Alcohol, prohibition and Al

Capone
A hundred years ago, you could not buy or consume alcoholic
drinks in the United States. It was the age of "prohibition", and a
time when criminals controlled a whole industry. The most famous
gangster was Al Capone.
    

The "Untouchables" - from a 1950s TV series. They fought to bring the big criminal gangs to justice.
They could not be "bought"
 America is the land of Liberty.  You can think what you want to think, and you can
say what you  want to say; but you cannot always do what you want to do — 
without breaking the law.
  Today you cannot use hard drugs, because it is against the law. The law has
decided that drugs are dangerous,  and most people believe that the law is right.
Today, in many places, you cannot smoke a cigarette in the street. But today, you
can sit in a  bar and drink a beer — just as long as you are not below the age
limit;  a hundred years ago, you could not. America was dry. Alcohol was  illegal.
You could neither drink it nor make it, nor buy it, nor import it, nor sell it.
     lf you did, you could go to prison.
     Alcohol became illegal in the year 1919; it remained illegal for fourteen years.
However, it never disappeared! Before 1919 alcoholic drinks were very popular in
the United States. There was a big drinks industry, which employed a great
number of people. Suddenly, in 1919, the industry had to stop!
     Of course, it could not stop. It stopped officially, but it continued to prosper - 
unofficially.  In place of big business, there was big  crime. The Mafia took control
of  the distribution, and the bosses of  the Mafia replaced the bosses of 
the breweries and the distilleries.

Al Capone, after he was arrested

     The biggest gangster of them all was  Al Capone, who came from New York
and operated in Chicago.  Capone controled a vast  empire of crime. He was so
powerful that he could control anyone he wanted to. He could "buy"  policemen, he
could "buy" politicians. He was "untouchable". In his fortress at Chicago, he was
quite safe, because he was a friend of the Mayor, "Big" Bill  Thompson.
       Big Bill liked Capone,  because he liked his drink. Bill and his drinking friends
in the authorities made sure that Capone did not have much trouble. Capone had
lots of enemies, but most of his enemies were frightened of him. They knew that Al
could kill them, and would kill them, if they were not careful.
     Most policemen were very careful not to get in the way of Al Capone, unless
they had to. Most policemen, but not all.  A small group of policemen,  known as
"the Untouchables", were determined that Al Capone would not escape from
justice for ever.  They took several years to do their  work, but in the end they
succeeded. Al Capone was finally sent  to prison.
     However, he was never accused of killing, nor of selling alcohol. He was too
clever for that. No evidence could incriminate him for that. He  was sent to prison
for not paying  taxes.

 
WORD GUIDE
   
     WORDS: as  long as - on condition that - remained: continued to be - to
prosper:  to do well - brewery: a place where beer is made (brewed) - have
trouble: have difficuty get in the  way of: obstruct - incriminate him:  show that
he had done something. 
 Modern Cowboys
 A short text in intermediate level English .

Cowboys all lived in the 19th century, when the Wild West really was
wild. There are no cowboys in the USA in the 21st century. Right ?
No, wrong !  Even today, there are still men and women who work as
cowboys and cowgirls in the western USA and in Canada.... and in
South America too !
    

A cowboy at work in the American West

        Are there still cowboys in the American West?

    The answer is certainly yes! There are still thousands of cowboys in the American west.
They still ride horses, and they still carry guns; but they don't spend their time fighting
Indians.
    Although they often travel on four wheels, not four legs, cowboys still have to be expert
horsemen too. They ride horses very regularly.
    Some of the ranches in the American West cover thousands of hectares. Cattle are
often free to move over large areas. There are steep hills, rivers and streams, forests and
rocks. In many places, it is impossible to use a pick-up, even with four-wheel drive; even 
motorbikes are useless. The only ways to cross the prairies are on horseback, or on foot;
and you can't chase cattle on foot!
    Cowboys are working men; they look after the herds of cattle that live on the prairies in
the mountains, from Texas to Canada. They have lots of jobs to do; they have to mark
cattle so that they can be identified; they have to move cattle from place to place; they
have to vaccinate them, and check that they are healthy. They also have to inspect miles
and miles of fences and barbed-wire barriers.
    There is no shortage of people who want to be cowboys. The profession has a very
special reputation; it is different from other jobs, but it can be hard work, with long hours.
Besides, many cowboys are not very well paid. It can also be a dangerous job.
    Cowboys do not often fall off their horses, of course! They have to be excellent riders;
but they carry guns for two reasons. Firstly, they may have to kill an injured animal - a cow
or even a horse; secondly, they may encounter dangerous wild animals, such as
rattle snakes. There are bears and wolves too, but they do not usually attack humans.
Nevertheless, it is useful to have a gun, just in case.....

CHANGING COWBOYS
    In the 19th century, cowboys used to drive cattle for hundreds of miles. Sometimes they
had to take them to new destinations; sometimes they had to take them to market. Today,
there are no more long cattle drives. These days, cattle are picked up in big trucks and
taken to new destinations by road.
    That is one thing that has changed. Another more modern idea is the "dude ranch".
    Anyone who wants to can become a cowboy for a week or more, if he has the money.
Dude ranches offer holidays to people who want to be part-time cowboys! Of course,
dudes don't do much real work, but they enjoy the spirit of the west.

WORD GUIDE
area: zone - pick-up: small truck - chase: follow - cattle: cows and bulls - look after: be
responsible for - herd: large group - healthy: in good form - fence: wooden barrier
- shortage: absence, not enough - snake: serpent - dude: city man 
Who was George
Washington?
The story of America's first president
All Americans know about George Washington.  He was the first president of
the United States of America, and his face appears on the iconic one dollar bill.
He has also given his name to the capital city of the USA, Washington D.C, ....
and to a state, the state of Washington. No other American is quite so famous ! 

An unforgettable president ...

George Washington's portrait is on the iconic one dollar bill

If you had to sum up George Washington's life in one word, that word would have to
be unforgettable. George's story is one of travel and adventure, full of risks and, most of
all, full of glory.
   After all, in 1789, he was elected the first president of the United States, a country that
was to become the most powerful in the world. At the end of his life, in 1799, George was
an international hero.
   But, if you look back into George's early years, you will see that things were not always
so rosy. George was sent into the Army as a very young man. For a colonist of his
generation, it was a respectable thing to do. It gave him an opportunity to make a living,
and at the same time see the country, which at the time was full of wild animals and
Indians. It was a tough life, but an interesting one. One could hunt forever in the vast
forests. One could explore new lands seemingly forever.
   A lover of Nature, George became a surveyor with the Army, a job which led him further
and further into the wild, unknown country. As for the Indians, they were generally friendly,
and were good trading partners.  All in all, George's young years were full
of carefree wandering in a new, virgin land. 

