Silas “Si” Hawkins is the first character introduced in the novel and the patriarch of the Hawkins family. He’s given the title of Squire as the most respected citizen in the tiny village of Obedstown, Tennessee. Silas is devoted to his family and to providing a financially secure future for his children, yet he is consistently drawn into high-risk ventures by family friend Beriah. Though each of these ventures has led only to poverty, Silas—a trusting and perhaps naive man—never questions Beriah’s reliability. The potential wealth these ventures offer proves too great a draw for a dreamer like Silas, who in his irrational expectation of future riches epitomizes the era that would come to be called the Gilded Age.

Though Silas makes many foolish decisions, he is not personally greedy or selfish. He adopts Clay and Laura despite barely having enough to get by on, and he accepts a life of toil to provide for his children. His worst mistakes are intended for their benefit. He tells his wife they’ll have to “drag along, and eat crusts in toil and poverty, all hopeless and forlorn—but they’ll ride in coaches, Nancy!” (3). Hyperbole aside, his children are his priority and his source of