And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie

Agatha Christie's famous mystery novel, And Then There Were None, spins around the verses of the disturbing poem, "Ten Little Soldiers."

Ten strangers are lured to a mansion on a island off the coast of Devon by U.N. Owen. As they dine together the first evening a record begins to play with the voice of their unseen host accusing them all of a deadly secret which caused the death of someone else. Within a few hours the first guest is dead. He chokes to death from cyanide poisoning. Soon the guests figure out their likely murderer is among them. But who is it?

And Then There Were None is Agatha Christie's most popular novel. It was published in 1939. In 2015 it was voted as the favorite Christie novel in a worldwide survey to commemorate her 125th anniversary. It also is the best selling crime novel of all time. (Christie webpage.) And it is the very first Agatha Christie novel I've ever read. Can you believe it?

Last week my family and I listened to the audiobook of And Then There Were None as we traveled to Oregon for a family reunion. Even though the book has been made into numerous movies and spoofs, none of us knew how it worked out and became thoroughly engrossed in the mystery. When we got home from our trip we still had an hour of the story left, so we sat in the family room listening to the conclusion together.

Agatha Christie said it is was a very difficult book to write but the idea of basing a novel on the "Ten Little Soldiers" poem really fascinated her. (Christie)  No matter how difficult is was to write she did it masterfully. What a chilling and perplexing mystery. I highly recommend it. We are reading this book for next month's book club. Betty, a retired teacher, told me she taught this book years ago but before she gave the students their copy of the novel she removed the last chapter of the book so the children wouldn't know who the murderer was before she was ready for them to know. They anxiously awaited the last section which she gave them after a few writing assignments on who they thought did it.  Obviously, she gave this assignment in the days before the Internet, but what a fun assignment.

Now I am off to see if I can locate the BBC series (Dec. 2015) of "And Then There Were None" and the Family Guy spoof, "And Then There Were Fewer" (2010).

Source: Audiobook made available on Hoopla by the Pierce County Library system.

Favorite, funny, and poignant moments from our trip of a lifetime

Travelers. Day 1 in Quito; Day 7 in Panama City.

This travelogue features some of the funniest, most poignant, or favorite moments from our trip of a lifetime to Ecuador and Panama.

Day 1:  We had one day on our own in Quito before we joined tours to see the best of Ecuador. We knew we wanted to see La Basílica del Voto Nacional (The Basilica of the National Vow), the square in front of the Presidential Residence, and the Iglesia de la Compañía de Jesús (The Church of the Society of Jesus) aka The Gold Church.

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  We started the day by hiking uphill to visit the La Basílica. It felt like we were climbing a mountain since it is situated in the city at 9350 feet above sea level -- mere foothills of the Andes). Don and Tom separated from Tony, Kathy, and I to climb the tower. The three sibs were on our own to explore the unfinished cathedral. We were outside on one of the turrets when we rounded a bend to see this ladder with a sign that says "Only Up Stairs." Not sure how we would get down if we dared to climb up. We laughed at how different safety standards are in other parts of the world compared to the US.
  
• After exploring the Basílica, we headed toward the Plaza de la Independencia, the main square in Quito which is bordered on one side by the Presidential Palace. When we entered the plaza we were very aware something was about to happen based on the increased police presence. As it turned out, September 26th was Flag Day in Ecuador and we happened upon a ceremony featuring a military parade and speakers, including the President of Ecuador. We couldn't believe our luck arriving when we did to see this special moment full of pomp and formality, so colorful and somber, but the military musicians weren't very good. They reminded us of a junior high band. We had to cover our mouths with our hands to avoid laughing out loud.
  
  
  
  
  
  

Classic Review: MOBY-DICK

Good Moby Dick book covers. My favorite is the third one over with the big whale coming up under the small-looking ship.

If asked before I started reading Moby-Dick a month ago, what the story was about I'd have a fairly short summary ready -- Ishmael, a member of the crew on a whaling ship named the Pequot (I would drag from the back of my brain) is a witness to a maniacal quest by Captain Ahab to exact vengeance on a huge, white whale that bit off his leg on a previous voyage.

In theory my summary was correct but Moby-Dick, my version weighing in at over 850 pages, would be the world's most boring story if that is all it was. The book didn't exactly delight me, but it sure surprised me. Those surprises are what I would like to focus my review on.

First, a little history (thank you Wikipedia) -- Herman Melville published the book in 1851 to mixed reviews and it was not popular, going out of print before the author's death in 1891. In 1919, after the centennial of Melville's birth, William Faulkner said he wished he'd written the book himself and D.H. Lawrence called it "one of the strangest and most wonderful books in the world" and "the greatest book of the sea ever written". That did it. Praise from two guys, famous writers both, and Moby-Dick went back into publication and has never been out of print since. It is now considered one of the great American novels and a fine example of American Renaissance literature (1830-60s). 

Melville drew on his own experiences as a sailor from 1841-44 which included spending some time on whaling ships. He also clearly spent A LOT of time reading whaling literature and researching everything the world knew about whales and whaling. This research must have acquainted the author not only with facts but with myths about the behemoths of the sea and also gave him an opportunity to examine renderings of whales by artists, who may or may not have ever seen live whales. The descriptions of these bad paintings/illustrations of whales was one of the highlights of my reading experiences. For example, Ishmael describes a painting of a whale in a New Bedford tavern that is "most appalling" and so "repugnant to all right-thinking artists" that the whale looks like a "blob" or a "dumb-bell" and he makes fun of European engravings that make whales look like distorted pigs or fantastical creatures (Ch. 57). I'm guessing he was referring to something like this:

 

Medieval whale art

Speaking of whale art, I sure had my pick of whale art on the covers of 1800+ editions of Moby-Dick on Goodreads. Here are some examples of really bad covers, in my opinion:

None of these covers advance the story or even inspire me. The book I purchased has no pictures at all, just the words: MOBY-DICK. That was especially bad.

