
While in that service he conceived
the idea of and began the agitation
for the construction Of an fnterconti-
mental railway line He called it the
Three Americas railroad, North, Cen.
trail and South. He outlined the man |
ner in which the railroad could be |
carried through South America to |
Central America, thence through |
Mexico and then meet in Texas the
railroad system of the United States
From then on until his DEATH
which occurred in Washington last |
year, Hinton Rowland Helper the
Souths prophet of the North's sue
cess in civil war, devoted the greater
part Of his life to the forwarding Of
this idea. Nothing could discourage
him. For years, when he talked of
his scheme, he met with no encour-
agement whatever; instead, ridicule
was heaped upon him, especially by
Jay Gould, who declared that it was
as reasonable to build a railroad in
then an almost undiscov-
cred region, or in Greenland. But no
slight nor insult daunted Mr.. Helper.
With the zeal of Turk and the faith
Of an Arab, he pressed forward his
idea at every conceivable opportu-
nifty, and at last he came to know
for surety that it would ultimately |
triumph.
And then he died-and he died OBJ
w oh
erty. My authority for this statement
is Mrs. Sally G. Noble, niece, who |
lives in Rockland, Me-, and Is the
onlv one of the immediate family
who survives
"Not until after he died did I know
in what perjury my uncle lived" said
Mrs. Noble to me recently. "Yet for
I don't know how many months he
put UP bravely with the utmost priva-
ton that he might be able to com
plete his work. For weeks at time
he lived upon a loaf of bread, but still
he kept patiently and persistently at
work. Bodily comfort meant nothing
to him when his idea was at stake.
That idea was everything to him, and
thoughts Of it-this man whose name
was upon every lip just before the
war.
SCI hope the time will come when
due honor will be given to him as the
first suggestor Of what is to be the
| Pan-American railroad. An attempt
has already been made to steal that
honor from him; they went so far
as to remove my uncle's picture from
the Pan-American building in Wash
ington. Yet he was SO thoroughly
absorbed in his work that he seemed
not to care for the lack of friends
Once he told me that he had no time
for social intercourse, as he had to
work and work constantly on his
great Three Americas Railway prof.
ect. And to the last he worked on it.
and because of it died in dire want
Of food and friends"
Copyright, 1870 by z. J. Edwards All