Keokuk, Iowa

His arrival in Keokuk marked the first time Sandburg had ventured outside the state of Illinois. He later remembered seeing the Mississippi River for the first time as one of the most awe-inspring sites on his whole journey.

Crossing the long bridge over the Mississippi my eyes swept over it with a sharp hunger that the grand old river satisfied.

A captain of a small steamboat offered the young Sandburg passage to Keokuk for work "shouldering kegs of nails to the wharves."

It was in Keokuk that Sandburg met his first fellow hobo. This man was a "tramp," which meant he didn't work for money, but instead relied on the kindness of strangers to survive. He taught Sandburg that a "lump" meant food that was given as a handout, and "sit down" was a phrase used when someone would invite a tramp to the kitchen table to eat.

Sandburg also found work in Keokuk that would provide some extra cash and meals. He spent a day going door-to-door with a can of asphaltum for blackening rusty stoves, and then:

I saw a sign “Waiter Wanted” in a small lunch counter near the end of Main Street. He said I could make myself useful at 50 cents a day and meals.

After a day working at the lunch counter, Sandburg slept that night in a boxcar that took him halfway across Missouri.

• Keokuk, Iowa

  
  

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  His arrival in Keokuk marked the first time Sandburg had ventured outside the state of Illinois. He later remembered seeing the Mississippi River for the first time as one of the most awe-inspring sites on his whole journey.

  Crossing the long bridge over the Mississippi my eyes swept over it with a sharp hunger that the grand old river satisfied.

  A captain of a small steamboat offered the young Sandburg passage to Keokuk for work "shouldering kegs of nails to the wharves."

  It was in Keokuk that Sandburg met his first fellow hobo. This man was a "tramp," which meant he didn't work for money, but instead relied on the kindness of strangers to survive. He taught Sandburg that a "lump" meant food that was given as a handout, and "sit down" was a phrase used when someone would invite a tramp to the kitchen table to eat.

  Sandburg also found work in Keokuk that would provide some extra cash and meals. He spent a day going door-to-door with a can of asphaltum for blackening rusty stoves, and then:

  I saw a sign “Waiter Wanted” in a small lunch counter near the end of Main Street. He said I could make myself useful at 50 cents a day and meals.

  After a day working at the lunch counter, Sandburg slept that night in a boxcar that took him halfway across Missouri.