DC Reflections

D.C. War Memorial gets funding but deserves something more: people

Not that I have anything against the Washington Monument or the Lincoln Memorial but the D.C. area's lonely tributes are the ones I love the most. My heart goes out to them because they stand for so much yet receive so little. 

I couldn't help but feel pangs of sadness every time I walked or rode my bike past the D.C. War Memorial that honors District residents who gave their lives during World War I. While the World War II Memorial basks in perfectly appropriate adulation within but a few minutes walk, the D.C. War Memorial sits there wondering if anyone will pay it a visit. Will people remember the fallen or what they died for? 

I knew I had to write about the site the moment I read that Uncle Sam was stepping in to give the D.C. War Memorial some badly needed restoration. My piece on the D.C. War Memorial in American Legion magazine is online now and the print version is on the way. I imagine that the spirits of the people honored there would appreciate you giving the piece a read and heading out to say hello when the work is done. The World War I Memorial Foundation would, too.

Another under-appreciated site every American should visit is the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier of the American Revolution in Alexandria. 

On a day in D.C. like today when the snow is pouring down and the cold is sending us all inside to our comfortable, heated homes, let's take a moment to remember all the soldiers who trekked barefoot through snow and ice during the Revolution on through those who fought in the trenches during World War I. Then let's go pay a visit to the lonely memorials honoring what they did.

Photo courtesy David DeJonge of World War I Memorial Foundation.

 

Depression at the Renwick Gallery: Japanese internment camp art

I went to the Smithsonian American Art Museum and the Renwick Gallery across the street from the White House to a learn a little bit more about art. My girlfriend and I have started a little side business buying and re-selling art, antiques, home decor and furniture and I thought some additional education would serve our wallets well.

I did not expect to be hit by an emotional curve ball.

"The Art of Gaman: Arts and Crafts from the Japanese Internment Camps, 1942-1946" grabbed my attention. (The exhibit ends on Jan. 30 and you should make plans to attend immediately.) I saw all kinds of things -- ornate wood carvings, knives, alters, statues, paintings, model ships, weaved baskets, and a baseball jersey made from a mattress cover that was used by a pitcher in an internment camp league.

A drawing on a piece of notebook-sized paper stopped me in my tracks: I saw a man falling to the ground with bullet wounds as he tried to reach through a barbed wire fence to rescue a stray dog. The man, I read in the accompanying text, was deaf. He did not hear the American military police office ordering him to put his arms back inside the fence.

I stood there, speechless, staring at the drawing for about 10 minutes. I forced myself on to the rest of the exhibit but I kept going back to that drawing. I wrote a note in the guest book expressing my appreciation for the chance to learn about a part of American history I knew very little about.

I didn't realize how many internment camps my government built, how many innocent people it imprisoned in a knee-jerk reaction to Japanese aggression during World War II, how long it kept people in those camps and how horribly we treated them while they were there. I could almost feel the deaf man's blood oozing around my tennis shoes.

The impact that exhibit made remains with me. I suspect it will be etched permanently on my conscience -- as clearly visible as the lines in the Depression glass I bought recently for my business enterprise.

I hadn't really taken the time to research the glass but the trip to the Renwick put me in the studying mood. I learned a little more about what the term meant ... that companies during the Depression distributed pieces of glass to entice consumers to buy their products. Buy a box of oatmeal and you might get a very beautiful cereal bowl. Go to a movie, get a candy dish. A number of companies made the glass in various patterns and all kinds of colors. It didn't take long for me to identify ours thanks to the Internet. We own, at least for now, the "pineapple and floral" pattern, also known as "Number 618", made by the Indiana Glass Company from 1932-1937.

I only knew from books and stories told to me by my grandparents what the Depression was like. I can not imagine how hard it was to survive that era. I sorted through the glass, holding each piece gingerly as I examined it. I made note of the number of each piece in the two boxes and dutifully recorded them on my inventory list. I counted a total of 60-plus pieces -- plates, relish platters, cups and saucers, candy dishes and more. The total estimated retail value for my $6 auction steal came out to close to $400. I decided we should keep a few pieces for ourselves.

By that point, I didn't care as much about the money as I did the tactile education on American history. I wondered about the people who made the glass and the people who obtained it. I wondered what it would look like if I could go back in time to a dinner with that family. What were they like? How were they surviving? How did they manage to put food in those dishes? Did my own grandparents eat off glass just like that?

Maybe tonight I should grab a pineapple and floral glass and offer a toast to everyone who endured the Depression and to all the Japanese Americans who as the name of their internment camp infers "bore the seemingly unbearable with dignity and patience."

