Ode to the Internet

After reading a bunch of classic fiction and nonfiction, it is once again an amazing thought that one could access so much information instantly on one's laptop computer. The boys in the Altsheler novel I am currently finishing (Rock of Chickamauga)are impressed by algebra, which really was a greater educational achievement in the 1860's. In my school district it was a graduation requirement for everyone to finish algebra, and most of my friends and I tackled algebra in middle school. The boys in the novel do know woodscraft skills far beyond what I have even begun to learn, so there is some trade-off in going forward. Still, as I am reading about the campaigns in this last leg of the Civil War, I can google the names of the places where they stopped, and look at photographs and maps of those places. If I wanted to I could bring up satellite imagery and look at almost real-time views of those places from above. As an educational tool, the Internet is unparalleled, especially as an aide to other reading and study. I was unfortunately unable as of yet to find key words that would bring up more detailed studies of Civil War weather, to answer my late-night musings (Whether the nasty storm that came up around the time of the attack on Jackson was in fact a low-grade hurricane weakening as it made landfall) but even so, I found plenty on weather during that war in general. Surely someone else has tried to develop a good picture of hurricane seasons during the 1860's and could answer which of the nasty wartime storms were the remains of hurricanes. Anyway, between that and looking at the streaks of sand blowing across the Sahara, I am once again impressed with what it is possible for ordinary people to know now because of technology.