"The Lackawanna Valley" by George Inness, 1855
"The USA appears destined by fate to plague America with misery in the name of liberty." Simon Bolivar, Caracas, 1819
Lackawanna! Even the name sounds like a promise.
Lackawanna NY is a Lake Erie port south of Buffalo, once the terminus of the Erie Lackawanna railroad, and now a dreadful slum, stuck in the same economic malaise as the rest of post-industrial upstate New York.
It's a bit tangential, but HBO did a version of the play "Lackawanna Blues" which is worth catching. And no, to the folks there, it mostly doesn't sound like a promise, at least one that's been kept.
Also, Lackawanna became a major railroad as a consequence of railroad baron Jay Gould's failed attempt (one of many, all of which failed to this day) to create a truly transcontinental (coast-to-coast) railroad empire - instead of acquiring the DL&W, the connecting lines he initiated went to the Lackawanna.
*Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