Whoops, I'm digressing, back to the many surprises and more history about Moby-Dick. 

The whale in the book was patterned after a notoriously hard whale to catch, Mocha Dick. I was shocked to learn that whalers actually named some of the whales they sought and could identify others based on their markings. But now that I think about it for a few minutes I realize that whale experts today can do the same thing. Okay, not so shocking. Melville used the story from survivors of the sinking of the whaleship Essex in 1820 by a sperm whale as his inspiration. The men who survived their ordeal in that sinking had to resort to cannibalism to survive, which explains the references to cannibals in Moby-Dick as the character Queequeg, a tattooed South Sea Islander, is referred to as one.

Melville also spent chapter upon chapter describing the taxonomy of whales, all whales, while exulting the virtues of the sperm whale in particular. Ishmael built a whole catalog of whales and their characteristics and urged future researchers to add to his list as they discovered new details. Parts of the book had that charming, believable aspect to it. If I was the lone survivor of a shipwreck I think I, too, would write a journal of everything I could remember from the voyage, including all the whales I saw (or hoped to see).

In addition to describing various types of whales, Ishmael went into detail on every single part of the superior sperm whale, as he saw it. There was a chapter on the head, a chapter on the body, another on the blowhole. You get the idea. Then there were the chapters on how they killed the whales, which I could not picture in my head, and another how they attached the whale to the boat so they could go to work on rendering it into oil. I have to confess I was morbidly interested in these details. How, on earth, does one do these things with limited technology and tools...no electric winches to help them in that day? 

Speaking of "that" day, I could never figure out the years in which Melville set the book. Was it supposed to be a contemporary novel, set in 1850 or set in earlier years? Let's see, A.I. to the rescue, Melville, it says, made references to historical events happening between 1840 and 1842 in the story. There, I answered that question for you and for me. So if the Pequot set out in December 1840, why does Ishmael keep referring to whales as fish? Whales were officially reclassified from "fish" to mammals in 1758. This little detail became a sticking point for me. Clearly Melville, who did all this research on whales for the book, would have known that whales are not fish. Then I wondered if it was a technique he used to show the ignorance, or lack of schooling of some of the crew. I'll never know, but it bothered me.

Melville was greatly influenced by the writings of Sir Thomas Browne and Thomas Carlyle, who I'm not familiar with, and also by both Shakespeare and the Bible, which I am. Whoever/whatever were his influences I'd call the language used in Moby-Dick as stilted. A.I. corrected me and told me that was my opinion, that the language in the book was "archaic, formal, and dense". Okay, whatever. That pretty much says the same thing. Captain Ahab's dialogue and soliloquies were especially elevated, sounding like something straight out of Shakespeare. There were so many "thees" and "thous"I felt like I was reading the King James version of the Bible. I'd guess that the language, alone would make Moby-Dick almost impenetrable for 21st-century teenagers. In fact, it made reading the book almost impossible for me, too, so I switched from the print version to the audiobook, and let the language flow over me, being read by the excellent narrators chosen for the task by the publisher. It was like watching a Shakespearean play with actors who know what their lines mean and can convey their meaning to the audience through their voice and their actions. It is so much easier to understand Shakespeare that way than trying to read it.

Here is an example from Chapter 31 of one of Ahab's soliloquies. In it he is regaling the wonders of what the whale sees and knows. He clearly loves or reveres that beast which is in direct opposition to how he feels about Moby Dick, another beast but his enemy.

“Speak, thou vast and venerable head,” muttered Ahab, “which, though ungarnished with a beard, yet here and there lookest hoary with mosses; speak, mighty head, and tell us the secret thing that is in thee. Of all divers, thou hast dived the deepest. That head upon which the upper sun now gleams, has moved amid this world’s foundations. Where unrecorded names and navies rust, and untold hopes and anchors rot; where in her murderous hold this frigate earth is ballasted with bones of millions of the drowned; there, in that awful water-land, there was thy most familiar home. Thou hast been where bell or diver never went; hast slept by many a sailor’s side, where sleepless mothers would give their lives to lay them down. Thou saw’st the locked lovers when leaping from their flaming ship; heart to heart they sank beneath the exulting wave; true to each other, when heaven seemed false to them. Thou saw’st the murdered mate when tossed by pirates from the midnight deck; for hours he fell into the deeper midnight of the insatiate maw; and his murderers still sailed on unharmed — while swift lightnings shivered the neighboring ship that would have borne a righteous husband to outstretched, longing arms. O head! thou hast seen enough to split the planets and make an infidel of Abraham, and not one syllable is thine!”

Have I scared you off yet? One reviewer exclaimed after reading this passage "Oh boy. What a page, what a book!" I have to confess there is poetry and music in the rhythm of the prose and, if read slowly enough, could be thought of as beautiful. 

Lest you think the whole book is full of such soliloquies, let me assure you that is not the case. Melville uses songs, poetry, catalogs (which I already mentioned), even stage directions, and asides. The crew speaks in their dialects using colloquialisms and slang. It really is written in a varied and unique style throughout.