 

 

No apology needed: Veterans Day at Arlington National Cemetery

Moments after laying a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, Vice President Joe Biden stepped to the podium inside the marble white Memorial Amphitheater and told a story about a wounded veteran he met. The man's legs were gone and one of his hands were mangled.

The soldier reached up with his good hand to the triangle above his bed, hoisted himself into a sitting position and apologized: He said it was his intention to greet the vice president by standing and saluting.

Tears shot from my eyes and air flew from my lungs. 

I wasn't the only one gasping -- or crying. Sitting beneath a brilliant blue sky amid a sea of red, white and blue, everyone of us felt the power of Biden's words. Old soldiers got misty-eyed, civilians of every age and hue wiped their eyes. Even children too young to understand what war is seemed to sense they were experiencing a hallowed moment on even more hallowed ground.

Veterans Day at Arlington National Cemetery packs a punch. That's why I went. Experiencing that day at that site had long been on my list of must-have life experiences. Now I think I'll make at an annual tradition.

Spending the day there was my way of paying tribute to my grandfather Wilbur Young, who fought in World War II and whose sailor's hat sits in a place of honor in my home along with the bullet casings from his 21-gun salute funeral. I went to honor my uncle John Young, one of the countless unsung heroes of Vietnam. I went to honor my kid brother, Gregory Lancette, a newly minted Navy man who graduated from boot camp this summer. I also went to thank the millions of men and women I've never met who have placed their lives on the line for this country.

Biden asked the crowd if we knew what was the most frequently asked question he received from wounded soldiers. Several possibilities raced through my mind but I wasn't even close. The vice president said the number one question he gets is this: "Sir, can you help me get back to my unit?"

Tears erupted again and I thought I was about to start sobbing. A little girl broke my concentration when she sprinted away from her young veteran parents in record speed. I threw out my right arm to scoop her up and swing her back to mom and dad. A flag in my shirt pocket fell to the ground but got scooped up so fast I couldn't see which of the nearby men in uniform retrieved it. I blinked twice and wondered if the flag pickup had been a figment of my imagination.

Biden and other speakers including Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric Shinseki trumpeted some good news -- faster and better benefits and long-overdue increases in all kinds of programs for veterans among other things. He also issued a notice to all who seek to do us harm, saying that we will never shrink from danger and that we will never be defeated.

In between speeches, a member of "The President's Own" U.S. Marine Band belted out songs that took me to a place where no music ever has. His voice reached into my guts and lifted me as high as the flags draped behind the speakers and guests of honor. Soldiers saluted, colors retired, canons fired and the service ended. 

Silence enveloped the amphitheater. I chose to walk back down to the Arlington entrance instead of waiting for the bus, drifting off in thought again. I wished that more employers would close on Veterans Day so that more people could attend ceremonies honoring those making the ultimate
sacrifice. 

I saw a plot of land being prepared for a new section of graves. I thought of America's men and women bravely wearing uniforms that day -- doubting that any of them had the remotest idea that they will soon lay there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tom Hanks got it wrong

Tom Hanks got it wrong. Forget baseball: There's no crying in ... history luncheons.

The last thing I expected on the final day of the Organization of Historians annual meeting in D.C. was to well up over a chicken something at the Dupont Circle Hilton. That was before Allida Black stepped to the podium to talk about her life's mission of heading The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project at George Washington University. Roosevelt dedicated her life to the fight for democracy and human rights and the project named for her continues that legacy by developing young minds. Black already had me in the palm of her hands while making Roosevelt's case that democracy may fade or grow based on the job we do educating students. 

Then the self-described "gleeful agnostic" read Roosevelt's war-time prayer.

Dear Lord, Lest I continue my complacent way, help me to remember that somewhere, somehow out there a man died for me today. As long as there be war, I must then ask and answer am I worth dying for?

A tear sprang from my right eye and I gasped for air.

I've never heard a more beautiful answer for why we should study history and appreciate what our predecessors have done for us. Truth be told, I didn't know anything about Eleanor Roosevelt before today as she's well outside my expertise -- the American Revolution. I certainly didn't know that Roosevelt lead the effort to create the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that set the standard for what all human beings are entitled to. Black, though, helped me make connections.

"You can not talk about the Declaration of Human Rights without talking about the Declaration of Independence," she said, every sentence of her remarks filled with intellect and compassion. I can easily imagine how fired up students get when she teaches them how to examine the facts of history "critically but with respect."

I wasn't the only one affected by Black's words.

