Тексты для дополнительного чтения Text 1 a History Tour of the us

(a fifteen-minute presentation of a student of Moscow Linguistic University)

The history of the US is not long compared with the older nations of Europe and Asia. Let’s have a brief view of it by visiting its major cities.

All major European airlines fly to various destinations in the United States. Perhaps it would not be a bad idea to head for Philadelphia, the US most historic city, which could make a nice starting point for our tour. As the ten-hour flight is coming to its end, we are passing over the Caribbean Islands of Cuba, Haiti and the Bahamas, the territories discovered by Columbus in October 1492. (But back then, his voyage took him and his crews 10 weeks instead of 10 hours.) A short time later, we are getting off the plane at Philadelphia Airport. The city whose name translates as City of Brotherly Love from Greek, was founded in 1682 on the banks of the Delaware river by William Penn, an English aristocrat and religious free-thinker. Offering refuge to Europeans seeking religious freedom and new opportunities in the New World, it grew very rapidly. When Benjamin Franklin, one of the best-known Founding Fathers of the United States, arrived here in 1723, Philadelphia was the colonies’ most prosperous city. Franklin did a lot to make City of Brotherly Love a city of firsts, with the first library, insurance company, university and fire brigade. In the 1760s Philadelphia became the second most important city in the English-speaking world.

However, in the opinion of many colonists, the British rule became too tyrannical, its taxes too arbitrary and punitive. And Philadelphia, founded on the ideas of freedom, took centre stage in the War of Independence (1775-1783). The city was chosen to host the First and Second Continental Congresses which brought together delegates from the 13 colonies and resulted in the Declaration of Independence. On July 4, 1776 the Philadelphia bell, later known as the Liberty Bell, summoned people for a public reading of the Declaration. Ten years later the Independence Hall of Philadelphia witnessed the adoption of the United States Constitution (1786) about which Franklin said: “I consent to this Constitution because I expect no better, and because I am not sure it is not the best”. For another 10 years (1790 to 1799) Philadelphia was home to the US government.

In 1800, however, the government moved to a new location 100 miles to the south. And we also move on there, to Washington D.C., the US capital. Here we’ll tour the White House, the official residence of the US President, and have a look at the Capitol, the place where Congress meets. Not far from Washington there is another historic place, a visit to which is a must for every history lover. It is Gettysburg Battlefield, the site of the bloodiest battle of the Civil War (1861-65) between the North (Unionists) and the South (Confederates). It is on that field that Abraham Lincoln addressed a large gathering of people with a speech to be later known as the Gettysburg Address. In fewer than 300 words delivered in just over two minutes, Lincoln redefined the Civil War as a struggle not merely for the Union, but as “a new birth of freedom” that would bring true equality to all of its citizens, create a unified nation and a “government of the people, by the people, for the people” that the world had not seen. Visiting Gettysburg is a magnificent opportunity to visualize and thereby relive these remarkable events.

But the spirit of adventure so typical of America already calls us to explore the opposite coast of the United States. Since we are on a history tour it would be great to follow the historic rout of the Corps of Discovery, the expedition sent to the west by President Thomas Jefferson. In 1803 the US bought large territories from France, taking in nearly the entire mid-section of North America. Jefferson commissioned the Corps of Discovery to find a water rout to the Northwest, to map the new territory and make contact with its inhabitants. The 2,000 mile journey on the Missouri River (upstream all the way) took the expedition a year and a half. A long time, indeed! So it might be wiser for us to consider another option. Why not travel in a wagon? It would remind us of the Gold Rush of 1849, when thousands of people set off to the gold fields of California, colonizing vast territories, and shifting the frontier father and father west. Can anything compare with a life of a freewheeling cowboy!? Battling against harsh weather, meeting “noble savages”, hacking a trail through the wilderness…But perhaps, the most sensible idea still would be to take a direct flight to San Francisco, the center of the California Gold Rush. In 1848 San Francisco was a small coastal settlement inhabited by only 1000 people. The Gold Rush brought there a flood of treasure seekers from all over the world, and by December 1849 its population grew to 25,000. The promise of riches was so strong that crews deserted their ships and rushed off to the gold fields, leaving behind a forest of masts in San Francisco harbour. Other major cities we’ll visit on the Pacific coast are LA with its Hollywood studios, San Jose, “the capital” of Silicon Valley, and San Diego, with its magnificent natural harbour. Here we’ll embark a northbound cruiser and sail along the coast to Seattle, the gate to Alaska and the headquarters for Boeing and Microsoft.

After the enjoyable and refreshing voyage we are ready to take a return flight to the Atlantic Coast. We’ll fly there via Chicago, America’s third largest metropolis, located on lake Michigan. This is the place where the world’s first skyscraper was erected in 1885. Downtown Chicago is also home to the world’s tallest skyscraper, the 110-floor Sears Tower. Building high-rises became possible due to the invention of William Genney, an architect from Chicago, who devised the steel-frame skeleton. Skyscrapers added a new vertical dimension to the otherwise largely flat American landscape.

The last stop in our itinerary is New York, the largest and busiest metropolis in the USA. New York is a city of immense proportions dwelling on 50 islands, so the best and quickest way to see it is by tour boat. The tour covers 35 miles of coastline and travels past major sights and attractions: the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, the United Nations Building, the Brooklyn Bridge, to name a few. As we pass the sights, the tour guide will disclose to us the secrets of the city. We may even be shown a Nike missile site. In the 1950’s and early 60’s, the time known as the Cold War, Nike missile sites were constructed around major US cities to protect them against Russian nuclear-armed bombers. The threat of a nuclear disaster became especially acute during the Cuban missile crisis (1962), when confrontation brought the two superpowers to the brink of war. Nowadays, however, the United States is facing different threats. From our boat tour we’ll be able to see a gap in the skyline of Manhattan. This is the place where the twin towers of the World Trade Center used to be, dominating the view from the time they were completed in 1973, until that fateful day of September 11, 2001 when two passenger aircraft under the control of terrorists crashed into them, killing nearly 3,000 people. The 3 hour excursion was so exciting that we didn’t notice our boat make a complete circle. And our journey around the United States has also come to an end.

Getting on the bus that will take us to JFK airport, we cast the last glance at New York. Good-buy, America. Hope to see you again.