John Miller: Anonymous Activist

It seems these days everyone has a forum or two to make their opinions known on every subject possible.  We can post to Facebook or Twitter.  

We can have our own blog or self-publish our own books.   We can text, we can make regular comments online at various sites, and we can call in to various television and radio shows.

Over the last few years we’ve seen how social media can help to accelerate revolutions and impact protests in foreign countries, we can see how fast ideas travel and take on momentum via videos and Internet links that go viral.

I often wonder if we aren’t literally drowning in TOO much information….

I often wonder if the present quagmire of partisan politics isn’t caused by TOO much information….

Just imagine for a few minutes how events could have been shaped during the 1700s leading up to the American Revolution if people in England and the Colonies had access to some of the technology we do today along with the resulting partisanship, finger pointing and spin….not to mention the “gotchas”.

Thankfully….I think….the best bet someone had back then to get their point of view out for others to see involved paper and ink in the form of letters and newspapers.

As early as 1722 Ben Franklin was penning his Silence Dogood letters in the colonies, but from 1769 to 1772 folks in London England were reading the Letters of Junius…..letters that some historians claim sparked the concept of freedom of the press and influenced our own American Revolution.

If you haven’t heard of the Letters of Junius I’m not surprised.  I was never taught about them either….even though I’ve sat in numerous World history and British history courses where it would be appropriate to mention their impact.

The Letters of Junius were anonymous letters written in England attacking members of government including the King of England regarding all sorts of matters including immorality.  All total there were 69 letters….29 were sent directly to the publisher of the Public Advertiser, a London newspaper, while 40 letters were sent to individuals…mainly government officials, but they were later made public.

The government brought charges against several people for publishing the letters including Henry Sampson Woodall, owner and editor of the Public Advertiser.  Many historians credit Sir Philip Francis, an English politician with writing the letters.  However, there are others who name at least 40 other people who might be Junius including Benjamin Franklin since he was in London at the time the letters were published.  Franklin was known to send open letters to the paper using his own name including his letter addressed to Lord North in 1774.

Today, McGill University in Canada maintains a large collection of the Junius Letters.  Their website state, “The letters themselves after more than two hundred years are a most startling example of political polemic (when someone provides their views) and invective (expressing blame or censure).”

The objective of the letters was simple.   They were written to inform the public of their historical and constitutional rights and liberties as Englishmen, and to highlight where and how the government infringed upon these rights.

All total Junius used three other pseudonyms including the name Philo-Junius…a character who appeared to rescue Junius when it appeared he was being misunderstood by the public at some point.

Junius had a real impact on the British government.   Many people were influenced by the letters and real concepts of liberty were sparked.  The letters even provoked some rioting.

The letters are important because of their political significance, their style and the fact a mystery surrounds who wrote them.   Many critics state the author of the letters no matter who he was ahead of his time.

Some views of Janius include:

*We owe it our ancestors to preserve entire those rights, which they have delivered to our care; we owe it to our posterity, not to suffer their dearest inheritance to be destroyed…1769

*When the constitution is openly invaded, when the first original right of the people, from which all laws derive their authority, is directly attacked, inferior grievances naturally lose their force, and are suffered to pass by without punishment or observation….October 17, 1769

*They [the Americans] equally detest the pageantry of a king, and the supercilious hypocrisy of a bishop….December 19, 1769

*The injustice done to an individual is sometimes of service to the public.  Facts are apt to alarm us more than the most dangerous principles…..November 14, 1770

*The government of England is a government of law.   We betray ourselves, we contradict the spirit of our laws, and we shake the whole system of English jurisprudence, whenever we entrust a discretionary power of the life, liberty, or fortune of the subject to any man or set of men, whatsoever, upon a presumption that it will not be abused……May 25, 1771

You can view the entire contents of one of the letters here.

Of all of the possible authors regarding the Junius Letters the most interesting man to me is John Miller….mainly because he is the great-grandfather of a man who is prominent in the history of my hometown.

John Miller was an English printer who immigrated to South Carolina in 1783.  Prior to arriving in the colonies John Miller had created quite a reputation London as being a bit outspoken regarding many topics including the government, and of course, he supported a free press. He was brought to trial several times regarding items he printed and served time in prison. 