"I felt a strong connection to what she was saying," said Lauren Vanderpluym, a young teacher at Walter Payton College Prep in Chicago. "Eleanor is one of my heroes. Hearing some of Allida's stories about her successes through the Eleanor project is empowering."

After the luncheon, I thanked Black for her remarks. I tapped my heart and told her it was the most inspiring luncheon I have attended in my career. 

The next time my friends ask me why studying history is so important to me, I'll direct them to Eleanor Roosevelt and Allida Black.

Read More From The OAH Meeting:

Part 1: Historians descend on D.C.

Part 2: Historian heroes in D.C.

Historian heroes in D.C.

Add West Springfield High School (Virginia) history teacher James Percoco to my list of America's unsung heroes. On day three of the Organization of American Historians' annual meeting, I learned about the work he has put in for nearly 20 years teaching an applied history course.  Students start by hitting the books and then head into the field to gain hands-on experience -- often learning to tell the story of an important place through the perspective of someone who was there.

"We create student historians and they tell the story about that person," Percoco said.

To date, his students have contributed more than 30,000 man-hours to historic sites, museums and history agencies in Northern Virginia and Washington D.C. They've also been inspired to pursue a wide variety of history related careers in areas including curatorial work, museum studies and teaching. 

I love initiatives that provide multiple benefits in one nice package. Percoco's labor of love helps students strive for greater academic success, gives them a chance to bring history to life and opens doors to rewarding career opportunities.

Percoco, though, is just one of an iphone full of unsung heroes I've met so far this week. To name just a few:

• Patsy Fletcher, an independent historian in the District, works with communities in the Northeast and Anacostia River areas to help them preserve their history. Her company, THREAD (Training, Historical Research and Economic Development) has helped numerous neighborhoods do everything from interpret sites to produce neighborhood histories that prevent their contributions from being lost to the pages of time.
• Lee White, executive director of the National Coalition for History, left his legal career to advocate for history. Working with some 60 national and local organizations across the country, he fights for causes including much-deserved funding for the National Park Service and National Archives and Records Administration, greater transparency in government, and stronger support for history education.
• Senior Editor Elizabeth Sherburn Demers works with Potomac Books to give sometimes overlooked authors a chance to tell powerful stories. A copy of Following the Drum: The Women at Valley Forge drew me to Potomac's booth in the exhibitor area. I've written about Following the Drum before. Many people don't realize the role women have played in every war in our history and I wish every American patriot would buy a copy of that book. Buy two, actually, and give one to a friend.

I've got a reporter's notebook full of the contributions other heroes are making. I hope to win the lottery soon so I have time to write about them all. And there's still one day left at the OAH meeting.

Read More:

OAH Part 1: Historians descend on D.C.

OAH Part 3: Tom Hanks got it wrong

Historians descend on D.C.

Hold on to your quills -- the Organization of American Historians descended on Washington D.C. today for its annual four-day meeting. The event is aimed at professional historians but open to anyone who would like to learn more about an exceptionally wide variety of subjects. 

I'm using three vacation days to attend the meeting. After just one day, I'm already glad I did. A couple of quick highlights from sessions I attended:

• Eola Dance, sporting an always spiffy National Park Service ranger uniform, teamed with Heather Huyck of the College of William and Mary to talk about the service learning program work they're doing to connect student in Richmond, Virginia with the life of Maggie Lena Walker. Walker, who lived from 1864 to 1934, was the first African American woman to charter a bank. She also helped launch a store and a newspaper. She also dedicated her life to fighting against racial discrimination. Students are not just exploring the Maggie Walker National Historic Site, they're investigating it. They're walking the grounds, sifting through original documents about Walker's life, writing guides to the site, and more. 
• Catherine Turton, also from the National Park Service, provided a look at the limited effort many of America's historic sites make to tell inclusive stories representing the full range of voices a site represents. She also pointed to a number that are getting it right, particularly as it relates to including women. Topping the list? The Otis House Museum in Boston, The Hermitage in Nashville, Tennessee, and Arizona's Sharlot Hall Museum.  
• Professors Jonathan Den Hartog of Northwestern College, Michael Lee of Messiah College and Bentley University's Chris Beneke lead a discussion about "(Re)Interpreting the Bible in Early American Culture. The session looked at the way that the view of the Bible changed from the Colonial era through the Revolution and into the 1790s. Presenters noted that some people began to view the Bible more objectively, while ol' Thomas Paine took a literary beating after the publication of The Age of Reason.

Read More:

OAH Part 2: Historian heroes in D.C.

