Friday, January 5, 2024

Nutwood, Dubuque's Most Famous Horse

An old sepia tone engraving of a very sleek horse.

From Horse Education by Thomas J. Murray (1890) at HathiTrust:

On the adjoining page will be found a good likeness of the celebrated horse, Nutwood, of a still rising fame. The gentlemanly owners are Messers. H. L. and F. D. Stout, of the Highland Stock Farm, Dubuque, Iowa. Nutwood is of a chestnut color, 15.3 hands high; weighs 1,160 lbs., foaled May 1, 1870.

... Except to state bare recorded facts of what Nutwood is, little need be said. Individually he is excellent, of superior conformation, of good size, with remarkable substance combined with finish and quality. He has the best of legs, sound and clean, and good feet. He has an even, gentle temper, and is kind and intelligent in disposition.

Henry L. Stout (1814-1900) was a lumberman who made a large fortune on the Mississippi River in Dubuque. He raced and bred horses here with his son Frank D. Stout (1854-1927), who in 1901 donated the land, in memory of his father, where Carnegie-Stout Public Library was built.

Monday, September 11, 2023

TBR Dubuque

There are so many exciting novels coming out in the next few weeks (Sep-Oct 2023), I thought I'd share some here, mostly as a way for me to keep track of what to read next. Cheers! ~Mike



The Fraud by Zadie Smith. September 5, 2023. In 1873 Victorian London, with the city mesmerized by the “Tichborne Trial,” wherein a lower-class butcher from Australia claims he is the rightful heir of a sizable estate and title, Mrs. Eliza Touchet becomes determined to find out if he’s really who he says he is or if he’s a fraud.



What You Are Looking for Is in the Library by Michiko Aoyama. September 5, 2023. What are you looking for? So asks Tokyo's most enigmatic librarian. For Sayuri Komachi is able to sense exactly what each visitor to her library is searching for and provide just the book recommendation to help them find it.



Wound by Oksana Vasyakina. September 5, 2023. The lyrical and deeply moving story of a young queer woman’s journey across Russia to inter her mother’s ashes and to understand her sexuality, femininity, and grief.



Chenneville by Paulette Jiles. September 12, 2023. After recovering from a traumatic head injury, John Chenneville discovers his beloved sister and her family were murdered during the end of the Civil War and embarks on an odyssey across the Reconstruction-era South seeking revenge.



Land of Milk and Honey by C. Pam Zhang. September 26, 2023. A Chinese American chef who, lured to a decadent, enigmatic colony of the superrich in a near future in which food is disappearing, discovers the meaning of pleasure and the ethics of who gets to enjoy it, altering her life and, indirectly, the world.



America Fantastica by Tim O'Brien. October 24, 2023. A rollicking odyssey in which a bank robbery by a disgraced journalist sparks a cross-country chase through a nation corroded by delusion.



Absolution by Alice McDermott. October 31, 2023. Sixty years after they lived as wives of American servicemen in early 1960s Vietnam, two women reconnect and relive their shared experiences in Saigon.

Wednesday, May 3, 2023

Shhhhh

 


We've had these signs for decades, but they never were in style. ðŸ˜‚