John Miller eventually settled in Pendleton County, South Carolina where he has his own historical marker.

Hurley E. Badders who wrote Remembering South Carolina’s Old Pendleton District said, “The stories he, as well as other newspapermen told, likely led to freedom of the press being written into our Bill of Rights.”

Badders also stated, “Miller had been classed as a radical in England, but in America he showed conservative tendencies often refusing to print political contributions.   For this and his foreign birth he was frequently denounced.”    Even so, Miller was a member of the Pendleton Franklin Society – an anti-federalist group concerned with the new nation’s policies.      Miller was very fond of saying, “Laziness in politics is like laziness in agriculture; it exposes the soil to noxious weeds.”

Following 1783 Miller devoted time to agriculture and politics helping to choose a site for the Pendleton County Courthouse, and he served as the first clerk of court.  I find it an interesting coincidence that his grandson, Richard M. Wilson would also serve as the first clerk of court in Douglas County, Georgia. 

Prior to his death Miller did return to journalism.

John Miller’s Weekly Messenger was established on January 16, 1807.   The name was later changed to the Pendleton Messenger following Miller’s death at the end of the year.   It was sold to an Anderson paper in 1858.

Other than the few historical markers in Pendleton John Miller slipped into obscurity upon his death…..just one more person who fought for what he believed in and made his mark by avoiding the sidelines.

There’s a lesson in there somewhere, and I’m not just referring to historical content either.

I’ve written about John Miller’s grandson and his role in our American story here.

Myths, Memories and Music

On October 2, 1925, the Church Hill section of Richmond, Virginia suffered a great tragedy when a train tunnel caved in at the exact moment a train happened to be in the tunnel.  Several people lost their lives.  

It wasn’t long after the cave-in that a story began circulating describing a blood covered creature with jagged teeth.  Huge patches of decomposing skin were hanging off the creature’s legs and arms.  The tale went on to explain how at the time of the tragic cave-in the creature made his way towards the James River and then to Hollywood Cemetery where he was last seen entering the crypt that belonged to William Worthan Pool.

It only added to the story that Mr. Pool’s burial site did not share a birth date…only the year he died….1913. 

He never died?  Seriously?

Somehow the story morphed into a vampire story and the tale of the Richmond Vampire was widely told through the years.   Mr. Pool had lived a very ordinary life before passing away at the age of 80. He moved to Virginia in the 1860s and had clerked for many years in one of the tobacco factories in the area and had last been employed as bookkeeper.

So…..fact, or myth?

Researchers have determined that there was a creature of sorts that day at the cave-in, but he didn’t run off and hide in Mr. Pool’s crypt.   The creature’s name was Benjamin F. Mosby.  He worked for the railroad.   The day of the crash he was working as the fireman which meant he was shoveling coal into the steam tank of the train.   At the time of the accident Mosby was scalded and burned terribly….some sources state “beyond recognition”.   Mosby was taken to Grace Hospital in Richmond.  His burns were too severe though and he passed away the following day. 

So much for the Richmond Vampire, but the tale isn’t the only reason why Hollywood Cemetery is one of Richmond’s most popular tourist attractions.   There are many other reasons, too.

I attended a house concert last Saturday night.   A house concert is a musical performance presented in someone’s home or other private space.  The benefits of a house concert are many….including the fact that a certain intimacy exists between the performers and the audience during the performance.   Think about one of your favorite performers coming to your home and providing a concert for you and a few of your friends, and you get the idea.

I was fortunate enough to bask in the music of Jeff Pike, a personal friend of mine, and Hugo Duarte  as they brought their Frozen Gringo tour through Atlanta along with approximately 30 other people. 

There was lots of great music mixed in with great stories.  

The Frozen Gringos....Jeff Pike and Hugo Duarte....Marietta, Georgia

In fact, one of Hugo Duarte’s stories reminded me about the fascinating cemetery in Richmond, Virginia that overlooks the James River.  The place is so much more than the myth of the Richmond Vampire. It seems that Hugo was in the cemetery late one afternoon after closing time......and he ended up on the wrong side of the locked front gate.

