Can you envision a time in America when it seemed our society was cleaving apart at the seams? A time when it appeared that our treasured democracy was failing? A time when insurrectionists threatened the Constitution? A time when rampant political partisanship ruled everyday news? A time when a prominent politician attempted to override the Electoral College and US House of Representatives to steal a presidential election? Does such a cleave in American society sound familiar?

Perhaps it does, but the word cleave is worth a deeper look. It is an unusual word that although spelled and pronounced the same, has exact opposite meanings: cleave as in "to divide" and cleave as in "to cling." If we look beyond factors that cleave us apart, we may find a glue to cleave us together. Times of cleaving are more common in our Nation's history than you might have envisioned.

The turn of the century, 1800, was one such time. Would these new loosely-united states remain united? Many were looking to the States' western edges, the Borderland, for opportunity. All Americans knew there was a great barrier standing between them and the new lands on the wilderness side of the towering Allegheny Mountains. They believed conquering this Eastern Continental Divide was the ticket to life, liberty, and happiness. There was a road, a mere trail, to lead the courageous who sought this new life.

No power on Earth could stop the movement, the cleaving apart, of the Americans in the east from those migrating to the western lands along the Allegheny, Monongahela, and Ohio Rivers. At the same time, a greater power poured out a road of faith to ensure these people could cleave together. Walk this road over the Continental Divide with me to envision America's destiny.