George Washington rides to battle in the French & Indian war

   Yet suddenly one day, the threatening news came: wild animals and Indians were not
the only inhabitants of the woods. Virginia scouts had found French soldiers on the other
side of the Appalachians. It was said that the French claimed all land west of the
mountains for New France. This was bad news for the governor of Virginia, who wanted
the same land — at all costs.
   In his quest to get the land beyond the mountains, the governor called upon his best
soldier to deal with the situation: it was young George Washington, barely 22 years old at
the time. The governor told George to go and find the French, and give them a simple
message: leave the region immediately, or get ready for battle.
   Wanting to serve and please his authorities, George did as he was told. He went over
the mountains with a small army, found the French, and passed on the governor's
message. But, of course, the French did not wish to leave. Inevitably, the conflict
developed into a war, known as the French and Indian War; that is, the French and some
Indian allies fighting the British colonials.
   For George, it was a difficult time. To cut a long story short, it was the only time in his
life that he had to surrender an army — at Fort Necessity, near the forks of the Ohio. In
that battle, George nearly didn't become the first president of the United States. His army
was surrounded by the French and Indians, badly outnumbered, so he had to surrender
the fort. Luckily for him, the French allowed him and his army to leave with their horses
and guns. The battle had been lost, but the English, who were more numerous, eventually
won the war.
  The French and Indian War was a learning experience for George, one that he would
later exploit in the War for American Independence. Indeed, twenty years later, George
was dressed in an American uniform, and fighting not against the French, but against the
British.
  In this war, it is said that George's fiery leadership inspired his American troops when
they were starving and cold, and he emerged from the war as the greatest general.
  It was no surprise that the victorious Americans chose him as their first president. As for
getting his picture on the dollar bill, that didn't come until after George was long dead and
gone, proving that his spirit was truly an unforgettable one.

WORDS:  
sum up: to give a brief review or summary - rosy: nice - colonist : (in the USA at the
time) a man from England - make a living: make enough money to live - hunt : chase wild
animals - seemingly: apparently - surveyor: person who measures land - trading
partners: people with whom one buys and sells - carefree: casual, with no worries or
responsibilities - threatening news: news of danger - quest: attempt - deal
with: confront, handle -to cut a long story short: in short - forks of the Ohio: place
where the Ohio river begins, from two other rivers - outnumbered: having many less men
than the enemy - fiery: strongly emotional - starving: without food

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 Hollywood &
Superheroes
Why is Hollywood fascinated by Superheroes ? 
Interactive English : Twenty-one words have been omitted from this article. Replace
them by checking the right option in each of the twenty-one drop-down text boxes. In each
case, there is only one correct solution  !

There have been lots of movies about superheroes!  Fabulous heroes like

Superman, or Batman, or Spiderman, have been popular  since the first half of
the twentieth  century, saving people and saving the world.   If only they were
real ! When Coronavirus struck the whole world, we could have done with a few
superheroes to help us get by.

Ben Affleck was Batman in the 2017 film Justice League

Not just Superman and Batman...
   Superman and Batman are just two superheroes out of many. We could also
include Spiderman, Wonder Woman, Robin Hood, James Bond, Zorro, Indiana Jones and
a lot more. They're all more or less the same person, in different forms. Some are in the
past, others in the present, others in the future.

   But why does Hollywood   superheroes? Is it a question of money? Of course;

but it's not only money.

    People have always   superheroes. Long before the first Hollywood movie,

people loved stories about superheroes. Robin Hood has   a popular hero for

over 600 years ... and there were others before him.

    The first superheroes were real people. Nevertheless, the stories about   

were often   . Some of the first European superheroes

were Charlemagne and Roland (Orlando). Mediaeval writers and singers invented

exciting stories about these real men, just as Hollywood   stories about
tomorrow's superheroes.

   A thousand years   , people sometimes sat round in dark rooms in the

evening,    to the adventures of brave heroes. Today, we sit in a dark room

in the evening,   the adventures of the brave Batman. The medium is

different, the technology   changed .... but the people are really the same.
Superman - perhaps the best-known of all superheroes

    Hollywood doesn't actually invent   new superheroes. Superman, Judge

Dredd, Batman and the others   "existed" before Hollywood discovered them.
These three all come from   magazines.
    The first Batman story came out in 1939! So Batman has now been defending the
people of Gotham City for   80 years! There have been several Batman
movies, with different stars   Val Kilmer, George Clooney and Christian
Bale. How long can it last?
   Superman is even   : he dates from about 1932 (the exact year is
not   ). Even Judge Dredd is a familiar figure; he first   in
England in 1977.

    Hollywood's biggest superheroes live in the future. That is not   surprising.
Hollywood has fallen in love with special effects, and the future   great
spectacular special effects. Besides, people today are frightened about the future. Things
do not   look good; perhaps we will need characters like Batman and Judge
Dredd in 100 years' time. Perhaps we even need them today!
WORDS:  
movie: film - do with: use, get some help from - long before: a long time before -
nevertheless: but, yet - Charlemagne: Carlus Magnus, Charles the Great -
mediaeval: from the Middle Ages - medium: means of communication - actually: in fact -
last: continue - dates from: first appeared in - besides: also - look: seem, appear

Canada - the biggest country in the

New World
An intermediate level English resource  
WHAT IS THE  BIGGEST COUNTRY IN THE WORLD - in terms of surface area?  The
USA?     NO !  CHINA ?  NO !  RUSSIA ? YES  !!  And the second biggest country in
the world? Many people  are quite surprised to learn that it is actually Canada.
Click here to open vocabulary guide
CANADA - IT'S NOT the USA 

The Canadian
Parliament building, in Ottawa ... seen from Gatineau

    Imagine yourself sitting in a café one day in your home town, when on the next table
you hear some people speaking English with a strong North American accent. Being a
friendly person, you lean over and say, "Hi! Are you American?"
    "No," comes the immediate answer. "Canadian!"
    Calling a English-speaking Canadian an American can be as bad as telling a Scotsman
that he's English or a Swiss person he's German. In spite of a common language, there
are differences in culture and national feeling. "No," many Canadians will tell you with
insistence, "We're not Americans! We're Canadians."
   
    In the same way as Quebecers are determined to keep their identity, Canadians from
the other provinces are determined to keep Canada's identity. Although the Canadian way
of life is more and more like the American way of life, lots of details are different, and many
Canadians, particularly Quebecers, are worried about the survival of their own differences.
    Canadians use metres and kilometres and measure temperatures in Celsius; Americans
use feet and miles, and measure temperature in Fahrenheit. The USA has states, Canada
has provinces.
    Yet about 80% of Canadians live within 150 km. of the U.S. border, and this has had a
bad effect on the Canadian economy. Like most European countries, Canada has a
national health service, and a good social security system; but good welfare services
have to be paid for by high taxes, so the cost of living in Canada is high. Because of this,
hundreds of thousands of Canadians often get in their cars and drive over to the USA to
go shopping. This is one cause of economic problems in Canada. Over half of Canada's
imports come from the United States, and Canada has a trade deficit with the USA.
    But the American influence is not just a question of shopping. Lots of Canadians drive
American cars, and cars are almost as important in Canada as they are in the USA. There
is television too. While Quebecers tend to watch their own French-language TV stations,
English-speaking Canadians have a choice between local English-speaking channels,
national programmes from CBC, and dozens of American channels brought to them by
cable or satellite. Unless they specifically want to watch local stations, they're just as likely
to tune in to one of the big American channels as they are to a Canadian channel.
    Perhaps it is not surprising if some Canadians are afraid that their country will soon be
just like another part of the USA. If, one day, Quebec becomes independent, many
Canadians fear that the rest of Canada could break up. Perhaps that's an exaggeration;
many Canadians feel it is a real risk.