Hollywood Cemetery was established in 1849 from land that had long been known as “Harvie’s Woods.”   The cemetery website states, “The land that is now Hollywood was inherited by  William Byrd, III and was part of his graceful estate, Belvidere, on what is  now Oregon Hill.  After Byrd wasted his fortune on foolish schemes [sounds like a good story there] his land passed through Bushrod Washington and Lighthorse Harry Lee to Colonel John Harvie.”

Hollywood Cemetery with the James River in the background

The name….”Hollywood”…came from the number of holly trees scattered about the property. 

There are so many people buried at Hollywood…important people…historical figures. such as President James Monroe and President John Tyler as well as the only President of the Confederate States of America….Jefferson Davis.

….and then there ARE the 25 Confederate generals resting at Hollywood along with 18,000 Confederate soldiers (see this link).

There are many stories regarding all sorts of sightings of spirts at the cemetery along with the eerie feeling many advise they get while on the property.    

Hollywood Cemetery....it does seem a little spooky.

Hugo Duarte is no different.  His song….Hollywood…recounts his own visit to the property....after regular hours.    In 2007, he sang the song for General Pickett’s birthday along with Eddie Pickett.

I love the words…..

Hey, boys this is Hollywood.  It ain’t home, but It’s home for good.  We’d walk away from here if we could…never come back again.

And later in the song…..

Then General Pickett strode right up to me and in a troubled voice he said, “Ya’ll ain’t learned a damn thing from history….”

Take a listen for yourself…..

I’d have to agree with General Pickett.   We haven't learned anything...yet.

You can see future Frozen Gringo tour dates here.  If you are close by one of their shows I strong urge you to attend. :)

Vin Fiz: Adventures With Grape Soda

There’s a little restaurant not too far from my home that we frequent for the great steaks and great service.   I usually order an adult beverage before dinner….a little something served up in a martini glass called a Cosmic Grape.   The drink reminds me of a frozen Fanta Grape soda…..not as sweet as a Fanta, but similar.   The last time we were there I ordered my Cosmic Grape and then wondered aloud what might be in the drink so we could recreate it at home.   I assumed it contained one of the new flavored vodkas….seems like every flavor under the sun is offered up these days.

I picked up my hand-dandy smart phone and went online to look up the recipe.   I entered the words “cosmic grape” in the search box.

Guess what I found?

Yes, I found recipes that seemed like they could be my beloved Cosmic Grape, but I found something much more interesting.

My recipe quest was soon forgotten because I found a bit of history involving grade soda and the first transcontinental flight across our country. 

The year was 1911 and newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst offered $50,000 to the first person who flew a plane from coast to coast within a 30 days or less.  This was most certainly a challenge in those days because on average planes flew at 50 miles per hour and only rose to about 1,000 feet in the air.

Calbraith Perry Rodgers was a risk taker.  Perhaps his bravery came from overcoming the fact he was deaf in one year and nearly deaf in the other….due to scarlet fever.   Perhaps his bravery stemmed from the fact he was related to Oliver Hazard Perry – hero of the Battle of Lake Erie during the War of 1812 and Matthew Calbraith Perry – U.S. Navy Commodore during the Mexican-American War, served during the War of 1812, and was instrumental in opening up China to the West in the 1850s.   The family could also trace their family line to the Scottish hero William Wallace.

Calbraith Perry Rodgers

Knowing his family connections it’s not surprising to find out Calbraith Perry Rodgers became interested in aviation.   He took 90 minutes of flying lessons with Orville Wright and became only one of 49 men who were licensed to fly in 1911.

He took Hearst up on his challenge and set about finding a sponsor to help with the expense of flying a plane across the United States.

Enter another famous name during the early 20^th century – J. Ogden Amour – owner and president of Amour & Company.  During his tenure as president the company expanded nationwide and overseas, growing from a small regional meatpacker to the largest food product company in the United States.

