Welcome!

I would like to welcome everyone to our "American Revolution & Founding Fathers History" Group. I am confident that I am the baby in the group in terms of my learning process though I am no less enthusastic in my quest for more knowledge about our founding fathers and this most meaningful period in our geat nation's history.

I am very impressed by those who have joined our family thus far--what impressive library collections to say the very least!! I admire the knowledge and accomplishments of our membership and I personally hope to learn from each and every one of you.

I encourage your active discussion and participation--both of which will make this group most enjoyable and productive for all.

Again, welcome!

Sincerely,

WPark

Hi all. This is a subject near and dear to me that I want to immerse my children in. Luckily I live in New Jersey (rich in revolutionary history) and can get to Philadelphia easily.

I feel much the same: I live near Saratoga, so this summer I took my kids to a re-enactment of the Battle of Bennington. (Come to that, my sister lives a couple miles from the Oriskany battlefield, we were also there this summer.)

As Washington said - "Impress on the mind of every man, from the first to the lowest, the importance of the cause and what it is we are contending for."

I have noted, already, in reading several posts, that some (most) of us had ancestors in the Revolution. I'm sure we each have special stories to tell about our ancestor's experience. Do you use a particular approach to sharing the stories? Do you write about them? Web sites? ever do podcasts or wikis? Just talk to interested folks? Thanks for some examples.

I don't know much about the experience of my ancestors who actually fought in the Revolution, just that there were a few who were Hessians that decided to stay. I'm related to Philip Freneau on my mother's side of the family, however, who wrote quite a bit about it at the time and published a paper owned by Jefferson and Madison during the Washington administration. Mostly I just talk about him when it comes up, and I took his father's spelling of their surname, which was the version that would have been found in France (Fresneau), as mine for my SCA name.

This group has been quiet for a while, so I thought it might help to have a group picture. This is the Sigining of the Constitution by Howard Chandler Christy. This painting hangs in the east stairway of the House Wing of the U.S. Capitol building. I hope you like it.