The Daily Noggin

The Blue Ridge Parkway was built for one purpose: to be enjoyed. It runs 469 miles along the crest of the Appalachian Mountains, linking Shenandoah National Park in Virginia with Great Smoky Mountains National Park in North Carolina. Along the way there are no traffic lights, no billboards and no trucks hauling freight. The speed limit is mostly 45 miles an hour, and most travelers are happy to go slower.

Work on the parkway began in 1935, during the Great Depression, and it gave jobs to thousands of people. Building a road along mountaintops was slow going, and it took more than 50 years to finish. The last piece, the graceful Linn Cove Viaduct, which curves around the side of Grandfather Mountain without disturbing the rocks beneath it, opened in 1987.

The road is marked by mileposts, starting at zero at Rockfish Gap in Virginia, and travelers use them to find their way. At milepost 176 is Mabry Mill, a water-powered gristmill and sawmill that is one of the most photographed places on the parkway. Near Asheville, North Carolina, the Folk Art Center shows and sells traditional Appalachian crafts such as quilts, pottery and woodcarving. Farther south, the road reaches its highest point, 6,053 feet, near Richland Balsam.

Overlooks are spaced all along the way, each with a place to pull over and a view across ridge after ridge of blue mountains. The soft blue haze that gives the Blue Ridge its name comes partly from natural compounds that the forest trees release into the air.

Fall is the most popular season. Color usually begins at the higher elevations in early October and works its way down the mountainsides through the month. Spring brings wildflowers and blooming rhododendron, and summer offers cool air at the overlooks when the valleys below are hot.

A few practical notes: some sections close in winter because of snow and ice, gas stations are found in towns off the parkway rather than on it, and cell phone service can be spotty. Visitor centers along the route have maps and restrooms, and rangers are glad to suggest a short walk to a waterfall or a view.

When snow covers the yard and the color has gone from the garden, a male cardinal on a bare branch is a cheering sight. The northern cardinal is one of the best-loved birds in America. It is the official state bird of seven states: Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, North Carolina, Ohio, Virginia and West Virginia.

Unlike many songbirds, cardinals do not fly south for the winter. A pair usually stays in the same neighborhood all year, which is why they are such faithful visitors to backyard feeders.

The male is bright red with a black mask around his face. The female is a soft tan-brown with warm red tints on her wings, tail and crest. Both have a thick, cone-shaped orange-red beak, a tool built for cracking seeds. Their red color comes from pigments in the berries and seeds they eat.

Cardinals are fine singers, and unusually, the female sings as well as the male. A pair may even sing back and forth to each other. Listen for a clear, whistled “cheer, cheer, cheer” or “birdie, birdie, birdie,” often heard on late-winter mornings. In spring, watch for a sweet bit of courtship: the male picks up a seed, hops over to the female and feeds it to her, beak to beak.

A century ago, cardinals were mostly birds of the South. Through the 1900s they spread steadily north into New England and southern Canada. Milder winters, the growth of towns with shrubby yards and the popularity of bird feeders all helped them along.

If you would like cardinals at your window, here are a few tips:

Offer the right food. Black oil sunflower seed and safflower seed are favorites.

Give them room. Cardinals are fairly large and prefer a platform feeder, a sturdy tray or the ground to a narrow tube feeder.

Provide cover. They like dense shrubs or evergreens nearby where they can dart for safety.

Remember water. A birdbath, especially a heated one in winter, attracts cardinals and many other birds.

Cardinals are often the first birds at the feeder in the morning and the last in the evening, so keep an eye out at dawn and dusk.

There is a particular pleasure in finding a handwritten envelope among the bills and circulars. Before it is even opened, a letter tells you that someone sat down, thought about you and took the time to write.

Sending a letter was not always easy or cheap. Before 1840, postage in Britain was charged by distance and by the number of sheets, and it was usually paid by the person receiving the letter. Rowland Hill, a schoolmaster and reformer, argued that a single low price, paid in advance by the sender, would make mail affordable for everyone. His Uniform Penny Post began in January 1840, and that May the world's first adhesive postage stamp, the Penny Black, came into use. Letter writing grew enormously, and other countries soon followed with stamps of their own.

