Not long ago I came across a book called The Quakes of ’92: The History and
Geological Background of the Vacaville-Winters Earthquakes of 1892.
Although it is primarily about Yolo-area geological events
and physical effects in 1892, the authors--Richard Cowen, Janice Cooper, and
Richard Cooper--also offer some striking observations on the “mindset” of
Yolo-Davis people at that time.
Their observations relate to the general and pervasive
problem of accurately grasping the perspectives of people who come before us in
the human story.
As put by L. P. Hartley in the line opening The Go-Between that has become a proverb:
“The past is a foreign country: they do
things differently there.”
I enjoyed these authors text on this matter a great deal and
I am pleased to present it in this post.