OAH Part 3: Tom Hanks got it wrong

Standing in awe -- and uncertainty -- in revolutionary Boston

BOSTON -- Studying the history of the American Revolution sometimes feels more like mud wrestling than an intellectual pursuit. Even after all the years, libraries, documents and road trips, I just can't quite get my arms around it and pin it down. I don't know why I'm surprised that my life-long dream of coming to Bean town is proving to be yet another couple of rounds in the pit.

My day started with awe.

I hit The Freedom Trail this morning, notebook and cameras in hand -- my mind spinning in anticipation of seeing sights I have known only as words and photographs for so long. "Captain John Hodgkins" led me along a guided tour that left me hanging on his every word. Every time he pointed and drew a deep breath, I bounded in that direction. Dressed in colonial attire of a gentleman, he told us about the history of the founding of this city and then bellowed out some of the highlights of the revolution that began here.

I bowed my head at the Granary Burying Ground and paid respects to James Otis, one of the not-as-well-remembered heroes of what became the freedom movement. He was the lawyer who argued against the writs of assistance for four hours, imploring that the British Crown not be allowed to enter anyone's house with a flimsy document and confiscate anything they find. His effort fell on deaf ears, but John Adams said he thought the Revolution started on that day. I gave just as much reverence to the likes of Paul Revere and to what modern history still records as victims of the Boston Massacre.

That's where it gets muddy.

The truth is that the Americans antagonized the British troops that fateful day. In the freezing cold winter, they hurled oyster shells and everything else they could find at the soldiers. Tension was still running high over the shooting of a boy by a lobster back a week earlier. We didn't have time to get into this kind of detail on the tour but I've read enough accounts of the events of that event to understand how the soldiers could have lost their composure. That didn't make firing on the colonists right but I have to at least acknowledge their mobbish behavior.

I'm still not sure what to make of everything that unfolded that day (March 5, 1770), but I am adamant that the site of those deaths should be better heralded than it is now. The spot where five people died and that ignited revolutionary fervor is now marked but by street bricks on a tiny traffic island outside the Old State House. People step all over it crossing the street and many clueless passersby probably don't even know what the spot is. I didn't even see a sign. I suspect that the everyday tourist in the group would've passed right over it without knowing what it was were it not for our captain.

I just don't quite get how a place that should be much more hallowed ground became something that people simply stomp all over. I realize that in 2009 it would be nearly impossible to fix the problem -- there's no room to re-route the roads.

Still. Couldn't something have been done earlier?

I returned to awe on my next few stops.

At Faneuil Hall, I sat there quietly imagining all the debates and community meetings that took place more than two centuries ago. Then I hopped on the T and took the train out to Quincy to visit the homes of my very favorite Founding Father, Mr. Adams. He is to me the most accessible of the bunch. The most human. The most open and expressive with his emotions and his thoughts. I can relate to his joy's and wallow in his pains. I can feel his ego bruisings. I can identify with his shortcomings: He hid them not.

I toured his birth home, walked next door to the home he later occupied with Abigail, the great love of his life. Every man and woman should be so lucky as to have a bond like what they shared.

I moved on to the home, "Peace field" where John and Abigail spent the rest of their lives. Its' where they listened in horror as surgeons cut into their daughter's breasts with a saw trying to remove a tumor. It's where John wrote and read so much of famous correspondence with Thomas Jefferson, a man with whom his relationship rode a roller coaster over their decades of friendship and service to this nation. Some of the words they exchanged in their final years are the most touching to me and I've now stood in each of the very rooms where they read and wrote the other -- and, of course, where both died within hours of each other on the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

I did not realize John Adams died in his study. The National Park Service tour guide explained that once his wife died, the old president could bear no more nights in their bedroom.

I thought I was going to end Monday's history exploration in the high note of the good company of John and Abigail. Both of them are heroes of mine, by the way, and I have spent an extraordinary amount of time in their graces. I've held original letters he wrote from France and I've even touched an alleged lock of her hair. (History groupies find access to these kinds of experiences.)

A ride back to Boston led me to a mudslide.

I entered the Boston Public Library at Copley Square and camped out in the beautiful reading room with a stack of books on the Revolution after marveling at the architecture of the building. The most compelling read was "Black Courage 1775-1783: Documentation of Black Participation in the Revolutionary War," by Robert Ewell Greene in 1984.

At the risk of sounding like the kind of politically correct blowhard I disdain, it is absolutely a self-evident truth that the contribution of African-Americans to the American Revolution have been largely overlooked by popular history. I've intended to do more with this idea but I have so many different Revolutionary research projects going I can't seem to finish one of them. The questions the author poses and begins to answer, though, are worth discussing.

