America was a dynamic place in the middle-nineteenth century, where even a descendent of an indentured worker, born into poverty, might become one of the richest men in America. And that man might then inspire the world, by going on vacation.
During the civil war, the manufacture of powder and explosives was often handled by the most vulnerable, young women and children, whose labor was needed when so many men had been sent off to war. On March 13, 1863, the confederacy experienced a munitions disaster, in the confederate capitol of Richmond.