SOME SURPRISING FACTS ABOUT CANADA

 Canada is the second biggest country in the world, but the population is only 36
million.
  Over half of all Canadians live south of a line that runs, in Europe, through Dijon,
Zurich and Budapest.
 Winter temperatures regularly go down to -25°C all over Canada, except on the
West Coast.
 Driving for 12 hours a day, it takes 5 days to go by road from Montreal to
Vancouver.
 Ottawa, the Canadian capital, is situated in Ontario, on the border with Quebec. Its
biggest suburb, Gatineau, is in Quebec. A third of the population of Ottawa are
French-speakers.
 There is a Canadian version of the Loch Ness Monster, the "Turtle Lake Monster".
It is said to be between 3 and 9 metres long, and to live in the very deep waters of
Turtle Lake, Saskatchewan.

 A CANADIAN WINTER ...... Brrrr ! It's cold

Winter life in Canada

 If there is one thing that unites almost the whole population of Canada, it is the experience
of winter.
    While in most parts of Europe, people never know what the winter weather will be like
from one week to the next, Canadians know what winter means. When the last leaves fall
off the trees in Autumn, Canadians know that the winter is coming, and that it will be cold;
or if it is not cold, it will be very cold! When the Arctic air blows south in the winter months,
Canadians know that the temperature will fall to -20° or lower, perhaps down to -40°; but
because they know that it is going to happen, Canadians are ready for it! That, as they
say, is half the battle of survival!
    In Edmonton, the biggest city in the province of Alberta, the first winter snows can come
in October.  When this happens, Edmontonians complain that it is a bit early, but then just
get on with normal life.
     For most of the winter, which usually lasts from November to April, daytime
temperatures in the city rarely rise above freezing; from time to time, Arctic
winds howl down from the north, and for several days temperatures in the city may not
rise above -20° (and may drop below -40°).
    But in a city where people are used to cold winters, life carries on as usual. Canadians
have to know how to cope with the cold; those who can't have just two options, to
emigrate or to go and live beyond the Rocky Mountains, beside the Pacific Ocean, in
"B.C."  – British Columbia!
    The easiest way to keep away from the cold of a Canadian winter is to stay indoors as
much as possible! This does not mean that you have to stay at home, however! Many
people keep their cars in heated basement garages which they can reach without going
outside. Cars are often kept warm in winter, with electric heaters which are plugged
into power points.
    Some shopping centres have underground or indoor parking lots: and in the city
centre, it is often possible to walk from one building to another, underground or above
ground, without ever having to go out in the cold. The biggest shopping centre in town has
hundreds of shops, cinemas, an ice rink, a sports centre and an amusement park all under
one roof! The "West Edmonton Mall" is like an indoor city — and in the heart of winter, it is
a good place to go shopping.
    Outside, people make the most of the snow, for leisure and recreation. Skiing, skating
and snow-shoeing are popular activities that can be practised in the city's parks; many
parks also have areas which are flooded in winter, to provide natural icerinks, which are
lit up in the evenings. Everyone tries to enjoy the snow as much as possible!
    Perhaps this is easier than it is in most parts of Europe; Canadian snow tends to be dry
and powdery. For most of the winter, for example, you can't make it into snowballs, it's too
cold. There is no point in putting salt on the roads, either, as at -10° and below, the snow
just will not melt, even with salt! The only way to clear the roads is to use snow-ploughs or
snow-blowers.

Constitutional issues
Canada's official Head of State is Queen Elizabeth, who is also the nominal head of state
of 15 other Commonwealth countries. Her function is purely symbolic. Many Canadians
would like Canada to have a Canadian head of State; but many others want to keep the
monarchy. Opinion is divided, but there is no great opposition to the Queen as head of
state, except in Quebec.
    It was not until 1982 that Canada became constitutionally an independent nation! When
this happened, many Canadians were quite surprised, as they thought that their country
had been independent since 1867. In practice they were right; the Canadian government
in Ottawa has governed Canada since that date.
    The links between Britain and Canada remain very strong, all the same. About 40% of
Canadians have ancestors from the British Isles, and about 30% have ancestors from
France. In particular, lots of Scottish people emigrated from Britain to Canada in the 19th
and 20th centuries, and the British Isles remained the main source of immigration to
Canada until the 1980's.
    Today, most new Canadian immigrants come from Asia, particularly from southern and
south east Asia.

The first Canadians

Celebrating Canada's
Indian heritage in the centre of Calgary, Alberta.

    Before Europeans came to North America, Canada was inhabited by native Americans,
known today as First Nations, Indians,  Inuit or sometmes as Eskimos.
   In the Americas, the word "Indians" does not mean people from India!  It means
"indigenous people", people who already live in a place, or were born there.
    Contrary to popular imagination, Canada's First Nations were not all nomadic people,
and in eastern Canada, many Indians lived in villages made of wooden huts. Like
Europeans, they grew crops and cultivated small fields.
    Different groups of Indians often fought for territory, for good agricultural land, for the
rivers with most fish in them. However, there was plenty of room for everyone in such a
vast country, and food was not a real problem; the forests were full of wild animals.
    The First Nations living in the western half of Canada were more nomadic. The great
prairies of Western Canada were  home to tribes  who lived in teepees; these nomads
lived mainly from hunting.
    Today, there are about 300,000 officially registered Indians in Canada, and about a
million other Canadians who are partly of First Nation origin. Indian ceremonies and
festivities are an important part of Canadian culture.
    Across Canada, there are over 2000 Indian reservations, many of them relatively poor.
However some Indian reservations have rich natural resources. In Alberta, First Nation
communities receive hundreds of millions of dollars each year in royalties for gas and oil
extracted from the ground in or under their reservations.

WORD GUIDE
ancestors: grandparents, great grandparents, etc. - basement: the underground level of
a building - border: frontier - cope with: live with, accept - crops: food plants
- flooded: covered with water - health: medical condition - howl: blow very fast -
hunting: killing wild animals - icerink: place for skating - parking lot: car park - plugged
into: connected to - power points: sources of electric current - - tend to: have a habit of
(-ing) - trade deficit:  a trade deficit is when a country imports more than it exports - tune
in to: select - used to: accustomed to, familiar with - welfare: services to help people who
are in a difficult situation
 USA:  Still looking for Gold
There are still prospectors searching for gold in the American Far West
 GOLD has always attracted people. At the start of the twentieth century, and during
the nineteenth century, thousands of men went to the West of the United States,
looking for gold. The "Gold Rush" lasted, on and off, for, sixty or seventy years,
then it finished.
But today, there are still men and women out in the West, looking for gold, as 
Andrew Rossiter  found out.

It was a blistering hot day in

summer. The track leading to "Atlantic City" (Wyoming) was dry and bumpy, and great
clouds of dust blew up behind the car. In 1870, Atlantic City was a prosperous town, with
several thousand inhabitants, mostly men. It was a strange place to find a town, mind
you, hidden in little gulch in the middle of a wide scrub desert.