Greene stated that the two essential questions that face Americans of color are what the Revolution has to do with them, and why black people would fight for a nation that held them in slavery. He wrote that the answers can only be obtained by first gaining a better understanding of the full facts surrounding black participation in the war.

As the sun set and the sky outside the giant windows in the library went dark, I delighted in Greene's clear, direct writing. No high-brow academic stuff here.

In short, he wrote that black men suffered just like their white counterparts in the war. Robert Green took a musket ball in the face. Thomas Lively lost his right eye in a battle and lost his leg in another. Caesar Skelton got stabbed in the back. An estimated 5,000 black men and women gave themselves to the cause of liberty -- their nation's and their own in hopes a victorious country would make good on its promise of freedom to those who served in Washington's army.

Why is this important to us today? I see it, as I believe Greene does, as a matter of simple fairness. A matter of telling a complete and unvarnished story about the full participation in the war that gave us this country. I've thought all day about what metaphor I might use to make this point. My first thought was naturally to compare telling an incomplete story to the idea of describing a beautiful woman but leaving out key details like the color of her eyes or the shape of her cheekbones. That doesn't do it justice, though.

As I sat here getting some directions from google for tomorrow's itinerary, I realized that failing to include the participation of African-Americans in the Revolutionary War would be like leaving out countless key turns when you're giving someone directions to an important destination. The poor sucker might not ever get there, or know how exactly he made it if he did manage to blindly stumble across it.

Time for me to go wash the mud off my hands. My wake up call is but hours away and there's much to explore tomorrow. 

George Washington and Michael Jackson: What a strange Fourth of July

When "George Washington" refused to shake my hand today, I could only shake my head: It had already been a very peculiar Fourth of July -- and it would get more bizarre before it was over. After studying and admiring the man for many years, I naturally leaped at the propitious moment to greet the general as he stood not far from the entrance of his Mount Vernon home.

"A gentleman from Virginia does not take the hand," he explained when I asked for the honor. "It is only from approximately Pennsylvania north where men engage in such a greeting. Where are you from?" 

"Georgia," I said. "I guess I should know better. So ... how do I greet you?"

"We bow," the courageous and patient commander said.

I immediately turned my head down and bent forward but saw out of the corners of my eyes he hadn't moved.

"But we are not monarchs," he said, gently. "There is no need for you to avert your eyes. Let us try this once more."

Feeling slightly ill at ease because of my thought that I was not worthy of the general's gaze but appreciating the lesson in equality he was trying to teach me, I maintained eye contact and bowed -- though the striking difference in our heights still made it difficult to keep him in my sight.

He nodded his head affirmatively and gave me a quick smile.

"Thank you, " I said.

Moments later, Washington's troops along with modern-day security forces jumped onto a new mission: A panicked father was screaming at the top of his lungs for his son, Teddy, last seen wearing a yellow shirt with "Nantucket" on it. The troops began their search.

Ten minutes passed, no Teddy.

Everyone on the front lawn repeated to each other the description of the boy we were looking for to make sure we had it right. Our stomachs tightening, we put down their slices of America's birthday cake as we all joined the search.

Five more minutes, no Teddy.

The father walked by, muttering to himself, "I've got to call my wife. I've got to call my wife."

Fearful tears broke out like the plague, jumping from one person to the next as the hunt continued. A voice from nowhere screamed, "We've got him! We've got Teddy!" Mount Vernon staff grabbed the father and told him they would take him to his son. He was safe.

We all breathed a hugh sigh of relief. I then went to do what I had come for -- paying my respects to the real George Washington at his tomb. I visit his home and his grave often; America would not exist today without him. As a student of the American Revolution and as a patriot, the Fourth of July means more to me than any other holiday. I well know what that whole generation endured to give us the country we have today.

My Independence Day got off to a strange start, though. First I opened The Washington Post and saw that it had published a letter I wrote last week in response to its absurd, sycophantic and worshipful coverage of the death of pop star-turned-freakish-pedophile Michael Jackson. Though I do media outreach for a living, I don't think I had ever written a letter to the editor for myself. Considering all I could say about the Fourth of July, I wasn't quite sure what to make of the fact my letter appeared today but was on the subject of the vile media and public praise of the once-talented entertainer who should have died in prison rather than in his mansion. A man does not pay $17 million to the family of a child he "allegedly" molested if he is innocent.

