Background
Vachel Lindsay was born in 1879 in Illinois, USA. He often sold his poetry on the
streets and made long walking expeditions, trading his poetry on the way in
exchange for food and lodging. As his poetry was often known for its
experimentation with sound and as he often gave recitals, it is worthwhile listening to
old recordings of his poetry which are accessible on the internet.
Line 1: It is hard to estimate how many buffalo once roamed North America but it is
thought that there would have been between 30 and 75 million. By the time Lindsay
was writing there were about 300.
Line 3: the first railroad in the area was the Illinois and Central Railroad chartered in
1851. The construction of the railroad hastened the depletion of the buffaloes.
Shooting the beast from the windows of the railroad by passengers was popular and
widely advertised.
Line 14: Blackfeet and Pawnees are two American native tribes. The population of
the Pawnees in the early nineteenth century was about twenty to twenty-five
thousand, but it declined rapidly in the later part of the nineteenth century mostly
because of smallpox and cholera, but also through falling prey to traditional enemies.
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