Now as to themes -- Clearly the big one, "revenge", is the dominant theme of the book. But there were many other themes, some I expected and need no explanation like "man vs nature" while others surprised me. I'll begin with "race". The crew of the Pequot was made up of 30+ sailors from all over the world. It seemed like just about all races were presented and the men on board were all cool with it. Surprisingly, for the time period in which the book was written, the black man was never called a slave. Bravo, Melville! There was a scene near the beginning of the book where "sexuality/sexual identification" is seemingly in play when Ishmael and Queequeg, bedmates, wake up hugging each other. The scene comes across as very non judgemental and tender. Again, bravo! There is another scene where the sailors joyfully squeeze the congealed spermaceti from the whale's brain. The scene is so highly sexualized (it's almost funny) and Ishmael feels a loving, almost manic connection to his crewmates. "Religion" in many forms, not just the protestantism practiced by most New Englanders of the day, were presented, often involving chanting and meditations. God was evoked by Ahab during his further descent into madness, making it clear at least he thought all of this vengeance was sanctioned by God. And then, of course, there was the "madness" which became more and more evident as the story progressed. Ahab rants, "They think me mad—Starbuck does; but I'm demoniac, I am madness maddened! That wild madness that's only calm to comprehend itself!" (Ch.37)

Notice something in that last quote? The first mate is named "Starbuck" and yes, my husband looked it up, the coffee company Starbucks, took their name from this character in Moby-Dick. That is a fun little factoid.

And what of the revenge scene? Compared to the whole book, the last battle between the madman Ahab and Moby Dick, his nemesis, is relatively short -- just a few pages and it is over. Everyone dies except Ishmael and, this was news to me, Moby Dick! Yay. The whale lives to fight another day.

One more thing. Is it "Moby Dick" or "Moby-Dick"? Which is correct? I just looked it up. Moby-Dick, with the hyphen, is the correct title of the book. The original title of the book was Moby-Dick; or, The Whale. Moby Dick, without the hyphen, is the name of the whale. (Oh dang, now I have to go back and correct myself. I should have looked this up earlier.😏) Common usage goes either way, as you see on the exampled book covers! (See above.) If you want to read more about peculiarities of the use of the hyphen here, see this article in Smithsonian.

So why did I decide to finally tackle this great American novel? I'm not a spring chicken. Shouldn't I have read it by now if was going to read it? Well, two reasons. The first, I decided to do a roundup of all the "Must Read Classics" lists I could find. When I compiled all the lists, Moby-Dick made it on the list at spot #13. Currently I am attempting to read all of the top thirty classics on that list, with only five left to go. Secondly, every January I pick one big book and challenge myself to read it some time in the upcoming year. Moby-Dick is my One Big Book of 2026. Woot. Woot. I finished it. Everytime I finish a big book I give myself a pat on the back. Now I have joined with all those humans past and present who have also tackled this book and completed it. A whale of an accomplishment! Ha!

-Anne

Poetry book reviews. Two very different books.

The 100 Best Poems of All Time edited by Leslie Pockell---

Back in 2018 my sister and I met up with our daughters in Ashland, Oregon to attend several plays as part of the Oregon Shakespearean festival. Ashland is a fun, college town with lots of shops to poke around in and restaurants serving unique and tasty foods. It also has several bookstores that I love to poke around in. Aside from the festival's bookstore, my favorite is Bloombury Books on Main Street. As is my usual practice whenever there is an independent bookstore, I make a point of buying something, usually a book or two. During this visit I purchased a small, paperback poetry collection titled The 100 Best Poems of All Time. As a new-ish poetry reader it felt like one of those books I must read. Certainly it was important for me to know which poems are thought to be the world's best.  Apparently I wasn't in a rush to learn about the poems, however, since the volume got stuffed onto a bookshelf when I got home from the trip and didn't see the light of day for several years. 

When I rediscovered the volume and starting reading it, I found myself increasingly shocked at the poems selected by editor Pockell as the best poems of all time. First, the book would have been more accurate if it was titled 100 Favorite Poems (Published in English), since very few of the 100 poems were translated poems. There were none by Rumi or Hafez, both famous and wildly popular Persian poets. Only eighteen of the poems, to my way of counting, were not originally written and published in English and that includes the nine that were written either before English was a language or not a dominate language. Certainly 4/5th of the world's best poems weren't composed in English.

Secondly, there seemed to be an attempt to include just one poem from most (but not all) famous poets throughout time. Shakespeare, Sandburg, Eliot, Stevenson, Poe, and Angelou each had only one poem in the collection, so a better book title would have been 100 Poets with One Example of Their Work. Many famous and prolific poets weren't represented at all, but that may have been related more to when the book was published, 2001, so some poets like Mary Oliver and Nikki Giovanni were probably omitted on that score, though it did seem that old, dead white guys predominated the list.

Certainly it was fun to read or reread many of these classic poems but I suspect that a novice poetry reader would find most of the selections tedious or too dense to enjoy. As I read the poems by the English romantic poets---Wordsworth, Lord Byron, Keats, Burns, and Blake---I found myself longing to have the poems read to me, especially the ones that were several pages long. Poetry, afterall, is meant to spoken aloud.

It seems to me, after looking over this review, that I should reread this collection of poems some day when I am not feeling so critical. Ha!

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars.

Why Storms Are Named After People and Bullets Remain Nameless by Tanaya Winder---

Poet Tanaya Winder is a registered member of the Duckwater Shoshone tribe and grew up on the Southern Ute reservation in Colorado. Winder not only writes poetry but also performs it. Her poems usually are centered around the theme of building community. On this topic, Winder said, "Poetry has the potential to create community for people who are searching for it by providing a space to interact and share experiences on the page." 

In her poem, "Every Word You Ever Needed", her desire to use the written word to enhance community is evident. The moonlight is calling me softly: / have the courage to be brave and create, / now's the time. Write / every word you ever needed.

