Shining gorgeously in gold and red.
It seemed to be a scene of grandeur scarce
Of earth; the silence and starry host
Which glittered in myriads through all the night,
Now sinking away into the depths of space;
The sun uprising slowly, silently
And sending forth the dawn upon the earth.
All this o’erpowered the mind with wonder and
Astonishment at Nature’s majesty
And endless harmony. So ever it is
Around us beauties and sublimities
Numberless, wrap us in their embrace,
Had we only the eyes to behold them.4
Clyde’s poem is interesting for what it can tell us about the author at this stage of his life. It illustrates an intimate knowledge of the natural landscape that surrounded him, as well as a love of the outdoors. The poem emphasizes the beauty of nature without creating a human presence to alter or dilute the scene. The speaker also chides those who are not aware of their surroundings, in effect dismissing them for a lack of sensitivity and awareness. Clyde’s poetry and world view shared similar themes and outlooks with those of another native Pennsylvanian who later settled on the California coast. The poet Robinson Jeffers studied the Classics, as well as forestry and medicine, and later applied his wide knowledge of human history and the natural world to his own powerful writings where he often, like Clyde in this poem, avoids an anthrocentric view of the world.
Throughout his college career Clyde took to the outdoors for respite from his schoolwork and other responsibilities. He liked to play football, explore caves in the surrounding Beaver Valley, and climb to the top of the nearby hills. In a Cabinet article titled “College Recreation” he wrote about one of his “customary rambles” in the local hills, describing a beautiful autumn day: “As the author gazed at the lovely spectacle, it occurred to his mind how little we know of the scenes of beauty which nature constantly spreads before us. It cannot be that the aspects of nature around us are not inspiring. The commonest of landscapes has something of interest to the watchful eye at any season of the year….Emerson says, ‘The moral sensibility which makes Edens and Tempes so easily, may not always [be] found, but the material landscape is never far off.’ But the country around us, far from being what might be called tame and devoid of interest, is quite picturesque. The hills skirting the Beaver form many striking views, there are numbers of romantic ravines in the vicinity, and the woods are not without beauty…”5 He goes on to remind his fellow students to take advantage of the great wealth of natural beauty that surrounded their small community, in order to see “what majestic beauties daily wrap us in their bosom.”
By June 1909, at the age of twenty-four, Clyde had completed his studies and was awarded the A.B. degree from Geneva. He wasted no time in bidding his family farewell, and set out for the West. Although he would remain in touch with his family, and occasionally travel back to visit, he would never return to live in the East. Even though the frontier had disappeared from the American West, there still remained large expanses of wilderness sufficient to challenge the hardiest of outdoorsmen. And, in the wake of Frederick Jackson Turner’s 1893 proclamation of the end of the frontier, there were numerous groups and individuals who championed the outdoor life for physical, spiritual, and moral reasons. The growth of the Sierra Club in California, the popularity of the Boone and Crockett Club and the Appalachian Climbing Club in the eastern United States, and, after the turn of the century, the importation of the Boy Scouts from Great Britain all contributed to the zeal for outdoor life. Popular writers, including John Muir, John Burroughs, and John Van Dyke, extolled the virtues of the wilderness of mountain, forest, and desert. Their works found a kindred spirit in Norman Clyde.
Clyde was enormously influenced by John Muir’s writings, especially The Mountains of California (1894). It is a collection of Muir’s essays that had previously appeared in various magazines and one newspaper, and which Muir himself had selected for inclusion in his first published book. Muir wrote an overview of the Sierra Nevada especially for this volume. The Mountains of California is considered by many of Muir’s admirers to be his finest book.6 Its presence in l894, two years after the founding of the Sierra Club, satisfied a growing interest in the Sierra Nevada, and mobilized individuals to take a greater interest in conservation issues.
There are other parallels between the two men. As with Clyde, Muir was a Celtic native (from Scotland) who immigrated to the United States with his family at a young age, settling in the upper Midwest state of Wisconsin. Both came from households where religion was a dominant theme in their lives: Muir’s father was a Calvinist Presbyterian and lay minister. It may be safely assumed that at least some of the strict regimen and harsh discipline that had been visited upon John Muir was also the realm of Charles Clyde’s firstborn son. Self-reliance was an integral and indispensable characteristic of immigrants to North America who chose (or could afford) to live outside of the tenements of the Eastern seaboard and the Midwestern manufacturing centers. It was a characteristic of the Muir family, and the Clyde family as well.
Although both men hailed from religious parents, they each rejected Judeo-Christian morals and teachings and embraced an earlier (and universal) moral code, better known as the Golden Rule: to do unto others as one would have others do unto himself. This also means that one should respect the other person’s right to live as they see fit, without undue interference from outside forces, and in turn, to expect the same from others. That they lived in a time and place where they could be relatively free of encumbrances, be they governmental, social, or religious, enabled them to live their lives with a freedom once associated with frontier America.
Following in Muir’s footsteps
Norman wanted to travel; westward was the course of empire, and the direction and destination of Norman Clyde. Lacking the money to travel directly to California, he worked his way across the United States. Train travel was probably his means of transport, as automobiles were still in their infancy and interstate highways nonexistent.
Although he lacked the financial means to make his way across the country, he did not lack for intelligence or ingenuity. His years as head of the Clyde household following his father’s death gave him a depth and maturity far beyond his twenty-four years. He possessed an extraordinary physique and a brilliant mind, so that he could always find work with his hands as well as his head.
Following his graduation from Geneva College, Clyde landed a job aboard a Great Lakes steamship, bound for Duluth, Minnesota. Such a job would move him several hundred miles west in short time and put some much needed money in his pocket. He also cited a “‘[Francis] Parkman’ like love of nature in her wilder and more imposing aspects” as his chief reason for plying the chilly waters of the interior. In his account, written for The Cabinet, he lovingly describes the journey in the late summer and early fall of 1909, as the hardwoods began to turn and the first snows dusted the forests of pine, spruce, hemlock, and fir. Clyde found Lake Superior to be his favorite: “its dark waters, almost ice-cold even in mid-summer, stirred usually by breezes, tossed wildly sometimes by storms together with the cool, pure, refreshing atmosphere, fill one with delight.”
During the return journey from Duluth, he was witness to (and almost victim of) the ferocity of Superior’s storms. Assigned to the duty of midnight watchman, mountainous seas broke over him as the vessel pitched and rocked. Clyde “found himself grasping the railing and leaning over the leeward side of the boat with a votive offering for Neptune or whatever deity presides over Superior waters.” He managed to make his way to his forward post on the bow of the ship, a distance of seventy-five yards from where he came on deck. Clyde reported, “As the writer reached his point of lookout on the bridge, above the pilot-house, in the bow of the boat, the gale was shrieking through the rigging, flapping the canvas around the bridge, and carrying the spray of the foaming waves high into the air. The vessel plunged and lurched, now a wave breaking over her weather-side, then her lee gunwale rocking to the water’s edge. In spite of driving snow, flying spray and plunging