if you will recall, point number four in Peterson’s 5 Point Prescription on How to Beat the Heat of the California desert was to travel.  leave the desert.

I have taken my own advice.

everyone is familiar with the admonition to “go east young man”.  or, was it “go west young man”?

the famous one is “go west young man” which was first coined in the mid 1830’s by Horace Greeley, the founder and editor of the New York Tribune newspaper.

during the mid 1800’s it had the largest circulation of any newspaper in the country, and in the 1920’s through merger it became the New York Herald Tribune, which eventually went out of business in 1966.

at the time he used this phrase, he was an advocate of encouraging the unemployed and others unhappy with the economic downturn in eastern cities to “go west” to find their fortunes. this phrase became part of a belief in Manifest Destiny, which was popular in many quarters at that time, but is still the subject of some debate.

Manifest Destiny was the belief that Americans not only could, but were destined to, expand and stretch from coast to coast. This fueled not only western US settlement, but also lead to Native American removal and a war with Mexico.

the directive to “go east young man” is a play on the famous “go west young man”.

it also turns out to be the title of Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas‘s memoir of his life up to his appointment at a very young age (40) to the nation’s highest court.  his home in the west  interestingly enough was Yakima, Washington.

I am sure you can appreciate, given the information above and given the heat of the desert in the summer, why I am traveling East.

my trip will take me to New York City, Philadelphia, Washington DC, and Buffalo.

Go east young man!