Atlantic City began life as a staging post on one of the transcontinental trails,

taken by emigrants en route for California. Soon however it became
a roaring gold town, where people could make (or lose) their fortunes in a day.
Few did make a fortune; many found enough gold to keep them happy, but a lot
found nothing, or nothing much.
Then, about seven years after the gold rush began, it finished. Suddenly, it seemed that
there was no gold left in the ground. The miners packed their tools, their pans, and their
bags, and went off somewhere else, to try their luck again. There were no more emigrants
either; as soon as the first transcontinental railroad had opened in 1869, the old emigrant
trails had been completely abandoned.

The hotels closed, the shops closed, the bars closed, the jail closed; and before long,
Atlantic City was a ghost town, uninhabited except by the occasional rancher or hunter,
and the wandering coyotes. I didn't expect to find much in Atlantic City. I knew that a few
people lived there again now, some of the old houses had been restored, and others had
been built. But I didn't expect much.

We drove round a dusty bend, and there in front of us lay the town, a couple of
dozen wooden buildings, some old, some new, and mostly pretty plain.

Surprisingly there was a fire-station; then, in the middle of the town, a wooden
"saloon". A drink, I thought, something to drink at last.

I stopped the car in a cloud of

dust, and we walked up the steps and into the saloon.

Well if I'd wanted to do a bit of time-travelling, I couldn't have done much better;
walking through that door was like walking back over a hundred years in time.
Inside, the old Western saloon was still intact, with its big long wooden bar, and
enormous mirrors on the walls. Apart from the electric light, the juke box, and the
tables set for dinner, it was almost perfect.

And there in the corner sat the prospector, with his wife. If he'd been wearing a
red gown, I'd have taken him for Father Christmas, but he wasn't. This old-timer
wasn't in Atlantic City to bring presents, but to find gold.

He said his name was Brad, and he'd been looking for gold in Atlantic City for
some time now. Yes, he'd found some too; not enough to make him a millionnaire,
but enough to make him happy.
 When the Gold Rush ended in Atlantic City,
he told me, it was not actually because there was no more gold, but because gold
was too hard to find, or not valuable enough.

Today, gold is a lot more valuable than it was a hundred years ago, and modern
techniques allow people to find gold more easily. And that was why Brad and his
wife were in Atlantic City, digging for gold.

They were not the only ones, said Brad; quite a few of the "concessions" are now
being worked, and some old mines are being opened up again. In some places,
mining for gold has become commercially profitable again; but in most cases, the
miners, like Brad, are just amateurs.

No, Brad hadn't spent all his life digging in tunnels and panning in streams, to find
a few ounces of gold. In fact, he was a retired businessman, looking for gold as a
hobby, and a nice way to pass the time in a wild, lonely and beautiful part of North
America.

More than gold, no doubt, Brad was looking for a way of life, a dream of the past. If
he had found no gold, he would not have been too worried.  Few of today's
amateur gold prospectors are there for the money; they're there for the fun, the
isolation, and the nostalgia!. The legend of the west will go on inspiring people for
many many years.
WORDS:
Bend: corner- Blistering: very hot - en route for: going to - expect: think that - gulch:
valley - jail: prison - mind you: please note - on and off: from time to time
- ounces: grammes (1 ounce = about 25 grammes) panning: looking - plain: ordinary
- prospector: person looking for gold - retired: a person retires when he/she stops her
working life - roaring: very active - scrub: small bushes - staging post: place where
people stopped for the night, bought provisions, etc. - trails: tracks - worried: anxious 
 Who was Buffalo Bill ?
Discovering an American folk hero ......
The name "Buffalo Bill" is one of the most famous names in the history of
the West. Once Bill was known as a great fighter and a great hunter.
Today people prefer to remember other sides of his character. Later in his
life he was a great showman and one of the first people to see that it was
necessary to protect America’s natural environment .

      Buffalo Bill Cody was born on a farm in Scott

county, Indiana, on 26th February 1846.      

      In those days, life in the American West was a constant struggle for survival,

and native Americans and white pioneers would fight to the death to protect their
homes and their people.     

      Clearly, young Bill was a tough boy, who knew what he was doing. Before he
was thirteen, he was an expert horse-rider and very good with a gun; and in those
days, when the West was wild, that meant he had excellent qualifications for a job. 

      Before the age of twenty, Bill left home and took a job with the Pony Express
company, and very soon he became reputed as one of their best riders.     

 
      It was the time when the West was being opened up. After the Pony Express,
Bill got a job supplying buffalo meat to the men building the Kansas Pacific rail-
road. In the space of 17 months, he claims to have killed 4,280 buffaloes. This is
where he got his name, “Buffalo Bill".

    In the 1870s, he worked as a scout for the army, during the "Indian campaigns",
and took part in General Custer’s war against the Sioux. Once, he killed Chief
Yellow Hand in a duel. This was just one of the exploits that were written about in
popular story books. In those days, anyone who killed Indians was seen as a hero.
It is very different today. 

      Today, we look at the Indian wars in a different light. Though many American
Indians still call themselves “Indians", the expression “native Americans" is
considered to be more correct. Huge areas of land have been given back to the
Indian nations, and Americans accept that White pioneers stole it from them in the
past.

    In fact, Buffalo Bill was

one of the first men in modern America to realise that white Americans and Indians
could, and should, work together. Bill made his peace with the Indians, and when
he established his famous “Wild West Show", he recruited many famous Indians
to work with him. They included Red Cloud, Red Shirt, and even Sitting Bull. His
grandson says, “At its height, there were over 650 people who travelled with the
show, including 250 American Indians. With these Indians, with all the cowboys,
they re-enacted the robbery of the Deadwood stage coach and the Pony
Express mail relay system".

    With the money he earned from his show, Bill purchased some land in
Wyoming; but by then the West was already changing dramatically. Bill, the once-
great buffalo-hunter looked nostalgically at the few rare buffaloes that were still
around, and realised that they had to be protected. At the same time, he began
trying to conserve aspects of the old Western life that were rapidly disappearing
into the twentieth century. One of the things he did was to help establish America’s
first National Forest reserve in Wyoming.

       When he died, aged 70, Buffalo Bill knew that the old West was almost dead
too, except in history and stories. Yet he knew, too, that one of the most famous
names associated with its legends, was his own.

© Linguapress.com

WORDS : 

showman: man who runs a show - struggle: fight, battle  - survival: existence

- pioneer: person colonizing new territory - tough: strong, resistant - ancestor:
grandfather and earlier generations - expanse: open space - willing to: ready to,
prepared to - supply: bring, provide -  claims to have: says he - duel: organised
fight between two people - exploit: action - area: zone - recruit: employ
- height most important moment - re-enact imitate, play - mail: post - purchase:
buy -  reserve: protected zone.-  
 Team sports, American style
In many ways, Americans and Europeans do the same things,
have the same interests, have similar lifestyles; but in “team
sports”, America and Europe are two different continents.

 
  Europeans play football, and Americans play football; but surprisingly they do not play
the same game. American football is played by men (and occasionally women)
wearing helmets and protective clothing; the ball  is oval. European football is played with
a round ball, by people wearing just socks, shorts, a shirt, and football boots.

We Americans have another popular outdoor game too; baseball - a classic

American game, that is only played seriously in North America. In Britain, a few
people play an "ancestor" of baseball, called "rounders" - but it is not a popular
sport.