The Post also contained the story about Alaska governor Sarah Palin stepping down a year and a half early for no apparent reason. The Post reporters could make no more sense of the incoherent non-press conference than I could when I saw it last night. In typical Palin fashion, she took no questions -- choosing instead to ramble in so many directions with mal-formed thoughts that the viewer was left with as much clear information as before the event started.

The hormones inside me want me to like Palin because she is a very pretty woman. My conscience outweighs my porcine predisposition, though, and I just can't embrace the bubbly circumnavigator. I don't know that her departure from office, like Jackson's from the Earth, leaves any real void in our society, but I am at least happy for the wolves Palin is fond of allowing cowardly men with big guns to slaughter from airplanes. Maybe the Canis lupus will catch a break.

Paper perusing done, I hopped on my bike and headed to my first stop at the National Archives for what I thought was going to be a deeply moving ceremony that climaxed with a public reading of the Declaration of Independence. I stood ready for the air on my arms to stand up readers hit my favorite line about how "we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor."

Instead of an uplifting moment, the National Archives started well with music from Revolutionary War soldier re-enactors but dropped the ball with too much speech making. Adding insult to injury, the National Archives selected three children to do the reading. There is nothing more cloying than having children read a document that surpasses their understanding and that was written by grown men of great intelligence. I gagged when the first child approached the podium looking like he had just left an event at a private golf club. I left before the kid could even get to "laws of nature", giving the National Archives an "F" for its effort. Probably an F minus considering the poor quality of the sound system.

The ride out to Mount Vernon, though, was beautiful. I gave a triple thump on my heart (my own non-military version of a salute to something worth honoring) to the men buried in Arlington National Cemetery. I took in the view of the monuments sitting across the Potomac. I appreciated more than even usual the freedom to ride my bike anywhere my legs are willing to take me.

Despite the crowds, though, more odd things kept happening. Families walking on the trail kept themselves to just the right lane. Joggers only ran two to a side instead of in formation blocking the whole trail. Packs of bikers even rode single file. Weird.

On my return trip from Washington's home, I went back through security and, unlike during Inauguration Week, found LOCAL, courteous policemen and other security officers who were able to tell me how to get around security fencing to streets I needed to take. One even offered to inspect my water backpack while it was on my back so I didn't have to spend five minutes taking everything out.

With 50-plus miles under my belt on the day, I hit my own neighborhood and passed under the tracks that are but a few stone throws from where nine people died on the Metro crash last month.

Not long afterward, I saw an old man who had apparently collapsed on his driveway next to a cheap bike. He was motionless and I thought for a moment he might have had a heart attack. He sat up as I approached, and I opted not to mention the advice that a better bike would put less of a strain on him. Especially at his age.

I got home and replayed the beauty off the strange ride in my head. I thought of all the people I saw out having fun ... families of all races and melting pot mixes making all kinds of things on their grills, women jogging with their dogs, boaters cruising along the Potomac, men fishing on its banks. Friends throwing footballs and kicking soccer balls. A father pitching a Wiffle ball to his son. 

I sometimes get upset on the Fourth of July because I don't think people pay it or the generation of men and women that first gave us our freedom enough reverence. I do realize my own favorite founding father John Adams wrote that he expected this day to be commemorated with "Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other".

Though I take my history pretty seriously about every day of the year, maybe I should lighten up a little on this one. Maybe I should give my fellow Americans more credit. After all, it's almost time to watch the District's fireworks on TV while getting ready to walk over to Takoma Park's rendition.

Wait, no ... ABC News is STILL talking about Michael Jackson and bragging about the live coverage it will provide of his funeral. It's also "reporting" that staggering numbers of people are registering to obtain free tickets to his funeral service.

I sense Washington himself rolling over in his sarcophagus.

An army recruiter's toughest challenge: me

March 29, 2009 Sunday

Valley Forge, Pennsylvania -- Considering the turmoil America is in, it has got to be tough to be an Army recruiter like Sgt. Jeff Blessing. He can't lie to potential recruits: the hours can be long, the duty dangerous, and the pay but a pittance. Heat can annihilate you in the summer and you can freeze in the winter. Weapons can be hard to come by and their accuracy even more arduous to obtain.

Still, the sergeant knows he has a fish on the hook in the form of yours truly. I have approached him hesitantly, equal parts and excited and scared. My questions reveal that I've long thought about putting my love of liberty to the test, of defending my country, yet they can not mask the fact that I am for all practical purposes a city slicker. Never been much for sleeping on the ground, missing meals, or firing guns. I'm very athletic but I've got flat feet that make standing still a challenge and I already suffer from a constant ringing in my left ear. I can't even ride a horse.