Her poem, "We Were Stolen" really speaks to me as I try to be a better person, a person who doesn't just wrap myself up in my whiteness, but one who tries to appreciate and honor others. Don't just bear witness at rallies or see us in headlines / that declare "missing" then "body found" then "murdered" / and then claim that you'll protect us. / See us when we're alive... / Remember that we are real, we are worthy, and / we deserve to be seen with each beat our heart takes.

Winder is not only a Native author and poet, she is also a woman and many of her poems speak to women specifically. In "For Girls and Women on Fire" she addresses the issue of women losing themselves to men or to cultural norms. But she reminds women that they can achieve greatness and accomplish what we set our minds to. You did it. So don't stop now. / Because you are meant to / keep all the promises you every made to yourself. (Emphasis mine.) And in the poem, "Constellations of Love" these words remind to keep dreaming--- & when I remembered i was magic, it unraveled into beautiful moonlight / exposing new stars to wish upon.

Why Storms Are Names After People and Bullets Remain Nameless is a small volume of poetry, containing only nineteen poems in 40 pages. But the poems are all so powerful and thought-provoking I can wholeheartedly recommend this book to you.

Rating 4.5 stars.

-Anne

My Beatlemania...Part Two

As promised (You haven't been holding your breath, I hope) here is my second installment or report on the progress of my latent Beatlemania. (In case you missed it, here is the link to the first Beatlemania report.)

Since Sirius Radio introduced a Beatles Channel in May I've been all about the Beatles...again. I say AGAIN because I was all about the Beatles when I was young and then, like almost everyone, I got over their breakup and got on with my life. But I decided that this new Beatlemania brings me back to the original question, "Why, oh why, did the Beatles breakup?" Ultimately, I have decided, that is the question people want an answer to and yet no answer is adequate because, after all, whatever the answer they never got back together.

Several years ago a married couple whom we were good friends with suddenly got a divorce. We were in shock. We didn't know anything was wrong with their marriage, yet they were unwilling to reconcile and that was it. We were  devastated. It was as if we were thrown out at the same time as the divorce. Of course we looked around to blame someone for our loss and decided it was the wife's fault, since she had been unfaithful to her husband. Whoever was guilty, the relationship was over and we never had any chance at a good resolution as far as our friendship was concerned.

I tell this sad little tale just to remind myself that is what happened to most of us when the Beatles broke-up in 1970. None of us saw it coming and we weren't prepared for it. We loved all four of the Beatles but we needed to blame someone so for many people it was either Paul's fault or John's. We let our anger reside on that person and looked around for confirmation of our position. I decided that I needed to read about the Beatles to find our what I could to answer the breakup question once and for all.

The first book I read was The Beatles: the Biography by Bob Spitz. The print edition of the book is nearly 1000 pages yet the audiobook I listened to was only eight discs long. That means I listened to a deeply abridged version of the book. Though I learned quite a bit, especially details of the boys beginnings:  John's abandonment by his parents and his mother's early death; the death of Paul's mother at a young age; Ringo nearly dying several times from diseases we seem to have conquered today; George's seemingly regular life to a loving mother; and the early iterations of their band with several other friends playing other instruments, even though none were particularly musical. I learned a bit about how their summer gigs in Hamburg really laid the framework for the band we know today because of the sheer volume of music they had to put out. They had to play for four to six hours a day. Can you imagine?

When the boys returned to England, George because he was too young,  Paul and Pete (their drummer) because of fighting, followed eventually by John, they played the Liverpool scene and caught the attention of Brian Epstein, who became their manager and was the one who got a recording session organized. And the rest is history.

Here are a few other things I learned as I listened to this biography:

• None of the boys could read music. John and Paul would write the words to their songs down on a scrap of paper and compose a tune which they would teach to George and Ringo. The producer, George Martin, of the music studio  where they recorded their music was the one who wrote out the music and the orchestration. This blows me away. Such talent and yet no musical training.
• Brian Epstein was a closeted gay man and would act out on his impulses, which caused him great anguish. He also took tons of prescription pills like amphetamines. Ultimately it was these drugs that killed him on August 27, 1967. His death was probably the beginning of the unraveling of the Beatles since they tried to operate without a manager after his death placing responsibility on Paul's shoulders to keep the Fab Four together. This caused resentment
• Both John and Ringo married their first wives because of pregnancy (Cindy and Maureen), Paul dated Jane Asher for five years but they broke up due to his infidelities after they had announced their engagement. George asked his first wife, Pattie Boyd, to marry him the first day he met her, on the set of "A Hard Day's Night."
• Drug use really did play a role in The Beatles demise. They were introduced to pot by Bob Dylan in 1965, LSD by a dentist who had them over for dinner and he "spiked" their dessert with it. cocaine and uppers were common as was alcohol. John and Yoko were smoking heroin around the final year of the Beatles. I have to believe that drugs played a bigger role in the breakup than anyone wants to admit.
• Song-writing jealousy and competition played as a wedge in the relationships. Lennon, McCartney and Harrison were all composing so many songs that there is no way all of them could find a way onto an album. Lennon-McCartney, the most prolific song writing duo of all time, weren't used to sharing the limelight with Harrison. That caused resentment, obviously. In the beginning Lennon and McCartney would compose their songs face to face, working out with guitars facing each other, later on they would compose a song and then get minimal tweaks from the other.
• Paul is credited with breaking up the Beatles, but he was really the last to go. Before that Ringo had quit and then come back (during the recording of the White Album); George had walked out and had to calm down before returning; John was now with Yoko Ono who pushed her way into recording sessions, etc., had told the group he wanted a 'divorce' but was talked into staying through the release of the album. When Paul finally threw in the towel over management of the group, he was the very last to want to go. It was just a three-on-one situation at that point and he was odd man out.