In today's "global village",  lifestyles have become international. Often the

American model has spread to other countries of the world. American sports,
however, have not spread all over the world, as American films and American
fashions have. On the contrary, European sports have been more successful
internationally. Indeed European football is slowly developing in the USA (where
we call it "soccer").

In motor racing too, though it is not really a team sport, the USA is different. In
Europe, South America, Japan and other countries (including Canada), "motor
racing" means "Formula 1"; in America we have IndyCar racing.
The Indianapolis 500 is like a Formula 1 race, but different. Several famous
Formula 1 drivers - including Nigel Mansell and Jacques Villeneuve - have won the
race. On the other hand, no American IndyCar drivers have ever been Formula 1
champions. Nevertheless, Americans are beginning to discover Formula 1 racing,
since the first American Grand Prix.

Besides these big sports, America of course has basketball - perhaps the most
successful "export". Invented at Springfield College, Massachusetts, in 1891,
Basketball is quite certainly an "American game". Although it is not as big in
Europe as in the USA, basketball has become much more popular in other
countries than any other American team sport.

WHY IS AMERICA DIFFERENT?

The answer is simple. Until the 1960's, team sports were not played on a global
scale. In Europe, people played European games, and in North America we played
American games. The only real "global" sports were individual sports, such as golf
and tennis.

A hundred years ago, individual rich Americans could travel to Europe on holiday,
and play these two games. But whole teams of sportsmen did not often travel
around the world, it was too difficult and slow!
The first worldwide sports competition was the Olympic Games; but originally the
Olympics were only concerned with athletics; they did not include the wide
variety of sports that they now cover.

So as far as team sports are concerned, America has grown up with its own
tradition; we love our "football" and our baseball and our basketball. We don't
mind if these sports are not popular in other countries. That way, we can organise
the "World Series" baseball championship, knowing that a US team will almost
always win. From time to time, a Canadian team wins.... but they're North
Americans too, after all.

WORDS A-Z :

besides: in addition to - don't mind: are not worried - helmet: hard hat - on a

global scale: all over the world - were only concerned with: only included.
 Elvis Presley - still "the
King"
Music: 
An intermediate level English resource.
Although he died almost half a century ago, Elvis Presley,
the "King of Rock 'n' Roll" , is still a hero for millions all
over the world and Graceland, his home in Memphis, is a
major tourist attraction
 Elvis towards the end of his life

       It's hot and sticky in the summer in Memphis, Tennessee. The sea is
hundreds of miles away from this city on the Mississippi river, yet that
doesn't stop the tourists from coming. Some come just once, others make
the trip regularly. These are the real fans, those for whom rock 'n' roll has
only one voice, that of "the King" himself: Elvis Presley.    
   Memphis is the city where Elvis lived for most of his professional life; and
though he died in 1977, Memphis has not forgotten him. On the contrary,
America's most famous rocker (the only one to have had his picture on a set
of U.S. postage stamps!) has become the city's most famous son — and
seems to get more and more important as the years go by.
    Beside Highway 51, just south of the city is Graceland; this is the house
which Elvis bought after he became a star, and which he kept till the day he
died. Today it belongs to his daughter Lisa Marie, but is run as an Elvis
Presley museum: it is the second most visited house in the U.S.A., after the
White House.     The people who work at Graceland seem to be some of
Elvis's biggest fans. They live and breathe Elvis! In the café, there is day-
long Elvis on the music system; and as visitors are taken round Graceland,
their guides talk about Elvis as if he were more than the King — more like
the God of rock 'n' roll.
    "Is it true Elvis died of drugs?" asks a non-believer in the crowd of visitors
being shown round the house.
    Most of the other visitors look at her angrily or in astonishment, as if she
has said something terrible.
    "Oh no," says the tour guide. For a moment her permanent cheek-to-
cheek smile changes into a frown of discontent. "Oh no, that's just a story,
made up to discredit him. You know, Elvis had plenty of friends, but he sure
had some enemies too. They made up a whole bunch of stories about him.
There's no way Elvis took drugs. You know, he was even a federal agent.
You'll see his card downstairs."
   
    Then the guide's 180° smile springs back, and she changes the subject,
plunging into eulogies about the wonderful style with which Elvis decorated
his house.
 Elvis loved Cadillacs, and his
Automobile Museum at Graceland is a popular attraction

    For a poor boy brought up in a two-room shack in rural Mississippi, it

probably was fairly good style. Elvis's tastes were brash, rather like those of
many other ordinary unsophisticated folk. He liked the good things in life:
girls, guitars and Cadillacs — and he sang about them regularly. That was
one of the reasons why he became such a star.
    The other reason was, of course, that Elvis really was a good artist, and
he really did change the face of American popular music. Before Elvis, the
only real rock 'n' roll singers were black, and their style was not quite the
same as that of Elvis. Elvis was the first white rocker, and thus — in an age
where black music, except jazz, was not widely appreciated outside the
black community — he opened up a whole new branch of American popular
music.
    As a young rocker, he was America's biggest star, and this reputation
followed him into middle age. His energy and his looks, however, did not. By
the time he was forty, Elvis was a sick man, dependent on drugs. The thin
athletic youth had become a fat prematurely-aged man. It was not
surprising, really, that he did not survive beyond the age of 42.
    As for his reputation, that is a different story. Elvis may have died in 1977;
his influence, and his reputation, are still very much alive today.
WORD GUIDE

run: managed, operated - astonishment: great surprise - frown: scowl,

angry look - discredit: give a bad reputation to - bunch (slang): crowd -
plunge: jump - eulogy: flattering words - shack: hut, very small house -
brash: unrefined, uncultured - folk: people - prematurely-aged : old before
he should be
The story of Silicon Valley 
Intermediate English
 If old America was made in New York or Detroit, modern America is
made in Silicon Valley. But what is "Silicon Valley", where is it? And why
is it where it is?

San José,in the heart of Silicon Valley

     It is not made of silicon; and it is not a river valley; but forgetting that,
Silicon Valley is probably the most famous valley in the world. Although it is
not the place where the first computer was built (that was Manchester,
England), Silicon Valley, near San Francisco,  was the birthplace of the
modern computer industry.
    For this, we can say thankyou to scientists at the universities in California,
and to the Hippies of the 1960's.
    It was in the nineteen-sixties that American "youth culture" really began.
California, of course, already existed; but the Sixties Generation
rediscovered it.
    At the time there were really two different forms of youth culture; the
"Beach Boy" culture on the one hand, and the anti-establishment hippies
and radical students on the other hand; and they all dreamed of California.
    For the Beach Boys, that meant southern California, where they could
sing about surfing and cars; for the Hippies and radicals, it meant San
Francisco, "flower power" and revolutionary new ideas. The campuses at
Berkeley and Stanford University, near San Francisco, were hot-beds of new
ideas, new technology, new culture, and new ways of living. 
  
    When they finished university, many of the best students did not look for
jobs with big companies like Ford or Exxon. Instead they wanted to be free
and run their own operations.... and stay in California, not far from San
Francisco. Silicon Valley is thus a group of small towns, including Palo Alto
and San José,  a few miles south of San Francisco.

