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The Message Tree in
Innocents
Abroad
I love the writings and musings of Samuel
Clemens, better known as Mark Twain, enough that I
occasionally quote the famous Missouri writer.
After discovering the details of the story I am
about to tell you, I was reminded of Twain's book
the Innocents Abroad, probably because there was a
period of time, nearly twenty years ago when I had
a bout with cancer, and after recovering I was
constantly running into acquaintances that all told
me that they were surprised to see me as they had
heard news of my untimely end. Well as I recall
Twain was supposed to have told reporters upon his
return from his travels abroad, those same travels
after which he compiled "Innocents", that "The
rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated."
As Twain traveled through Europe and the Holy land,
he penned articles which he sent home to the
periodicals he wrote for, these were later the
basis for "Innocents." All those years ago when I
found myself in the same position as Twain, that of
having to excuse myself for still being alive, I
found it humorous to use that famous quote. And
today, I have found a certain degree of humor in a
comparison of our modern technology to some of the
topics Twain covered during his travels more than a
century past.
Meta Pros, the Internet hosting company that has
been so gracious in providing an "online home" for
THE MESSAGE TREE, provides their customers with
some "tools" that not only allows our staff to
track how many times per month THE MESSAGE TREE is
viewed by readers, but when a reader "links to" us
from another web page that has a hyperlink that
directs the reader our way, this service tells us
the Internet address of the referring web page. For
instance, when a reader runs a search on Google or
some other search engine, THE MESSAGE TREE being
among the results of that search, and then that
reader clicks on that link and views THE MESSAGE
TREE, that incident is recorded in our statistics
page. Keep in mind that this gives us no other data
regarding the reader, it just tells us that some
anonymous individual was minding their own
business, searching for something on their favorite
Internet search page, and happened to stumble
across our little online magazine about the
Ozarks.
Now that the number of those of you visiting THE
MESSAGE TREE, each month, is in the thousands, you
can imagine that there are hundreds of times each
month when some poor unsuspecting soul types some
oblivious phrase in the window on a search engine,
and up pops THE MESSAGE TREE, and of course we hope
that they find the magazine to their liking as you
do. The only other data that this feature allows
our staff to "see", is the page of search engine
returns as they, the anonymous reader saw those
same pages, which includes the word(s) that had
been used for the basis of the search. And this is
what gets funny, for example, now that I have used
the name "Mark Twain" in this article, there is a
real possibility that someone searching for
Clemens' work, will find this page in a routine
search. Now let me tell you how this relates to the
"Innocents Abroad."
As you might imagine, not only do we watch how
many times the magazine is being read each month,
but we now check to see what people were searching
for when they found us. Remember the article
"The
Sirens Of The Ozarks" in the February 2003
issue, and I mentioned I had a great fondness for
White Castle burgers? Yep, you guessed it, some
poor soul was trying to use a search engine to find
the closest location of a White Castle so that
could buy a case of the frozen delights, take them
home and nuke them in the microwave, just to
satisfy their fast food cravings. But what did they
find in addition to their local White Castle, our
good old Message Tree and our story of the Ozarks
calling to a prodigal son. O.K., now that you kind
of understand how this thing works? Here is where
this story gets funny.
Good old Jim, wrote for us in the combined
December 2002 and January 2003 issue, a great
article entitled Tourism As She "Usta" Was, in
which Jim told the story, as only Jim can tell it,
about how tourists of a generation ago, were
confronted by small shops that lined the historic
roads of this great country such as Route 66, and
of course the Ozark's own Wilderness Road. In this
tale, Jim made a passing remark about how some of
the establishments that catered to the tourists,
might have a zoological display of sorts, in
particular, as Jim put it "snake shops." These
displays were designed to get the curious to stop
and view their collection of snakes and hopefully
buy gas or souvenirs, the latter being well stocked
in the store's inventory. As you might have
surmised by now, some anonymous person, apparently
looking to purchase a pet snake plugged in the
phrase "snake shops" and in addition to lists of
retail establishments selling such varmits, they
also found Jim's article as it appeared in THE
MESSAGE TREE. The funny part of this and also how
this story relates to the title "Innocents Abroad"
is that the reader that found our electronic
magazine, happened to be in a German speaking
country. So when I was looking through the
statistics page and noticed the Google address with
a "de" file extension, I had to "click" on it and
follow it back, only to find Jim's article in
German or instead of Tourism As She "Usta" Was I
found "Tourismus, Wie Sie "Usta" War."
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One of Jim's Articles as
it would be viewed in a German
speaking country.
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This incident with the snake shops, happened in
January, and throughout February and March, I have
been occasionally checking the statistics to see
how many times anonymous readers in foreign nations
have found Der AnzeigencBaum, (that is German for
THE MESSAGE TREE,) and have found that readers in
Canada as well as down under in Australia have
found the magazine by chance through the power of
modern search engines.
So think about it for a moment, folks in far off
lands, have been reading our brand of good 'ol
Ozarks storytelling. As Twain wrote about his
adventures in far off lands in "Innocents Abroad",
today innocents abroad are reading about our
adventures in the Ozarks They have by now read
about Joe Philibert and WW Kimberling building the
Wilderness Road, The Old Spanish Cave, Delaware
Town, the Yochum silver dollar and lost Silver
Mine, the Ghost pond at Reed Springs, the Blue Bird
of Douglas County, as well as all the places and
other Ozark adventures we have discussed in past
issues. I wonder what they think of that far off
land called Ozark Mountain Country?
So if you are reading Der AnzeigencBaum (The
Message Tree) send us an e-mail and let us know
where you are from, regardless if your home is in
Europe, Japan, Canada, or Australia, or even if you
live in the USA and have roots in the Ozarks or
just love the hill country and Branson, tell us
about it, we would love to hear from all of you.
And perhaps in a future issue I will tell you more
of some of the funny and unusual things folks have
been searching for when they found us.
So until then remember;
The compliment that helps us on our way is not
the one that is shut up in the mind, but the one
that is spoken out.
- Mark Twain: A Biography
Just hearing from you'all is in itself, indeed a
complement.
And:
Lokales lore und Legende erklärt uns,
daß ein alter Baum an einer Verzweigung der
Wildnisstraße des Ozarks stand, ein
unbekannter Reisender nagelten ein Gatter von einer
verlassenen Schweinfeder nach dem Baum, den lokale
Bewohner, Frachter und Kaufleute, sowie die, die
auf die alte Straße reisten, Anzeigen
überlassen würden, wie wir auf
Anschlagbrettern heute tun. In diesem sprit holen
wir Ihnen, unseren Lesern und den Verfechtern,
Nachrichten von Ihren Mitreisenden auf
WildniscStraße
Or in English;
Local lore and legend tells us that an old tree
stood at a junction of the Wilderness Road of the
Ozarks, an unknown traveler nailed a gate from an
abandoned hog pen upon the tree to which local
residents, freighters, and merchants, as well as
those who journeyed on the old road would leave
messages as we do on bulletin boards today. In that
sprit we bring to you, our readers and supporters,
news from your fellow travelers on the
Wilderness Road
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Stone
Creek Crossing
