Tag: U.S. History
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Nevin Custer: The one who survived.
George Armstrong Custer and the Battle of Little Bighorn is mythologized in American History. Sometimes the end of Custer and his 7th Cavalry is called Custer’s Massacre. A humiliating defeat for the U. S. just short of its 100th anniversary of its founding. Over two hundred troopers were killed including Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer,…
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A Day in Williamsburg, Va
Once the capital of the colony of Virginia. it is perhaps one of the United States’s most well known living history sites. It encompasses over 300 hundred acres. There are homes that have been both restored and recreated. They represent the 18- 19th centuries. After Jamestown was burned in 1698, “colonial leaders petitioned the Virginia…
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Witness Trees
Some are hundreds of years old, and some are way less than those years. No matter their age, a witness tree is defined as a tree that was present at a significant historical event. In the case of this post, U.S. History. I first became aware of witness trees when I first passed the Balmville…
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A Roosevelt Christmas
“Last week I acquired from my husband’s estate about two-thirds of the land which he owned here in Hyde Park. My son Elliott and I have gone into partnership and we are going to farm the land on a commercial basis,” Eleanor Roosevelt wrote in her “My Day” column on August 19, 1947. This would be the…
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Lyncoya Jackson
Recently while teaching a chapter on the Age of Jackson, a question was asked about Andrew Jackson’s Native American son Lyncoya. I was determined to find out more information about this individual, and why a president who is associated with the Indian Relocation Act of 1830, and the Cherokee Trail of Tears, adopted a native…
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The Historic Joseph Sherfy Farmhouse at the Gettysburg National Military Park, in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania
The Sherfy house sits on the Emmitsburg Road in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. This house, barn, and peach orchard were the center of the second day of the battle of Gettysburg on July 2, 1863. Some of the fiercest fighting took place around this farm owned by the Sherfy Family. Joseph and his wife Mary were pacifists…
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A Day at the Eisenhower Home
“Eisenhower National Historic Site preserves the farm of General and 34th President Dwight D. Eisenhower. Adjacent to the Gettysburg battlefield, the farm served the president and first lady as a weekend retreat and as a meeting place for world leaders. With its peaceful setting and view of South Mountain, it was a respite from Washington,…
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General Washington and His Walnuts
BECAUSE GENERAL GEORGE WASHINGTON IS one of the most-well known and most beloved personalities in United States’ history, both the facts and the fictions about him fill volumes. He had wooden teeth; he threw a coin across the Potomac; and, of course, for some reason he cut down a cherry tree. Well, if Washington did…
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American Chestnut: The Life, Death, and Rebirth of a Perfect Tree
This book by Susan Freinkel is published by the University of California Press. It was published in 2007. Susan Freinkel writes about the intersection of science, culture and the environment. Raised in Evanston, IL, she studied history at Wesleyan University, and journalism at Columbia University. After working several years as a daily reporter for the…
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Washington Slept Here, but Where Did He Sleep?
Many people do not realize that in the closing years of the American War for Independence, General George Washington journeyed through the scenic Rondout Valley to what we know today as Stone Ridge. Some called it Stoney Ridge during Washington’s time. The General was on his way to Kingston, New York. However, before he arrived…