Today, young
people from all over come to Silicon Valley to learn about computers.

    The high-technology industry was already present around San Francisco.

Intel had been founded in 1968, and in the same year the first computer
mouse was built at Stamford University. In 1970, Xerox opened a research
center in Palo Alto. There were also other electronics companies, like
Hewlett Packard, and Fairchild, the world's first "semiconductor" company.
    Then, in 1976, an electronics student called Steve Jobs started a small
computer company in his garage; he gave it the same name as the Beatles'
record company: Apple.
    Very soon,  more  companies, like Seagate and Google appeared. "Silicon
Valley" had arrived. There was even a sort of primitive Internet connecting
many addresses in Silicon Valley, called the Arpanet.

    Today, Silicon Valley is still the home of the computer industry; it is still full
of high technology, but it is not the only center for high-tech in the USA. 
Today here are computer firms all over the USA.... and all over the world;
but Silicon Valley still has the largest concentration of high-tech companies
and research centers.
   
     Microsoft, the world's biggest high-tech company, is not based in Silicon
Valley. It is further north, near Seattle in the state of Washington.

WORDS
The acclaimed new compact English reference grammar - a must for teachers,
students and libraries. 

birthplace: the place where a person is born - youth: young people - on

the one hand: on one side - anti-establishment: people who reject the
"established" system of society - radical: very different, revolutionary
- run: organise - company: firm.
The story of Coca-Cola
Probably the best-known drink in the world
What is the most recognizable object in the world? Could it be a football? Or a Big-Mac?
No, the answer is a Coca-Cola bottle. The famous Coca-Cola bottle is over 100 years old !

Coca-cola
advertisement in Las Vegas

    Footballs and big macs are certainly part of life for lots of people; but Coca-Cola is now
a permanent part of world culture. People know and drink Coca-Cola all over the world.
    It is said that the Coca-Cola bottle is the most recognised object in the world. Hundreds
of millions of people can recognise a Coke bottle by its shape, even if they cannot see it!
And the famous Coca-Cola logo is the most famous logo in the world. Unlike any other
famous commercial logo, it has not changed in 100 years!

    But the story of Coca-Cola is    older than that. It was in 1886    
John Pemberton, a druggist in Atlanta, Georgia, invented a new type

of syrup,    coca leaves, sugar and cola nuts, plus a few    

secret ingredients! Pemberton sold it    a medicine; and with its coca

(the source of cocaine), it must have    people feel good!

    Nevertheless, Pemberton's medicine was not very successful, so he sold his

secret formula to    druggist, Asa Candler. Candler was interested, because

he had another idea; he thought that Pemberton's "medicine" would    better if

it was mixed with soda.

    Candler was thus the man who    invented the drink Coca-Cola. At first he

sold it in his drugstore; then he began    the syrup to other drugstores, who
used it with their soda fountains. Candler also advertised his new drink, and soon people

were going to drugstores just    a drink of Coca-cola.

    Before long, other people became interested in the product,    a couple
of businessmen who wanted to sell it in bottles. Candler sold them a licence to bottle the

drink, and very    the men became millionnaires. The famous bottle, with its
very distinctive shape, was designed in 1916.

       the First World War, American soldiers in Europe began asking for Coca-
Cola, so the Coca-cola company began to export to Europe. It was so popular with
soldiers, that they then had to start bottling the drink in Europe.
    Today, Coca-Cola is made in countries all over the world, including Russia and China; it

is the world's    popular drink.

    As for the famous formula, it is probably the world's most valuable secret! The exact

ingredients for making Coca-Cola are only    to a handful of people. And as
for the "coca" that was in the original drink, that was eliminated in 1903. It was a drug,
and too dangerous. Today's Coca-Cola contains caffeine, but not cocaine!

WORD GUIDE
shape : form - logo: logotype, name-image - unlike : differently to - druggist: pharmacist
- syrup: concentrated sweet drink - nuts: hard round fruits - ingredient: element
-  source: origin - formula: recipe, instructions for making something -  soda: bubbling
water, fizzy water - advertise: publicise - licence: permit, authorisation
- distinctive: memorable, special - as for: concerning - a handful of: a very small number
of - eliminate: take out –
 The story of Blue Jeans

Denim - the all-American fashion..

Blue jeans are the most popular type of clothing in the
world; but they are not modern! In fact, jeans have existed
for over 160 years.

   In 1996, someone found some very old clothes in an old mine in Nevada, USA; they
included a pair of dirty old jeans. Today, those jeans are very valuable, and they are now
in the Levi Strauss Archival Collection, in San Francisco. The jeans, which are over 140
years old, are the oldest pair of Levi's 501 jeans in the world.
    They are almost the same as a modern pair of 501's; there are just some small
differences in the detail. For instance, today's 501's have two back pockets, the old pair
just has one.
THE STORY OF JEANS

    Jeans were the

classic clothes of the American West.
    In 1853, a young tailor from Germany, called Levi Strauss, began working in San
Francisco; Levi sold thick canvas to miners; the miners used the canvas to make tents.
    One day, a miner told Levi that he could not find trousers that were strong enough for
work in the gold mines. Levi decided to make some trousers out of canvas.
    Very soon, he had sold all the canvas trousers he had made! They were just what
miners wanted.
    However, the canvas was rather heavy and stiff. Levi therefore began to look for a
different textile; soon he found a heavy textile from France; it was called serge de Nimes.
Americans just called this de Nimes, and this name soon got reduced to denim.
    Denim was a bit lighter than canvas, but it was very strong; it was ideal for miners.
    However, original denim was almost white, and miners did not like the color! Their
denim trousers got dirty as soon as they began working!
    Levi Strauss therefore decided to use colored denim, and he chose dark blue. In
1873,he began to make denim trousers with metal rivets to make them stronger. This was
a radical new idea: "Blue jeans" had arrived!
    Levi's jeans were so popular, that his company got bigger and bigger; soon, other firms
were making blue jeans too. Miners liked them, but so did cowboys and other working
men. Blue jeans became classic American working trousers.
    After the Second World War, jeans became popular all over the world. Today, blue
jeans are made throughout the world – most of them in Asia. Very few jeans are now
made in the USA, because of the cost: but it is still possible to buy blue jeans that are
made in San Francisco.... if you have a lot of money to spend.
    Today there are hundreds of different brands of jeans. Many top fashion brands, like
Armani or Benetton, make their own blue jeans. But for real authentic jeans, "Levi's" are
still the most popular brand.
JEANS for EVERYONE ?

    In America, everyone wears jeans as leisure wear. Some people wear jeans all the
time, even for work. But Americans are perhaps less formal than other nations.
    At the "G7" summit in Denver, in 1997, American President Bill Clinton gave all his
visitors jeans, for a "Western evening". Tony Blair, the British Prime Minister, put them on,
but other European leaders, including Chancellor Kohl of Germany and Jacques Chirac,
the President of France, refused. Some people still think that jeans are not respectable
clothes!
    Not the young! Jeans are now the international uniform worn by young people. Why?
That is a good question!