For generations afterward, letters were how families kept in touch across oceans, how sweethearts courted and how news of births, weddings and harvests traveled. Many people still treasure a bundle of old letters tied with ribbon, the handwriting itself as familiar as a voice.

Writing a letter today needs no special skill. A few simple ideas can make it easier to begin:

Start small. A postcard or a short note is perfectly fine. Three or four sentences about your week, a question about theirs and a warm sign-off make a lovely letter.

Write as you speak. A letter does not need to be formal. Tell a little story, describe what you can see from your window, mention a book you enjoyed or a meal you cooked.

Ask a question. Questions invite a reply and keep a correspondence going. What are they growing in the garden this year? What was the best vacation they ever had?

Add a little something. A pressed flower, a newspaper cutting, a recipe card or a photograph turns a letter into a small parcel of friendship.

Choose your materials. Some people love good writing paper and a fountain pen; others are happy with a lined pad and a ballpoint. What matters is the writing, not the stationery.

Letters also do the writer good. Taking a quiet half hour to gather your thoughts, remember a shared joke or count your blessings can be calming and cheering in itself.

Grandchildren, old school friends, a neighbor who has moved away: almost everyone is delighted to receive a letter, and many will write back. Somewhere, a mailbox is waiting.

The bald eagle has been the national emblem of the United States since 1782, when it was placed on the Great Seal. With its white head, yellow beak and wings spanning about seven feet, it is one of the most impressive birds in North America.

Yet by the early 1960s, bald eagles had nearly disappeared from much of the country. A count in 1963 found only 417 nesting pairs in the lower 48 states.

The main cause was DDT, a pesticide used widely after World War II. It washed into rivers and lakes, built up in the fish that eagles eat, and caused the birds to lay eggs with shells so thin they broke during nesting. Year after year, fewer chicks hatched.

In 1972, the United States banned DDT for most uses. Eagles were protected by law, nesting sites were guarded, and in some places young eagles were raised and released to start new populations. Slowly, the birds began to return.

The recovery was so successful that in 2007 the bald eagle was taken off the list of threatened and endangered species. Today there are estimated to be more than 300,000 bald eagles in the lower 48 states.

Bald eagles are not actually bald. The name comes from an old meaning of the word: white-headed. Young eagles are mottled brown all over and do not get their white head and tail until they are about five years old.

Eagles build some of the largest nests of any bird, adding new sticks year after year. One famous nest in Florida measured nine and a half feet across and 20 feet deep.

Winter is a wonderful time to see them. When lakes freeze, eagles gather wherever water stays open, especially below the dams on the Mississippi River and other large rivers, where fish are easy to catch. Many towns along those rivers hold eagle-watching days in January and February, with spotting scopes and guides to help visitors find the birds.

There are faster ways to cross a country, but few that are as relaxing as the train. There are no seatbelts to fasten for hours on end, no traffic to watch and plenty of room to stretch your legs. The scenery changes slowly outside a large window, and the journey becomes part of the vacation rather than something to be endured.

Long-distance rail travel has a proud history in America. On May 10, 1869, a ceremonial golden spike was driven at Promontory Summit in Utah, joining the Central Pacific and Union Pacific railroads and completing the first transcontinental railroad. A journey that had taken months by wagon could now be made in about a week.

Today, passenger trains across the United States are run by Amtrak, which began service in 1971. Several of its long-distance routes are famous for their scenery. The California Zephyr runs between Chicago and Emeryville, near San Francisco, covering about 2,400 miles in roughly two days. Along the way it climbs through the Rocky Mountains, follows the Colorado River through deep canyons and crosses the Sierra Nevada. Other routes trace the Pacific coast, the Mississippi valley and the forests of the Northwest.

