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Horatio's Drive: America's First Road Trip from: Random House Audio City Travel Guides Price: $18.00 Prices subject to change. |
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Binding: Audio Cassette Dewey Decimal Number: 973 EAN: 9780739307403 Format: Abridged, Audiobook, Unabridged ISBN: 0739307401 Label: Random House Audio Manufacturer: Random House Audio Number Of Items: 2 Publication Date: July 01, 2003 Publisher: Random House Audio Release Date: July 01, 2003 Studio: Random House Audio Sales Rank: 1683936 Related Items:
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Editorial Review: Product Description: The companion volume to the PBS documentary film about the first—and perhaps most astonishing—automobile trip across the United States. In 1903 there were only 150 miles of paved roads in the entire nation and most people had never seen a “horseless buggy”—but that did not stop Horatio Nelson Jackson, a thirty-one-year-old Vermont doctor, who impulsively bet fifty dollars that he could drive his 20-horsepower automobile from San Francisco to New York City. Here—in Jackson’s own words and photographs—is a glorious account of that months-long, problem-beset, thrilling-to-the-rattled-bones trip with his mechanic, Sewall Crocker, and a bulldog named Bud. Jackson’s previously unpublished letters to his wife, brimming with optimism against all odds, describe in vivid detail every detour, every flat tire, every adventure good and bad. And his nearly one hundred photographs show a country still settled mainly in small towns, where life moved no faster than the horse-drawn carriage and where the arrival of Jackson’s open-air (roofless and windowless) Winton would cause delirious excitement. Jackson was possessed of a deep thirst for adventure, and his remarkable story chronicles the very beginning of the restless road trips that soon became a way of life in America. Horatio’s Drive is the first chapter in our nation’s great romance with the road. With 146 illustrations and 1 map From the Hardcover edition. Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
 Rating:  - Drive, she said!Companion volume to the PBS documentary of the same title. And it reads like it. Too slim to stand on its own. The pictures are fascinating, wish there had been more, oddly enough for a book derived from a TV documentary. Rating:  - A short book about a long journeyI enjoy reading almost anything about antique autos,the early days of the US auto industry, old car trips and stories about the history of early automobile travel in the United States. This is a wonderful companion to the PBS series video on the first successful United States transcontinental auto trip from California to NYC. Great olde tyme photos and a well presented memoir of the adventure. Of course you cannot "just" read the book...the video is a must! Rating:  - Before the SUV...Amazing document about a time in American history when there were only 150 miles of paved roads in the entire country. In 1903, an adenturous 31 year old Doctor from Vermont, now retired and living happily with his weathy young wife (on her funds), decided he'd attempt to be the first to man cross the continent via the latest technological gadget: the automobile. Being a non-mechanic, he hired an equally spirited 21 year old former bicycle racer who had been working as a mechanic in a gasoline-engine factory in California to accompany him. Most roads were little more than muddy wagon paths, and when those stopped the travellers could only follow along railroad tracks or trust in their sense of direction as they set out across the vast plains ... Read More: Rating: - not the narrative from the PBS showI had it in my head that this was going to be the audio from the wonderful PBS show but I was mistaken. It is a reading of the book. I should've looked more closely. The story, however, is wonderful. The voices from the narrative on the PBS show were more engaging and lively that those on this CD but the story remains just as good. Rating: - Brief but funThis is a brief account of the first cross country automobile trip, sprinkled with photographs taken by the "automobilist" as he traversed the nation's dirt roads just after the turn of the last century. Horation Nelson Jackson bet someone $50 in a club in San Francisco that he could cross the country in an automobile he had just bought, and do it in less than 90 days. He spent over $8,000 winning his bet (though he never collected the money). The car (something called a Winton) had numerous breakdowns. After each one, Jackson would write his wife and advise her that "the worst is over now" after which the car would inevitably break down again. Jackson and his mechanic, Sewall Crocker, spent endless days waiting for parts and jury ... Read More: |
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