Wide River, Wide Land

"Wide River Wide Land" is a wonderful piece of historical fiction. In its pages, we art treated to a glimpse into the life of early St. Louis, seen through the eyes of Hugh O'Rome, scion of an 18th century Franco-Irish marriage, so common in the Mississippi Valley of that day. Beginning in the era of the founding of St. Louis in 1764 and continuing to the Battle of New Orleans, we see the development and transformation of a land, a city and a region.We are introduced to an interesting cast of characters, both historical and fictional. Probably the greatest development of an historical character is that of Fr. Pierre Gibault, the Patriot Priest of Mid-America, who guided his Francophone flock into the American Revolution. Here we meet George Rogers Clark, the Virginia adventurer whose daring expeditions won the heart of a continent for the U.S. Of local interest, we meet Pierre Chouteau, founder of St. Louis. The nations playing roles in the drama are represented by the Indian Chief Pontiac, French Commander St. Ange and the Spanish Commandant, De Leyba.All of these characters are skillfully woven into the life story of Hugh O'Rome. Fr. Faherty uses O'Rome's life story to teach us a bit of history along the way. O'Rome is the son of an Irishman and his local French-Canadian wife, a common domestic arrangement of the time and place.It is explained that the name "O'Rome" had been adopted in Ireland in an effort to trade an obviously Irish name for one more acceptable to the British overlords. Perhaps that is how my mother's family acquired the name of English.Through the lives of three O'Romes, we see the resentment of the British Empire among the Irish and French, as well as the gradual incorporation of our region into the American Commonwealth. With these three generations of the O'Rome family we live through love and hatred, victory and defeat, moral crises and spiritual blessing. We meet a family whose goals and beliefs are not all that different from our own.Perhaps test of greatness in literature is whether or not the work leaves us with a thought which has changed our world view. For me, "Wide River Wide Land" meets that test. In the St. Louis region today, the Mississippi River is often seen as the wide river which separates Illinois and Missouri. Since my first reading of this book, I have often thought of it, as Hugh O'Rome saw it, as the Wide River which unites the Wide Land. So may it forever be.