Part of the charm is the life on board. Many long-distance trains have a dining car, where travelers are often seated together and conversations with strangers turn into friendships for the day. Observation cars, with windows reaching up into the roof, are a favorite place to sit with a cup of coffee and watch the landscape unfold. For overnight journeys, sleeping compartments turn into beds, and there is something very comforting about being rocked to sleep by the motion of the train.

A few tips can make a rail journey even more enjoyable:

Book a seat on the scenic side if the railroad offers that choice, and check the timetable to see which landscapes you will pass in daylight.

Pack a small bag for your seat with the things you will want close at hand: a book, a sweater, reading glasses, any medicines and a bottle of water.

Ask about assistance. Railroads can usually help with boarding, luggage and accessible seating if you let them know in advance.

Take your time. Consider breaking a long journey with a night or two in a town along the route.

Above all, a train journey is a chance to slow down. Watch the farms, rivers and small towns slide past, share a story with the person across the table and let the miles take care of themselves.

Few things make a house feel like home quite like the smell of bread baking. And for all its reputation, a basic loaf is one of the easiest things to make. It needs only a few ingredients and mostly asks you to wait.

The work is done by yeast, a tiny living organism. Given warmth, water and a little food from the flour, yeast gives off bubbles of carbon dioxide gas. Kneading develops gluten, the stretchy strands of protein in wheat flour, which trap those bubbles and make the dough rise. In the oven, the gas expands one last time and the loaf sets into its soft, airy crumb.

Here is a simple sandwich loaf to try:

In a large bowl, stir together 3 cups of all-purpose flour, 1 packet (2¼ teaspoons) of instant yeast, 1½ teaspoons of salt and 1 tablespoon of sugar. Add 1 cup of warm water, about as warm as a comfortable bath, and 2 tablespoons of melted butter or oil. Stir until a shaggy dough forms, adding a spoonful more water if it seems dry.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured counter and knead it for 8 to 10 minutes, pushing it away with the heel of your hand, folding it back and giving it a turn. It is ready when it feels smooth and springs back when you poke it.

Place the dough in a greased bowl, cover it and let it rise in a warm spot until doubled, about an hour. Press it flat, roll it into a log and set it in a greased 8½-by-4½-inch loaf pan. Cover it and let it rise again until it crowns about an inch above the rim, 30 to 45 minutes.

Bake at 350°F for 35 to 40 minutes, until the top is golden brown and the loaf sounds hollow when tapped on the bottom. Let it cool on a rack for at least an hour before slicing, hard as that may be.

If kneading is hard on your hands, a stand mixer with a dough hook does the job in about 5 minutes.

Bread has a long history in American kitchens, but sliced bread is younger than many people think. The first loaves sold already sliced went on sale in Chillicothe, Missouri, in 1928, cut by a machine invented by Otto Rohwedder. It was such a hit that people began calling any clever new idea “the greatest thing since sliced bread.”

The ruby-throated hummingbird is the only hummingbird that commonly nests in the eastern United States, and for many people it is the highlight of a summer garden. The male’s throat flashes brilliant red in the sun; the female’s throat is white. Both are a glittering emerald green on the back.

These birds are astonishingly small, weighing about 3 grams, or roughly the weight of a penny. Their wings beat about 50 times a second, fast enough to make the humming sound that gives them their name. They can hover in place, fly backward and even turn upside down for a moment.

To keep all that going, a hummingbird eats almost constantly, visiting hundreds of flowers a day for nectar and catching tiny insects and spiders for protein. On cold nights it can slow its body into a sleep-like state called torpor, lowering its temperature to save energy until morning.

Each fall, ruby-throats head south to Mexico and Central America. Before they go, they eat so much that they nearly double their weight with fat. Many then make one of the most remarkable flights of any bird: a nonstop trip of about 500 miles across the Gulf of Mexico, taking roughly 18 to 22 hours. Others take the long way around, following the coast through Texas.

They return to the southern states in early spring and reach the northern states by May. The female builds her nest alone. It is about the size of a walnut shell, made of soft plant down held together with spider silk, which lets it stretch as the chicks grow. She covers the outside with bits of lichen for camouflage and lays two eggs, each about the size of a jelly bean.