The second book I read was Wonderful Tonight by Pattie Boyd. It was a autobiography by the woman who was the muse for the wonderful Harrison hit, "Something" and later two hits by Eric Clapton, "Layla" and "You Look Wonderful Tonight". Since this book wasn't specifically about the Beatles but about a person tangentially related to them I didn't learn that much about the Fab Four but did gain some insights about George Harrison, her husband. One thing that struck me as I read this book---George and all the Beatles were so young when they got started. In 1960, when they officially became the Beatles John was 19, Paul 18, and George 17. Ringo didn't join them until 1962. But when they formed up in the groups that predated the Beatles, John was 16 and Paul was only 15. I say this because when I think about all the immature behavior that is reported in this book, I have to remind myself how young the boys were. No wonder they fell into such a wild lifestyle.  We know about George's interest in Indian music and meditation, for example, but Pattie reports here that he would meditate for days, then emerge and binge on cocaine. It doesn't sound like they had the happiest marriage, for obvious reasons.

My next selection, which I confess I skimmed, was Lennon Remembers: The Full Rolling Stone Interviews of 1970 by Jann Wenner. Less than twelve months after the breakup, Rolling Stone magazine meets with Lennon several times and writes it up in interview format. It was too soon. Lennon was angry and egotistical. He wasn't ready to think of anything outside himself and he spoke with no filter. He pretty much slammed everything and everyone except himself. Did McCartney write any good songs? Well, maybe "Yesterday" was pretty good. That's it. Pete Townsend? Terrible?  Just about everyone involved in music in the 60s? Rubbish.  He had just recorded his first single album and was talking up his song "Mother", which he felt would be his next big hit. It may not have been a huge hit but it revealed Lennon's deep sadness and anger at being abandoned as a child. Yet, I didn't feel any pity for Lennon after reading this book but it did confirme what I was thinking about 'divorce.' Lennon was sad that the Beatles dissolved but he wanted to blame others and not look inward at all. I'd say skip this book unless you want a rude awakening.


Lastly I spent a little time with a graphic biography called The Beatles: All Our Yesterdays. No new ground was plowed here and I am not even sure that all the facts are reported correctly but it was fun to "see" The Beatles according to Jason Quinn's imagination. One thing I did like was the lists of special Beatles stats. For example: at one point in April 1964, they had five songs in the top five slots on the charts.

I still have one book in the wings, Sgt Pepper at Fifty. Enough on The Beatles for one night. Do you have any good books on the Fab Four that you recommend?

Walking in the Steps of our Grandfather in Ecuador

We just returned from an adventure-filled trip to Ecuador and Panama -- two destinations not likely to be high on any list of top places to visit in the world. But these countries hold special prominence for the Kingsbury family, so with my brother Tony, sister Kathy and her husband Tom, Don and I planned this adventure together to trace my paternal grandfather's steps of 100 years ago.

   
In 1904, our granddad, Augustus Kingsbury, was hired as a civil engineer to work on the Panama Canal project. We know little about his job and how he spent his time on the project, but we do know that he stayed in Panama until 1923, working there long after the canal was open and functioning. And we know, from his own words, that he spent a lot of time exploring the region:

It has been my lot in my 20 and more years’ experience in Latin America to traverse and know great stretches of almost uninhabited and unexplored territory. I have taken scientific expeditions into the vastness of the Central American jungles. I have participated in hunting parties throughout Panama and other districts. I have traveled up and down Central and South America and I have learned a great deal about jungle life and at times, I like to get as far from civilization as possible. 

In 1923 Granddad was approached by two gentleman, H. B. Dinwiddie and Rev. George Simmonds working for the Christian Missionary Alliance and the Pioneer Missionary Society, to serve as outfitter and guide for an expedition down the Amazon for the purpose of locating and classifying indigenous people.

Left to right: Kingsbury, Simmonds, Dinwiddie

The expedition took four months, starting in Ecuador and ending, miraculously, in Brooklyn, New York, 8500+ miles later. According to Granddad's records from the trip down the Amazon and its tributaries [w]e traveled approximately 400 miles by train, 90 miles on mule back, 600 miles afoot, 1,000 miles in canoes, 500 miles on a wood burning launch, 200 miles by raft and 2,200 miles by river steamer. The length and breadth of this expedition is something that few would attempt today; let alone one hundred years ago without modern technology like motor boats, GPS locating devices, and dehydrated foods.

The expedition began for Granddad in Panama where he took a ship accompanied by two women, his aunt, Miss Fannie Kingsbury, and a school teacher friend of hers. 

We left Cristobal, the Atlantic entrance of the Panama Canal, August 25, and arrived at Buenaventura (Ecuador) two days later. Buenaventura is a typical west coast town, dirty and squalid, without pavements or sewers or buildings of consequence. Our stay there was short and we were glad to leave. We arrived at the mouth of the river Guayas three days after leaving Buenaventura and after several hours journey up the river arrived at Guayaquil. It is the largest city in Ecuador and one of the greatest sea ports of the west coast. 

One cannot help wonder if Granddad was in awe of the Panama Canal, which he helped build, as he traversed from Atlantic to Pacific at the beginning of his journey. From Guayaquil, the small group boarded the amazing and famous G&Q railroad to travel the 300 miles to Quito.

Leaving Guayaquil we crossed the river to Duran, the terminus of the Guayaquil and Quito railroad, on the first lap of our journey into the Andes. The Guayaquil and Quito (G&Q) railroad is one of the most remarkable railways in the world. It runs directly into the heart of the Andes Mountains and one of the most mountainous districts in South America. It crosses several high ranges, at one place at the height of more than 12,200 feet. The track clings for miles along the walls of deep canyons or along the sides of great precipices. It crosses roaring mountain torrents over high bridges, it winds its tortuous way back and forth up the mountain sides.  