Hollywood - its life and

times
Hollywood is one of the best-known names in the world:
but where is Hollywood exactly? Why is it so successful?
And how did it begin? Linguapress looks at the answers to
these and other questions.
 Walking with the stars

        At the start of the 20th century, a new city was beginning to grow on some flat land
near the sea in southern California; its name was Los Angeles - the name of the old
Spanish mission that had been there for many years.
    At the same time, a new industry was just being born; the cinema. In America, they
talked of "motion pictures", but this soon became shortened to "movies".
    America's movie industry began life in New York; but by 1910, movie-makers were
moving to Los Angeles. In New York, everything was too expensive; workers, land, taxes.
Worse than that, it was difficult to make movies in winter, because it was too cold.
    By contrast, the Los Angeles region was full of advantages. In California, they could
make films all through the year; and everything was cheaper. In particular, there was lots
of land for sale.
    The movie-makers found what they needed a few miles outside Los Angeles; and
before long, large new studios were being built in an area called Hollywood, at the foot of
some small dry hills.
    Movies quickly became very popular, particularly after "talkies" first appeared in 1925.
Nevertheless, movies were expensive to make, and movie companies needed money -
lots of it. For this reason, Hollywood rapidly became dominated by a small number of big
companies such as MGM, 20th Century Fox, Warner Bros. and Paramount.
    Since then, the big companies have had their ups and downs, but most of them are
still there. Some old names have disappeared, but some new ones have appeared,
companies like Walt Disney and Columbia.
    Naturally, Hollywood has changed a lot in over 100 years! Today the biggest studios
belong to huge international firms. For instance, 21st Century Fox is part of the Disney
empire, and owns dozens of film and media companies across the world..
    It is only huge companies like Fox that can afford to make today's very expensive films;
and for Titanic - which was at the time the most expensive film ever - Fox had to get help
from another big company, Paramount!
    Once Hollywood could make films just for America; today it has to make them for the
world. The suburb of Los Angeles has become the headquarters of a global dream-
machine. Perhaps we dreamed differently in the past. Today, thanks in part to Hollywood,
people everywhere have similar dreams.
     We now live in the age of global culture. Hollywood did not invent this culture - but for
better or for worse, it has become one of the most powerful elements in it. Like it or not, we
all now live on planet Hollywood.

America's oil - a love

affair
In September 2000, the world was hit by an "oil crisis"; the
cost of crude oil reached over 35 dollars a barrel, and
gasoline (which the British call "petrol") became very
expensive. Even in America. Since then, the cost of oil has
fallen; but even in the USA, use of oil has continued to fall .

They don't
make cars like this any more. They used too much gasolene

    During the summer of 2000, lots of car-drivers in America were angry. The cost of
gasoline went above $2 a gallon in some states. The age of cheap gasoline was over.
    Today, in 2020,  in spite of Covid-19, gas costs over $ 2 a gallon  almost everywhere in
the USA. In California, even regular gas costs above $3 a gallon.
    This is very cheap compared to Europe,* * but Americans think that it is very expensive.

    The United States is the land of relatively cheap energy; America is the second biggest
producer of oil in the world, but it is also the biggest importer. In fact, the USA imports over
20% of its energy, mostly in the form of oil.
    There is oil under the ground in many parts of the USA. America's first oil wells were
drilled in the year 1859, in Pennsylvania; and since then, more and more wells have been
made in other states.
    Today, oil companies are "fracking", and finding lots more oil under the ground.
 Working in the American oil
industry
    The centre of America's oil industry today is the state of Texas; and America's "oil
capital" is the city of Dallas. Texas is by far the biggest producer of oil in the USA.
    It was not always the case; the first Texan oil-wells were opened in 1901, when there
was already a big oil industry in other parts of the USA. But without the oil from Texas,
America's history would have been very different.
    In 2001, Texans celebrated their "oil centenary".

    Cheap oil and cheap gasoline helped to make modern America. They shaped America's
cities, and they were an essential part of the American lifestyle. They were also essential
in the great empty states of the West, where people often have to travel long distances.
    Today, Americans consume about 25% of the world's energy.... far more than people in
other countries; but the situation is slowly changing.
    Americans are already buying smaller cars, and American cars consume much less gas
than they used to. But in the coming years, they will use less and less oil. They will have
to.
    There is still a lot of oil under the ground, but oil and gas must become more expensive
in the future. Over 50% of America's traditional oil reserves have already been used -
mostly since 1950. Nobody knows when America's oil will start running out, but the first
problems could come in less than 20 years. And as soon as oil starts running out, its price
will go up very quickly!
    In conclusion, the "two dollar gallon" was good for America. It has encouraged
Americans to buy smaller cars, and to use less energy. That way, America's oil will last
longer..... perhaps until the age of clean green energy arrives.
 

** Comparing gasoline prices:

$3.80 per gallon =  about $1.00 per litre,  or about 0.85 €uros a litre... which is much
cheaper than in Europe.
(Converted at August 2020 rates)
 Winter sports in the
USA
Intermediate English
For people who like sport, the American
winter is a season of opportunity     
 Winter sports are popular in North America. In winter time, a large part of the
continent is covered in snow for up to four months.

Downhill skiing
in the Rocky Mountains, in Utah

    Only two parts of the USA are mild or warm in winter — a) the coasts, especially Florida
and southern California, and b) the southern part of the Mississippi basin.
    Everywhere else it gets cold, often very cold. By the end of November, many American
states are often covered in snow; and although recent winters have been less cold, sport
in winter usually means snow sports, or indoor sports.
    By January, many people in North America will have temperatures of -30°C; not every
day, of course, but such low temperatures are not rare. In Chicago and Minneapolis, the
temperature can fall below -40°.
   
    When it is very cold, specially when there is a cold wind, few people want to go outside,
unless they have to; but on sunny winter days, winter sports are popular.
    In the large flat regions in the middle of North America, the most popular winter sports
are  snowmobiling, snow-shoeing and cross-country skiing. Ice-skating is popular too;
lakes and rivers freeze, and many towns and cities have free open-air skating rinks. In
many places, these are flood-lit after dark, so that people can enjoy skating in the
evening.
    However, for many people, real "winter sports" means downhill skiing; and in the USA,
there are two main areas for this; the Adirondack Mountains in the North East, and the
Rockies in the west.
    The Rockies are probably the best place in the world for skiing. North America's
"continental" climate means that the snow that falls here is usually very dry, very powdery.
It provides perfect skiing conditions in the most famous skiing resorts, which are mostly
situated at a height of over 2000 metres.
    The best resorts are in Colorado and Utah, where the air is usually beautifully clear
through the winter months. Colorado has America's most famous skiing resorts, Vail and
Aspen, where the stars and the rich go for their winter holidays. But the great ski areas of
Utah are just as good, with miles and miles of slopes. 
   
    There is one big difference between American ski resorts and most Alpine resorts in
Europe: the traffic!
    For most Americans, a skiing holiday means a trip by plane, as  most American cities
are a long way from the Rockies. Americans do not take long holidays, so they cannot
spend several days driving to the Rockies.
    The situation is different for people in Los Angeles and other West Coast cities. They
can drive to ski resorts in just a few hours.
    Nevertheless, American ski resorts encourage visitors to come by plane and use buses
when they arrive: lots of ski resorts offer free bus services from the nearest airports; some,
like Aspen, provide free buses between the hotels and the pistes.
    As a result, people do not sit for hours in their cars, moving very slowly towards the
slopes, and the air is not polluted.
    Conditions are not going to get worse; the quality of the environment in America's
mountains is a very important issue.

