Letters to the editor for Tuesday, April 22, 2014

Typescript explains setting of journal

On May 29, 1851, pioneer Lucena Parsons reported 200 miners at Gold Cañon (Dayton), two weeks before John Reese passed through to settle Mormon Station (Genoa). In the Appeal on March 29, 2014, Kurt Hildebrand reported that Heidi Englund uses 1856 Grosh Brothers’ letters and Stan Paher questions the transcription of Parsons’ 1850-1851 journal to question Dayton’s claim as Nevada’s first permanent non-native settlement.

At the request of her family, Parsons’ journal was typed by respected newswoman Elene (Helen) Wilbur and her daughter, Elizabeth. The typescript includes an introduction and afterword explaining the journal’s setting and attesting to the transcription accuracy. Elizabeth, who graduated in history from Stanford University in 1927, donated a carbon copy to Stanford’s Department of Special Collections in 1928. To claim historical accuracy for an altered text would have been a serious violation of the Stanford Honor Code, something her son verifies Elizabeth never would have done.

In 1850 Indiana newspapers reported “large numbers of people were digging” for gold on the Carson River in the “lower Carson Valley,” “with the intention of forming a settlement and working the mines.” By 1853 articles described many miners working through the winter in Gold Cañon. By 1854 and throughout the decade, the Placerville Mountain Democrat reported an active and continuous settlement at Gold Cañon. By 1859 the miners in “Gold Cañon Flat” were described as mostly “Chinamen.” The Grosh Brothers not mentioning the settlement in 1856 is only a curiosity.

Linda L. Clements

Dayton

Obama could simply enforce equal-pay law

President Obama made a big thing about signing an Executive Order to address the discrepancy in pay between men and women. Sound familiar? President Obama is a classic con man. He conned millions in to believing a community organizer could successfully administer the Oath of Office for the highest office in our government.

You know the facts. He is an illusionist, just like you see in the Reno or Las Vegas showrooms. While he’s doing something out front, something else is happening elsewhere on stage. In this case the illusion is he cares about peoples’ pay. Narcissists don’t care about other people at all — as long as they lavish the narcissist with praise. He made a big deal about women’s pay because he wants people to move on from Obamacare which is collapsing under its own weight.

How can I be sure about the equal pay act? Because John F. Kennedy signed the Equal Pay Act of 1963 on June 10, 1963. Kennedy’s equal pay act is also known as Public Law 88-37 (77 Stat 56). If President Obama really cared about women’s pay, he would have his attorney general simply enforce the existing federal law — but that’s not what he wants. He wants you to believe equal pay is a big issue for this November’s election — it isn’t.

I am Ron Landmann from Minden, and I approved this letter to the editor.

Ron Landmann

Minden