Blackie and Danny Go To See The President (Cont.)
Screen 3 of 5Slowly and gradually we began to gain speed until after about five or ten minutes we were at what the conductor later told us was the train's "cruising speed" of between 35 and 40 miles per hour!
During the excitement of the departure, we had not noticed the rough and very uncomfortable horse-hair covers on the seats. It was especially irritating to the backs of our bare legs--so irritating that Gooch and I stood up on the seat as much as "Nelle" would let us. This discomfort of the seat covers increased with the heat of the day; but enough about that. We soon found out we had more serious problems.
The distance from Bowling Green to Lebanon Junction, where we were to change trains for Hodgenville, is only 60 miles, but it took us almost three hours to get there. The very long time required to cover that short distance was enough to discourage two small boys and their pet guinea pigs. We must have asked "Nelle" dozens of times how much longer it was before we would get to Hodgenville (we knew nothing about the change at Lebanon Junction). But this matter of time and distance turned out not to be our greatest concern. Something else was much worse than all that.
As the mid-summer sun crept higher into the morning sky and the railroad car began to heat up, we opened all the windows that were not stuck. This allowed the somewhat cooler outside air to come in; but that outside air--though at first quite welcome--brought in great quantities of cinders from the puffing steam engine just ahead. These cinders were black, rough, and of all sizes, most of them small enough to get under the eyelid and stay there until deftly and painfully dislodged. Some of the people in our car began trying to get cinders out of each other's eyes; others tried to remedy the situation by closing the windows. Then we almost suffocated from the heat. So the windows were opened again, and everyone continued retrieving cinders from irritated eyes. The most common method of doing this, I noticed, was using the corner of a twisted handkerchief. I remember some of the comments while all this was going on. "Be careful; I don't want you to scratch my eye with that heavily starched handkerchief." Then the answer. "Oh, I won't hurt you. Just roll your eyes toward the ceiling while I pull down on the lower lid. There it is. I see it now. No, it must be over in the corner where I can't see it." "Nelle" had a remedy which worked sometimes when she couldn't see the cinders in your eyes. "Now pull your upper lid out and down loosely over the lower lid," she would say. "In that way the tears will wash it out." And if the cinder was still there after doing that, she would then tell us to "rub the upper lid toward the other eye and then blow your nose:" Well, by various methods we got some cinders out. Others just seemed to stay in our eyes.
Needless to say, we did not enjoy much of the beautiful Kentucky scenery that morning, since we spent most of the trip either "looking up at the ceiling" or opening and closing eyelids in our crude attempts to remove cinders. I thought at the time that Blackie and Danny were lucky to be in that hat box during all this trouble. It may have been hot in there, but at least not very many cinders could get into the box.
On the way between Lebanon Junction and Hodgenville, we dropped some bread crumbs, lettuce leaves and pieces of raw carrots into the box for the guinea pigs. (Gooch had reminded me to bring some food for them, and I had filled my pants' pockets with these things before we left home.) They ate some of the food but not very much. Then we tried to give them some water, but that was more difficult. At the end of our car there was a crude water fountain with paper cups beside it. The water was just luke?warm, but at least it was wet and the guinea pigs were thirsty. I filled a cup half full and took it back to Blackie and Danny in the box. I reached down, holding the cup for Blackie to drink while Danny looked on. Things were going very well until we hit a rough spot on the tracks, causing me to spill the water on Danny. This frightened him and he immediately bit my finger. This is when I learned how sharp guinea pigs' teeth really are. Of course, the water spread all over the cardboard bottom and made the shredded paper very wet and soggy. What a mess! Later, I gave Danny a little water by holding him up to the drainage pipe of the water fountain. That worked better, but of course the conductor did not see me.
We arrived at Hodgenville shortly before noon and went directly to the Lincoln Memorial on a local bus after paying the 10 cents fare for adults and 5 cents for children. Blackie and Danny did not pay for the ride since they were then sound asleep in the box and no one saw them. While waiting for President Wilson, in the midst of several thousand other people, we ate the sandwiches which "Nelle" had prepared at home early that morning. Gooch and I had wanted to eat them earlier, but she had said no. And when "Nelle" said no about a thing like that we never argued with her. It was not a very elaborate lunch. The sandwiches were dry, and the only liquid we had to wash them down was tepid water from an outdoor fountain on the Memorial grounds.
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