![](https://assets.cambridge.org/97811076/39218/cover/9781107639218.jpg)
Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface and Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1 The Golden State in the 1850s
- 2 Thomas Starr King and the Massachusetts Background for His California Activism
- 3 Toward a Political Realignment
- 4 The First Years of War
- 5 The Military Front
- 6 The Cultural Front
- 7 A New Role for California Gold and a Seesaw Federal–State Relationship
- 8 “Coppery” California
- 9 Californians of Color
- 10 A Tragic Death and Its Aftermath
- Epilogue
- Index
- References
6 - The Cultural Front
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 April 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface and Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1 The Golden State in the 1850s
- 2 Thomas Starr King and the Massachusetts Background for His California Activism
- 3 Toward a Political Realignment
- 4 The First Years of War
- 5 The Military Front
- 6 The Cultural Front
- 7 A New Role for California Gold and a Seesaw Federal–State Relationship
- 8 “Coppery” California
- 9 Californians of Color
- 10 A Tragic Death and Its Aftermath
- Epilogue
- Index
- References
Summary
So many of us there are who have no majestic landscapes for the heart.…We may make an outward visit to the Sierras, but there are no Yosemites in the soul.
– Thomas Starr KingIf Thomas Starr King had been only a political orator, he would still have had an immense impact on California during the Civil War, given the state's dearth of actual politicians with the gift of eloquence. In fact, he went beyond the realm of talking about war and public policy to stir Californians at the deepest level of imagination by talking poetically about the landscape. In a series of lectures, moreover, he introduced them to his favorite New England poets. At the same time, he also wrote about California for a northeastern audience, giving other Americans the sense that California's treasures were not confined merely to gold. Also, he nurtured the state's young talent in both the literary and the visual arts. It is impossible to gauge his effectiveness in solidifying Unionist sentiment without discussing the cultural work he performed, work that advanced the same larger purpose as the explicitly political speeches.
What gave the cultural project special urgency in California was the state's sheer remoteness from the rest of the country. How could Californians feel connected to the struggle taking place so far away? How could they come to support political measures that might be initially unpopular, such as emancipation? Literature, perhaps, might help maintain and strengthen national loyalties, playing the role that William Ellery Channing had envisioned for it in his “Remarks on National Literature.” Clearly no one else in the state was as well qualified to open up a cultural front as Channing's coreligionist King, and King responded to the challenge with the same sort of energy that he was putting into political oratory.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Golden State in the Civil WarThomas Starr King, the Republican Party, and the Birth of Modern California, pp. 131 - 154Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2012