Vocabulary guide

area: zone - basin: wide valley - everywhere else : in all other parts -  flood-
lit: illuminated - height: altitude - issue: question - provide: make for, offer - resort:
holiday centre - skating rink: artificial lake where people can skate on ice - slope: piste
- snowmobile: a snow scooter - trip: voyage, journey.
 CLOSE ENCOUNTERS with a
Twister
Tornado ! Paul Denman tells about the day he came face to
face with America's most frightening meteorological
phenomenon
Click here to show vocabulary guide

(If the vocabulary guide does not show up (some smartphones), see guide at
foot of this page)

Until last year, I'd always wanted to see a tornado. A few years ago, in
Oklahoma, I saw one of those violent dark green storm skies, with

small  cones hangi
ng down from its underside; but the tornado that people feared at that
moment never materialized. The cones were sucked back into the clouds,
and eventually the sun came out again. 

   Then last year I met my first (and thankfully only) tornado.... and it was not
in the south. We were in Montana - tranquil old Montana - enjoying our
summer vacation, when the twister struck. The day had begun like any
ordinary July day in Montana, with a bright blue sky, and hot sunshine. A few
bubbling clouds were blowing across, as we made our way in the footsteps
of Calamity Jane , towards an ancient mining town called Castle. In the
days when the West was Wild, Castle was a rough and busy town, full of
miners looking for silver and gold. Jane stayed there for a few
years, running a bar. Today, Castle is a "ghost town", a collection of old
wooden buildings, some still standing, others just a pile of fallen boards and
planks of wood. Abandoned over 100 years ago, when the mines ran out
of precious metals, Castle now lies in the middle of nowhere, miles from a
paved road, miles from civilisation.

 That morning, Castle was deserted. Few visitors make the journey to this
distant part of Montana, and even fewer want to drive ten miles on a dirt-
track to visit a place like Castle. The sun was shining brightly when we
arrived, and it was still shining when we found the house where Jane used to
live. It wasn't until the sun went behind a cloud that we looked up at the sky.
   "Hey!" said Sarah, "Look, there's a storm coming..." Indeed, to the south,
the sky had turned an inky black. A storm was coming, and it looked like a
big one.
  "Let's get back to the main road," Sarah added. "These tracks will be
unpassable if there's a storm."
   "Sure, that's a good idea, let's get going!" I said
   "If we go north, we'll come out near White Sulphur Springs," said Robbie.

The track wound upwards through a forest of pine trees, then divided, then

divided again.
   "Which way?" I asked.
   "Take the track to the right," said Julie who had the map.
    "Are you sure?"
   "No, I'm not sure exactly where we are... the map doesn't show all these
tracks... but I think so."
    The time was just about midday, yet somehow, in the space of ten
minutes, all the blue had vanished from the sky, and the light
was fading fast, as if evening was coming on. The track twisted and turned,
up and down, through woods and over streams, and then, at last, out onto
an open, treeless, hilltop. Suddenly Sarah shouted. "Look, a tornado!"
    I pulled the car to a stop, and looked back; and there it was. Just like in
the movie: the clouds were hanging like a dark ceiling above our
heads, slate gray with tinges of brown and green. And there, just a few miles
to the south, was the tornado, an inky funnel of twisting cloud coming right
down to the ground. Beside it, several other menacing cones were hanging
downwards, ready to strike. We could see them moving in our direction.
  "Let's get out of here!" I said, and
threw the car into gear.

I don't usually drive cars at 50 m.p.h along dirt tracks, but this time I did; as
we sped across the open hilltop, it seemed like there were three different
storms coming towards us at once, from three different directions. By now
we could see waves of wind gusting across the grassland, and by the time
we reached the trees again, branches were blowing in all directions. Then,
beside the track, we came across a group of tourists on quad
bikes, enjoying a cross-country trip. We stopped the car for a moment to
warn them, but the tour-guide laughed. "Tornado?! No! We don't get
tornados here!" I wasn't going to hang around arguing with him, so we
just set off again, hoping to find a real road where we could move faster than
the storm. But it was not to be. We had come out of the woods, and were
going down into a valley when suddenly the hills in front of us vanished. It all
happened in the space of about two minutes.  
     "It's coming this way," shouted Sarah.
     "Find some shelter!" said Julie.
There was none - not a tree, not a building, not a bridge, until, just as we
were giving up hope, like a mirage in the desert, we spotted an old
abandoned church. Just beyond it, the sky seemed to touch the ground. As
we raced towards the shelter of this - probably the most solid building for
miles around - the first hailstones hit us, as big as golf balls, blowing almost
horizontally across the windscreen. We reached the church, and pulled to
an abrupt halt. Shelter! By then we could see nothing - or at least nothing
further from us than about fifteen meters; and although there were four of us
in the car, and it was a heavy car too, the vehicle was jumping up and down
on its springs, as if someone was trying to push it over. The noise of the
wind and the hailstones on the roof was deafening, and conversation was
impossible, so we just sat there in silence hoping and praying that our car
was not going to be picked up like a leaf, and thrown across into the
unknown that we could not see.....

It probably lasted about ten minutes - but sitting in that bumping noisy car, it
seemed more like ten hours until, almost as suddenly as it had started, the
wind stopped, and the hail stopped falling. Normality returned.
   "Phew!", said Sarah. "I thought we'd had it!"
   "Me too," said Robbie.
    Fortunately, the tornado had missed us, and we'd just been through the
very violent storm that accompanied it. But just short distance down the
road, the twister had caused chaos and destruction, flattening a farm and a
garage as it rolled across the prairies of Montana. A week later, a similar
twister crashed into a camp ground in Alberta, Canada, killing a dozen
people, and wrecking hundreds of tents and caravans. With hindsight, I felt
that we'd been quite lucky. I'd seen my twister, I'd been on the edge of it, but
fortunately not in the middle. Frankly, that was quite enough.

TORNADO ALLEY

Perhaps you saw the movie "Twister". Remember, it was the film about
scientists who wanted to measure the forces in the middle of a tornado. It
was a frightening movie, which illustrated the incredible strength of this
terrifying natural phenomenon. Though small tornados can happen in many
parts of the world, it is only in North America that the real big "twisters"
attack. "Tornado Alley" stretches from the Gulf of Mexico in the south, as far
as the plains of Alberta, Canada, in the north. The further north you go, the
rarer they are; but in the southern states of Texas, Kansas and Oklahoma,
Tornados strike every year, destroying houses and mobile homes, cars and
trees, and anything else that gets in their way.
Notes: 
Calamity Jane
Jane was one of the very few women who became famous in the very
masculine world of the Wild West. She was really Martha Jane Burke, 1852-
1903. She spent most of her life in mining towns of South Dakota, and
working on the wagon trains that brought supplies to the wild and isolated
towns. She was an excellent shot with a revolver or a rifle.

The days when the West was Wild:

Generally, the second half of the nineteenth century, as the new territories,
between the Mississippi and the Pacific, were opened up. In particular, the
short period between about 1850 and 1880, the "heyday" of the legendary
West.