Sgt. Blessing does have a few things on his side of the ledger, though. There's the spirit of adventure, patriotism, and those beautiful blue uniforms. Ah yes, the ladies do love a man in uniform.

The army man hands me an application. Just sign here, son, he says. We'll take care of you.

I walk away for the moment, afraid of making such a commitment. I tell the sergeant I'll be back. I need to think about it some. Maybe talk to my folks.

Not only will I be leaving home, I'll be stepping back in time -- all the way to the late 1770s. Sgt. Blessing, after all, is seeking men to join the Second Pennsylvania Regiment of The Continental Line -- a nonprofit, educational organization whose mission is to accurately depict American troops during the American Revolution. He and his brother-in-arms Jim Liddle also make ends meet in these uncertain economic times by adding to the ranks of the King's 43rd of Foot. (Don't spread that word 'round these parts. Blessing and Liddle are good men and they don't think the lobster backs are going to prevail in the end anyway.)

I turn my attention to other interests for the remainder of the "The Lock, Stock, and Barrel" Revolutionary War symposium sponsored by The Friends of Valley Forge Park.

All of the lectures stimulate my brain.

Philander Chase probes the mind of George Washington. Chase spent 35 years in the company of our first commander in chief, retiring recently as the editor of The Papers of George Washington at the University of Virginia. Chase may know the general better than any many alive yet even he can't answer one of history's mysteries: Why did Washington suddenly change his penmanship? No one knows.

I sit a spell with Jim Hollister, a National Park Service ranger and education coordinator at Minute Man National Historical Park in Massachusetts. He delivers a riveting presentation examining the age-old riddles of what really happened at both Lexington and Concord. He weaves eye-grabbing photographs and gripping eye-witness accounts into his remarks, which end with me on the edge of my seat using my i-phone to check the price of train tickets to Boston. I later go out to dinner with him and his fiance Emily Murphy, a historian at Salem Maritime National Historic Site, and discover they are both sterling personal representatives of the park service. They're good people, as we say back in my parts.

I peek in on Valley Forge in 1778, where Paul Lockhart of Wright State University is recounting the fantastic story of how Prussian immigrant Friedrich de Steuben showed up on Washington's doorstep, convinced him that he could transform his army into a disciplined fighting force, and promptly proved himself worthy of the post. Lockhart's book, "The Drillmaster of Valley Forge"  is next on my reading list, though it pains me to think I didn't later ask him to sign a copy for me while he was standing right next to me -- at Valley Forge -- with his book in my hands.

Scribbling notes as has been my occupational and educational hazard for more than 20 years, I struggle to keep up with Thomas McGuire -- author of "Battle of Paoli" and of a book that's the subject at hand this day: His high-octane tour across The Philadelphia Campaign serves as yet another reminder of how much more I still have to learn about the Revolution, a subject that has long been the focus of a great deal of my energy.

I wish the conference could last longer but the clock is ticking on the weekend. I head back to Valley Forge for a very special tour -- a "behind the closed vaults" experience lead by NPS ranger Scott Houting. Most people quickly turn their attention to the authentic muskets, swords and powder horns that are always the eye candy of Revolutionary War exhibits. Behind locked doors, however, my eyes are immediately drawn to something that cranks up my heart rate.

No way, I think.

Yes way. Sitting before me is a letter written in 1777 by Washington's artillery commander, the Boston bookseller turned military genius who also became America's first Secretary of War -- Henry Knox, one of my all-time faves. But this is not just any letter. It is one of the very kinds of letters I have been studying lately for a magazine essay I'm working on. It's a love letter to his wife, Lucy. Of the great many poignant exchanges during the Revolutionary War, few are more touching than the favors traded by this pair. 

"I have received my dearest love letter of the 25th ultimo," he begins. "I want words to express the pleasure it gave me." 

The sweet sentiment rolls through the course of the missive and endears me yet more to the general and to his wife -- a woman of British parents who made great personal sacrifices to marry and stay loyal to her rebel husband.

I couldn't imagine a more beautiful way to take leave of the Lock, Stock, and Barrel event but I knew there was one thing I still needed to do. I followed the sound of the musket and cannon fire to the top of a hill so that I could shake Blessing's hand and affirm that I will consider his offer; I've just got a lot to think about as joining Washington's men would be a serious commitment of time and money.

The good sergeant, though, has my attention -- and every good Army recruiter knows that is truly half the battle. Especially at Valley Forge, where our troops must persevere if America is to have a chance.