Granddad, a civil engineer, marveled for several paragraphs about the wonders of the G&Q Railroad, which he made known was built by Americans. He said, It stands today and always will stand as one of the most remarkable feats of railway engineering in the world, a monument to the genius of the American railway engineer. Unfortunately, Granddad's prediction for the future proved too optimistic. This greatest of achievements has fallen into disrepair and was closed down by the Ecuadorian government in 2020 so we were not able to experience a ride on the G&Q first hand. 

When the train pulled into Quito, Granddad Kingsbury was met by Dinwiddie and Simmonds. His journal includes no further comments about his aunt and her friend so we have no idea what adventure those two embarked on themselves. Almost immediately, Granddad was thrown into the business of outfitting the expedition and preparing for its departure.

We stayed in Quito for a week and here the serious work of our journey began. Dinwiddie had brought from New York, 12 cases of preserved foods, camera supplies, surgical instruments and other articles. I had apparatus for preserving skins and museum specimens, surgical instruments and a vermin proof tent and cots. We had an arrangement of nested utensils and a miscellaneous assortment of other articles. We bought trade goods and blankets and such other things as we needed.

And their expedition was on the move! We left Quito for Ambato, the real start of the expedition, on September 12 and retraced our steps about 100 miles over the Guayaquil and Quito railroad. We had made arrangements for a pack train to take us over the first 90 miles of our long trip eastward to Mera, as far as we could go by mule.

Granddad on the right with his hand on a mule.

From Ambato the mule team headed southeast to Baños. Along the way the team encountered a suspension bridge where they had to blindfold the mules before they would walk across it. Baños, was a small community of 2500 people at the time and home to natural thermal hot springs. Next stop was Mera, a small, squalid community of 12 or 13 huts, where it rains every day of the year, with the exception of ten. It was situated on a bluff overlooking a river. Travel would be by boat or canoe for the rest of the journey. The next day two teams were sent out to explore two rivers, the Napo and the Puya. Puya [the community] is situated on the river of that name at the edge of one of the wildest and least known territories in the world, the Ecuadorian Oriente. Ultimately we think the Puya River was selected (now Puyo), but the documents contain some confusing comments so we can't be certain which river they were on. From this tributary, the trip down the Amazon had begun. 

After considerable difficulty we rented three dugout canoes, about 20 feet in length and manned by three men each. They were large enough to carry our gear without difficulty. Imagine going down the Amazon in such a low slung canoe. Granddad mentioned that the boat spilled over several times. (We all laughed at his use of the word "rented" when referring to the canoes, as if they planned to return them!)

From this point forward the story doesn't pay as much attention to place names (if any were known then) but focuses on the indigenous people and the flora and fauna encountered along the way. Granddad witnessed hunters using curare darts to fell a tapir, took a photo of shrunken heads, and worried about alligators and piranhas. At one point on the trip he noted the Amazon must have been over ten to fifteen miles wide. Nothing was written in his account about the missionary aspect of the trip, but we assume Dinwiddie and Simmonds collected information for potential future mission efforts. Eventually the men boarded a freighter on Nov. 25th perhaps as far as one thousand miles up the Amazon River and were transported back to Brooklyn, New York, getting home on Dec. 24, 1923.

Augustus Kingsbury was originally from Connecticut. After returning home he spent some time on a speaking tour about his South American adventures in public settings such as libraries and churches. On a later train trip heading west, he met the woman who would become my grandmother and they moved to Oregon. My dad was the third of six children born to Augustus and Anna Kingsbury. While working on the Bonneville Dam on the Columbia River in 1936, Granddad Kingsbury died from injuries sustained in a workplace accident. My father was only seven years old at the time. Because my dad and all his siblings were so young when their father died, none of them knew much about the Amazon expedition until much later in life when Aunt Fannie, Dad's oldest sister named for Augustus' favorite aunt, connected with Rev. Simmonds who was able to fill in many of the holes in the story. And a copy of the document "EXPLORATION IN THE EQUADORIAN ORIENTE AND UPPER AMAZON, As told by Augustus H. Kingsbury and written by Max Schafer" was secured and passed around the family to read and treasure. All the quotes in this post come from this article.

As the 100-year anniversary of the expedition approached, my brother Tony and his son Andrew talked about making a trip to Ecuador to try to retrace some of our grandfather's steps. Tony made it clear that anyone in the family was welcome to join them. I didn't commit to the project until March as did my sister Kathy. Our youngest sister, Grace, is a teacher so she couldn't take time away from work for the trip. Our cousin Robin was interested in joining us, but her mother Betty (Dad's only living sibling) is quite aged and the timing was not right to leave her. In the end, Andrew also couldn't make the trip due to work. That left three 'Kingsbury kids' (Tony, Kathy, and me, Anne) and two of our spouses (Tom and Don) ready to make the trip. Our goal was to walk where Granddad walked, to see what he may have seen, to try to experience a little of what he encountered along the way. We knew we wanted to see the Panama Canal up close and to visit the Ecuadorian cities of Quito, Baños, Mera, and Puya, since they were all mentioned in the document. We hoped to take a boat ride on a tributary of the Amazon. We also hoped to ride on the amazing G&Q railroad, which we didn't know was no longer running when we began making our plans. Kathy, who is a master trip planner, arranged tours that would allow us to see a lot of the country and have a variety of experiences in both Ecuador and Panama. We chose a late September start date to coincide with the dates of the original expedition.

