Books: Mirror to America

North and west of Pocatello, Idaho, U. S. highway 30 N enters the Snake River Valley, a wild region of fantastic rock formations, ghost towns, ice caverns, dinosaur fields, waterfalls, hot springs, reclamation projects, historic legends, lava beds. In some places, because of the underground rivers, "a person can put his ear to the ground and hear deep and troubled rumblings as if a mighty ocean rolled far under." Thirty-eight miles from Pocatello a three-mile side road leads to Emigrant Rock, where travelers wrote their names in axle grease as early as 1849. Forty-four miles on, another side road branches off to the Silent City of Rocks, 25 sq. mi. of massive granite fragments shaped like cathedrals, towers, skyscrapers, toadstools. Eighty-two miles from Pocatello is the largest potato-flour mill in the world. At Twin Falls, 42 miles farther, Shoshone Falls drops 212 ft. From the walls of Snake River Canyon, 32 miles on, Idaho's famed Thousand Springs gush enough water to supply all the big cities of the U. S.

Of such miscellaneous items of local color, scenic grandeurs, natural wonders and plain facts, the U. S. guides of the Federal Writers' Project are compounded. With 42 big books already published, 20 now on the presses and some 200 more planned or in preparation, the Federal Writers' Project has become in the last few months the biggest literary job ever undertaken.

Last month publication of the Maine and Vermont guides meant that four of the New England States* had been covered. This month, guides to Philadelphia, New Orleans, Mississippi, North & South Dakota are scheduled for publication. In February the Writers' Project will wind up New England with guides to New Hampshire and Connecticut and will publish its first big highway tour, U. S. 1, tracing the 2,000-mile road mile by mile, landmark by landmark, from Calais, Me. to Key West, Fla. Some time in the spring the Project will release Whaling Masters in Massachusetts, U. S. 30—The Oregon Trail, The Ocean Highway. Also scheduled are State guides that are to be brought out as they are completed until every State, Puerto Rico, Alaska and the Virgin Islands have been mapped, toured and described.

U. S. travelers whizz over the surface of their country, picking up such information as they can get from signboards, gasoline station attendants, road maps, Chamber of Commerce handouts. They race past the biggest factories on earth, rarely pausing to wonder what is made in them. They look out across scenery unparalleled, but only occasionally know the names of the mountain peaks or yawning canyons that take their breath away. They sail through little towns where battles have been fought, insurrections planned, U. S. history made, but usually see only what lies beside the highway as they watch for crossroads and glance at the rear-view mirror to see if a cop is overtaking them. There are few books that can tell them much about the country they travel. The last official U. S. Baedeker appeared in 1909. Written for European tourists, it contained such useful information as that carrying firearms was no longer necessary in the U. S., travel now being "as safe as in the most civilized parts of Europe." But it did advise Europeans to bring their own matches, buttons, ribbons, needle-&-thread, dress gloves.