Saving history with "my tribe"

March 27, 2009 Friday

Valley Forge, Pennsylvania -- "Where's my tribe?" That's a question I've asked myself many times over the years. I found at least one answer here at Valley Forge National Historical Park where our army spent a grueling winter in 1778 and 1779 and where I spent time today amongst a community with whom I share a great common interest and bond.

In town for the second historical symposium, "Lock, Stock, and Barrel: The World of The Revolutionary War Soldier", I spent the afternoon riding my bike alongside Washington and his men. I have grown quite close to our first commander in chief over the years and sometimes feel his presence more strongly here than I do at his home at Mount Vernon. I looked across the fields and could not fully  imagine what life was like for our troops that winter but listening to their stories through my cell phone at stops along the way made it seem even more personal. Like they were right there in front of me. Breaking a comfortable sweat in my summer clothes and top-of-the-line tennis shoes, my heart reached out to the men who stood barefoot in the snow.

After a quick shower, I returned to the visitor's center for a kickoff reception sponsored by The Friends of Valley Forge Park -- organizer of the weekend workshop. I quickly realized I belonged with this group ... people who think about the same things I do and who have the same passions, fears and hopes.

These are people, patriots all, who seek to share our love of American history and the Revolution in particular. We are also people trying to prevent its death.

A demise of history -- the failure to pass to the next generation the joy of learning what it can teach us and how it can inspire us -- would be a crippling blow to our culture. History is what sets forth the virtues and ideals that we as a nation strive to uphold. It's also the wildly exciting account of how flawed people just like us managed to overcome their own limitations and global events to give us all the opportunities to pursue our own happiness in whichever ways we choose. The struggles they faced, though different in time and technology, are challenges that offer insight for us today.

History is not fairing very well, though. It's hardly taught in school anymore and the people who love it the most won't be with us much longer. Already facing decreasing political support before the economy crashed, federal and state funding for historical places and programs sits with its neck exposed to a chopping block.

People like Michael and Michelle Harris can read the diagnosis as well as anyone. The husband and   wife  who work for Brandywine Battlefield Park and Lower Perkiomen Valley Park are on the front lines of the battle to plant seeds of excitement in the hearts and minds of more citizens. Picking up on the common thread of conversation that night, they talked about how important it is for history lovers to reach out and expand the base. (I frequently lament that history is often the domain of old white male, white collar men --even if I'm nearing a three-for-three on the demographic myself.) 

When their generation passes, who will be there to advocate for the gold mine of civic engagement that history inspires? Who will provide the grassroots political and financial support for institutions like Valley Forge and those the Harris duo works for? Who will be left to tell America's story and and guide us in the fight for her future?

Michael and Michelle feel the urgency of passing the torch to more hands. Greeting every visitor they meet as if it may be America's last chance to spark an interest in her history, they talk to old and young. They talk to white, black and every shade in between ... to the rich and to the struggling. Though they may never know the fruits of their labor, Michelle is constantly energized by stories she heard about the impact she made as a 19-year-old museum intern. Unbeknownst to her at the time, she gave a presentation to a young girl who became so enamored with the subject that it propelled her to turn her life around by getting interested in school for the first time.

Stories of lives changing through the gentle embrace of history aren't limited to children. Barbara Pollarine, a National Park Service deputy superintendent for Valley Forge, tells the story of a man who was ordered by his doctors to get in shape or face dire consequences. He turned to the park as a site for exercise, falling in love with the place and going on to dedicate his time and talents to its mission.

Don Naimoli, meanwhile, is one of the field generals of that operation. As chairman of The Friends of Valley Forge Park, he is orchestrating plans to protect and preserve the park. The site is sadly sometimes the victim of its own success and needs great upkeep. It must thwart the attacks of land and road development and other challenges. It must advocate for the federal funding needed to run it. He hopes to increase the troops enlisted in the Friends' organization so that more people are able to lend their voices to the cause. Every person who joins gives the volunteer organization that much more muscle and clout.

I could have talked to everyone in that room all night long, and nearly did. I realized it was time to go when only the Friends' board members were left and they had brooms in their hands. I admire everyone I met today and hope to do my part in the coming years to share the thrill of American history with greater numbers of people. I can think of a thousand ways I can use my brain, keyboard and enthusiasm to accomplish exactly that.

I sit here at my hotel room desk tonight still buzzing with the joy of meeting so many people today, and the Lock, Stock and Barrel workshop doesn't even start until Saturday. I see now that this is what it feels like to spend a day uniting with my tribe -- both the living and the dead.