Photo credit: T. Kingsbury

We began our version of the adventure in Quito, Ecuador. Granddad mentioned in his notes that Quito is a city in a great valley, scooped saucer-like out of the mountains that surrounded it. What he didn't mention was that it is situated at an elevation of over 9000 feet. We all live at relatively low elevations (400-1500 feet) so the elevation of Quito was quite a shock to our systems. As we climbed the hill to 'The Basilica of the National Vow' not far from our hotel, I felt like I was climbing a mountain not just walking up a hill, panting and wheezing as I stopped to rest half way up. The basilica was built in 1883 so we are sure our grandfather saw it, even if he didn't visit, since this church holds a prominent spot in the city.

Photo credit: D. Bennett

As we explored Quito on September 26th we stumbled upon an elaborate and somber ceremony celebrating Ecuadorian Flag Day. Ecuador was part of Gran Columbia (The Republic of Columbia) after gaining independence from Spain in 1820, separating in 1830 and settling on its current flag on September 26, 1860. Granddad may not have experienced a grand ceremony like we did for Flag Day, but he certainly saw the same Ecuadorian flag we saw.

Photo credit: T. Buhler

Our first Ecuadorian tour was to the Mindo Cloud Forest. While there we fed hummingbirds, hiked to a beautiful waterfall, visited a butterfly farm, and experienced the process of artisan chocolate making from cocoa nuts on the tree to the finished bars on the shelf. It was a wonderful and exhausting day.

Photo credit: T. Kingsbury

The second day of touring involved a trip to the Cotopaxi National Park. Cotopaxi is one of the highest mountains in the Ecuadorian Andes. It is also an active volcano. For this reason, even if we were physically capable, we were not allowed to climb to the rim, only to the base camp. Before we drove to the parking area on the mountain (volcano) we stopped at a shop and drank a cup of coca tea to give us energy for the climb. Yes, that coca! We drank coca tea (a drink new to us), while the men on Granddad's expedition consumed an odd drink made from fermented manioc called chicha. We drank much of the chicha, especially on the march and we found it to be a very refreshing food. The elevation at the parking lot for Cotopaxi was 15,000 feet and the base camp was above 16,500 feet. No amount of coca tea was going to help Kathy and I up the mountain at that elevation. We made it to the edge of the parking lot before returning to the van. Tony, Don, and Tom made the attempt, but only Tom got all the way to the base camp. Later that day we saw some disused train tracks, which made us think of the G&Q railroad. That's when we learned the line was no longer running. Who knows if the tracks we saw were for that particular route or not, but we claimed them as if they were.

Tony and I posing with a real alpaca at Quilatoa.

Don and Tom making their way up Quilatoa on mules.

The next day we visited Quilatoa Lake, a natural lake created by a volcanic eruption ages ago. The hike from the rim down into the caldera was steep, but our guide assured us that mules would bring us back up. This time all three Kingsburys opted out but Don and Tom were gung-ho for the adventure. They were pretty happy when the mules came along so they didn't have to climb out of the caldera themselves. I made the connection earlier about Granddad's experience with mules. Earlier in the day we visited the home of an indigenous family and learned a bit about their lifestyle. We ended the day in Baños, even spending time in the thermal baths that Granddad mentioned. It was a surreal experience joining a multitude of Ecuadorians in a series of pools filled with hot, hotter, or hottest water. It seemed like we were the only 'foreigners' there.

We began the next day with the guys all trying an Ecuadorian delicacy: roasted guinea pig. After our morning visit to the popular market in Baños, we were back on the road heading toward Amazonia. We stopped for an opportunity to see a waterfall up close by traveling on a rickety cable car across the river valley. It reminded me of how Granddad put blindfolds on the mules when they encountered a rickety bridge. We all clung to whatever we could grab hold of and closed our eyes to keep out the fear of falling. After we were back on terra firma, we posed for a photo overlooking the river valley, wondering if the men stood on the exact same spot 100 years earlier as they contemplated which river was best to begin their navigation toward the mighty Amazon. All of us reflected later how meaningful this moment was to us.

Animals of the Amazonia region which may have been seen by members of the expedition. We saw them at the Bioparque Yana-Cocha.

Our host, Fabio, with the chocolate sauce we made. Ready to eat with fresh fruit nicely arranged. Photo credit: D. Bennett

Our special dinner after we arrived at the Sinchi Warmi eco lodge in Amazonia.
Special treats: yucca fries and plantain chips.

After the animal park our guide drove us to an eco lodge in the jungle of the Amazonia region. We now were down to practically sea level. After a night spent in huts under mosquito nets listening to monkeys in the background, we spent the next day learning about the region. We took an early morning bird watching tour on an Amazonian lagoon, made our own chocolate sauce from scratch (and ate it), and enjoyed watching indigenous children at play. I know we were all disappointed we never got on a boat on a river which was a tributary of the Amazon, but it was terribly nice of our tour guide to work in a canoe trip around the lagoon.

On the lagoon bird-watching trip. Without binoculars, almost all the birds we saw looked small and black, even the flock of parakeets that flew overhead. We also saw glimpses of woolly and spider monkeys. Photo credit: D. Bennett

After we left Amazonia we had a long trip back to Quito, with several high mountain passes in our way. The highest of those passes had an elevation of over 12,000 feet. All of us wearing Fitbits got lots of steps we never took that day. I call them jiggle steps. I got more than 10,000 jiggle steps just riding in the van as our driver did his best to avoid potholes and washed out spots in the road. Tony and I both started feeling pretty cruddy during the trip, thinking it was the curvy road and sudden elevation change. Later we found out it was something else -- COVID. But we didn't figure that out until two days later. By then we were in Panama on the second leg of the adventure.