To invite hummingbirds to your yard:

Plant red and orange tube-shaped flowers, such as bee balm, cardinal flower, trumpet honeysuckle and salvia.

Make your own nectar. Stir one part white sugar into four parts very hot water until it dissolves, then let it cool. Do not add red dye, honey or artificial sweeteners.

Keep it fresh. Change the nectar every two or three days in hot weather, and clean the feeder each time.

Leave your feeder up in the fall. It will not keep hummingbirds from migrating, and it may give a passing traveler a welcome meal. Many people leave feeders up for about two weeks after they see their last hummingbird of the season.

Few buildings are as welcoming as a public library. Anyone may walk in, sit down and read, and with a library card take home armfuls of books for nothing. It seems so natural today that it is easy to forget it was once a bold idea.

In 1731, a young Benjamin Franklin and a group of friends in Philadelphia founded the Library Company of Philadelphia. Books were expensive and scarce in the colonies, so the members pooled their money to buy them and share them. It was a subscription library, open to those who paid, but it showed how much more people could read together than alone. The Library Company still exists today.

Over the following century, many towns had small subscription or social libraries, and some had libraries attached to schools or churches. The great change came with the idea that a library should be paid for by the community and free to every resident. The Boston Public Library, founded in 1848 and opened to readers in 1854, was the first large free municipal library in the United States, and its success inspired cities across the country.

The biggest boost came from Andrew Carnegie, the Scottish-born steel industrialist who had arrived in America as a poor boy. As a young telegraph messenger, he had been allowed to borrow books from a private collection, and he never forgot it. In his later years he gave away much of his fortune, and from the 1880s until around 1920 his grants paid for well over two thousand library buildings around the world, more than 1,600 of them in the United States. Towns were asked to provide the land and promise to pay for books and staff, so each library became a partnership with the community.

Many of those Carnegie libraries still stand, with their grand steps and handsome reading rooms, and many are still in use.

Libraries have kept changing with the times. Children's rooms and story hours became common in the early twentieth century. Bookmobiles carried books to farms and small villages. Today's libraries also lend audiobooks and e-books, offer computers and help with forms, and host talks, clubs and classes.

Yet the heart of the idea is the same as it was in Franklin's day: knowledge and stories grow richer when they are shared. Next time you pass your local library, it may be worth stepping inside to say hello.

For millions of Americans, a new issue of The Saturday Evening Post was something to look forward to, and very often it was the cover that caught the eye. Between 1916 and 1963, Norman Rockwell painted 323 of those covers, and many readers came to feel they knew his characters as well as their own neighbors.

Rockwell was born in New York City in 1894 and knew early on that he wanted to be an illustrator. He studied art as a teenager and was still very young when he sold his first cover to the Post in 1916. It was the beginning of one of the longest partnerships in American magazine history.

His gift was for noticing small moments: a boy nervously waiting at the doctor's office, a family gathered around a holiday table, a runaway child sharing a lunch-counter stool with a kindly policeman. He painted ordinary people with warmth and gentle humor, and the details repay a second look. A crumpled letter, a dog's expression or a worn pair of shoes often tells part of the story.

Rockwell worked painstakingly. He would sketch ideas, find local people to act as models, arrange costumes and props, and in later years photograph his scenes before painting them in oils. Many of his models were friends and neighbors in the small towns where he lived, first in Arlington, Vermont, and later in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.

During World War II he painted his Four Freedoms, inspired by a speech by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The paintings toured the country and helped raise money for the war effort through bond sales.

In the 1960s, after leaving the Post, Rockwell worked for Look magazine and turned to more serious subjects, including civil rights and the space program, showing that his eye for human feeling could rise to the great events of the age.

For many years, critics dismissed his work as mere illustration. Time has been kinder. His paintings are now shown in major museums, and the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge holds the world's largest collection of his original art. Rockwell died in 1978, but his pictures still invite us to smile, to remember and to look a little more closely at everyday life.