Panama City plaza.

Our flight to Panama City was short. We arrived mid-morning and fortunately were able to check into our hotel early. After a quick lunch of a Cubano sandwich at a cafe next door and a short rest, we started our afternoon tour of the city. Our guide took us to see the 'old quarter' in the historic district of Panama City which is a UNESCO Heritage and Cultural Site. The architecture dates back to the 1600s which features a colorful plaza and buildings in the Spanish style.

We went to the Milaflores Locks next. These are the Panama Canal locks closest to Panama City and to the Pacific Ocean. They are also the locks that Granddad mentioned in his journals. After watching an IMAX movie about the history and construction of the canal, we went outside and watched several huge ships make their way through the locks. We could have stood there longer but the light was waning and the visitor center was preparing to close. It was all so interesting and moving, thinking that our grandfather had something to do with their construction.

The F & F Building in Panama City. Photo credit: A. Bennett

Hotel roof top pool. Photo credit: D. Bennett

By the time we got back to our hotel, it was clear most of us didn't feel quite right. Tony and I had sore throats, Don had trouble breathing in Quito the night before, Tom didn't have his normal level of energy. After getting back to our room we took COVID tests. Sure enough, both Don and I were positive. We called the others. Tony and Tom also tested positive. Only Kathy remained negative. The next day she went on our scheduled tour alone. Tom rested in his room while Tony, Don, and I took a short walk around the new part of town, marveling at the building in the shape of a screw and later spent time in the roof top swimming pool. We also made a plan for the next day, the last day of our big adventure. We decided we would rent a car and take ourselves on a tour to see the canal without putting someone at risk of getting the virus from us.

Our captain's name was Fernando. Photo credit: D. Bennett

A view from our little boat of the tankers we got near. On the Gatun Lake/Chagres River, part of the lock, river/lake, lock system of the canal. Photo credit: T. Buhler/A. Bennett

Tony rented a car and we drove a dock at Gamboa where we could hire a boat (and captain) to take us out into the Panama Canal. There we were, safely in a small boat not too far from some rather huge ships. We saw monkeys and crocodiles, too. It was easily one of the most fun and spontaneous things we did on our whole trip. That evening we had a yummy dinner at a Panamanian restaurant to conclude our adventure.

This trip to Ecuador and Panama was a 'bucket list' experience because it allowed us to connect with a grandfather we never knew aside from this family story of his time building the canal and adventures in Ecuador and the Amazon. We know our journey was much easier with 21st century conveniences -- air travel, air conditioned vans, mobile phones, and hotels with WiFi -- but the varied landscapes of Ecuador and the marvel of the Panama Canal were no less impressive. We also had wonderful hosts and tour guides at every stop who gifted us with generous hospitality and warmth of spirit, reminding us that God's love and care is ever present in people all over the world.  

-Anne and Don Bennett

Post script:

• To my siblings: Tony, thanks for dreaming up this adventure. Kathy, thanks for doing most of the leg work in planning our trip. Grace, every day of the trip we missed you and wished you were with us. At one point we thought we should make a photo cut out of your face so you could be a part of every group picture. 
• To my cousins: We hope that our trip serves as a catalyst for you to make a similar one in the future. Though none of us knew or even met Granddad it was such a joy to feel connected to him in this way. If you are interested in planning such a trip we are willing to share our travel template and any wisdom/advice to make your planning easier. Start with the document of Granddad's trip, If you don't have, or can't find a copy of it, email/call/Facebook message one of us and we'll send it to you. Next, contact Robin who has done extensive research on Augustus Kingsbury through Ancestry.com. She shared a ton of info with Kathy on a recent visit. Share this post with your children. Help them connect to their past. And help us spread the word to cousins we've lost touch with: Dick, Kevin, Phil, Shelley, Jill, Wendy, Tim, and Richard and Marvin's children/grandchildren. Robin, share this post with your mom, Aunt Betty. She is the only living person who knew Augustus Kingsbury in the flesh. I hope she finds a moment of joy in the remembrances.
• To our children and nieces/nephews: Why not plan a cousin trip together to Ecuador and Panama? Andrew was part of the original dreaming about the trip, Carly and Bobby/Kaylyn are excellent trip planners. Make it an event. Learn more about your heritage. There were many activities that we avoided due to our age and stage. Taking teenage kids on this trip would be a blast.
• To Dad, may you rest in peace: Kathy and I both brought you with us to Ecuador and Panama. She wore her blue "Dad" necklace and I wore the white butterfly earrings. We know you would have loved the adventure and we thought about you every day, every step we took to learn more about your father. We felt your spirit with us.

A few more photo collages:

In the Amazon region outside our huts, on the bird-watching/lagoon trip, making chocolate, and happy children.

Images taken in a boat on Lake Gatun/ Panama Canal.

Memorable moments: on the rickety cable car going over a river in the rain; wearing headgear we found with the Mera town name sculpture; the guys flashing 'chulla vida' sign under a waterfall; a bird that wouldn't leave Tony alone; eating roasted guinea pig; a parrot who wouldn't stop screaming "Hola!"; and the moon over the Amazon jungle.

More memorable moments: With an indigenous family; our guide, Irene, giving us a lesson about Ecuadorian fruit; Don and Tom made it to the bottom of the caldera; Kathy and Anne 💖; The Panama sign. We made our poor tour guide go through a lot of trouble to get to this sign for the photo. By the time we got to it, it was dark outside!

We saw a sloth in the wild in Panama! We also figured out that there is a baby sloth attached to the mama. It was an event of great excitement in us and we spent hours debating the baby/no baby aspect since the photos were all so bad!!!

😀