Mr. Armour agreed to sponsor Rodgers.   Part of the deal required Rodgers to name his plane after a new soft drink Armour was promoting – a grape soda called Vin Fiz.   The drink was one of several that hit the market at the turn of the century as an answer to temperance movement.  The soda’s name would be painted on the plane’s rudders and underneath the wings.   Vin Fiz was known as “the ideal grape soda”.   Somehow I don’t think it could hold a candle to my beloved Fanta Grape.   I guess I’ll never know….   

Armour also paid for a chase train to follow Rodgers.  The 3-car support train would be known as the Vin Fiz Special.

Grape sodas wasn’t the only thing promoted on the flight.  Airmail service was also promoted with special 25-cent postage stamps.   They weren’t issued by the Post Office, but they were allowed at the time.   Mail carried on the Vin Fiz also had to have regular stamps, too.   The Vin Fiz stamps were large and inscribed “Rodgers Aerial Post” and “Vin Fiz Flyer”.   There was a picture of the plane on them as well.  Today the stamps are very rare…..there are 12 known to exist today…….seven on postcards, one on a cover, and four individuals.  One sold in 1999 for $88,000.

  

The flight began on September 17, 1911 taking off from Sheepshed Bay, New York.   Along the way there were 75 stops and 16 crashes….and yes……several injuries.

Sadly Rodgers missed the 30 day deadline imposed by William Randolph Hearst.  His next to the last stop was Pasadena, California where he landed the Vin Fiz in front of a crowd of 20,000 people.  The landing hadn’t been his best leaving Rodgers with a concussion and a spinal twist.   He wasn’t finished though.  He took off again and finally reached the Pacific Ocean landing on the beach and then promptly taxied into the surf on December 10^th.   It had taken nearly three months, but the actually flying time amounted to 84 hours or three and half days.

Today the Vin Fiz plane is on display at the National Air and Space Museum.

You can find out more details regarding the Vin Fizz here.

Clive Cussler…one of my favorite authors….penned what has been described as a charmingly nostalgic tale about a pair of ten-year-old twins who get their wish to explore the wide world beyond their parent’s  California farm titled The Adventures of Vin Fiz.   Check it out!

President's Day, 2012

Happy President's Day!!!


When I was younger we didn’t have a day to celebrate all U.S. Presidents.  Instead we split the day in two and recognized Abraham Lincoln and George Washington since their birthdays were both in February…..so, I’m linking to two past articles.  The first involves Lincoln and the Emancipation Proclamation.  This article originally appeared at History Is Elementary as well as American Presidents Blog in 2008.  You can view it here.

This post appeared at History Is Elementary in 2007 and detailed a famous image we have of George Washington at Valley Forge.   I discuss how I used the image in the classroom and how controversy should not be avoided…but embraced to help students discover for themselves those areas that are white or black…but most of the time controversial areas are really just…. gray.

Slavery: Not Quite Gone with the Wind

I met up with a teacher the other day that has the privilege of introducing the Civil War to her fourth graders each year. 

The word “introducing” is a little misleading, however.  I live in Georgia where natives, no matter the ethnicity, are born with “The War” ingrained in our souls.   We can’t escape it, we can’t deny it – it’s always there.   Some of our earliest collective memories are filled with the statues around the town square, old family photographs; we hear the stories and see the preserved battlefields that dot our landscape.

I haven’t met a fourth grade student yet who doesn’t know something about the Civil War, but the fourth school year is designated by the Georgia Social Studies curriculum to formally learn about the war in an academic setting.   My own personal experience indicates students are eager to begin the process.   A formal study helps them connect to family stories still lingering around the Sunday dinner table and helps them sift through the facts and myths they already know.

I asked my teaching friend how she taught her Civil War unit.   Even with today’s mandated standards every teacher has his or her own personal methods that make each lesson unique.  I was interested to know the ingredients to her Civil War unit.

My colleague responded, “Well, we read the text, I add in some graphic organizers, we build a word wall, and I have some really great Civil War worksheets.”  

I really hoped that wasn’t everything so I asked, “What is the focal point of your unit….or better yet, what is the culmination of your unit?”

“Well…..I wrap it up by showing Gone with the Wind over a few days.  I give the unit test, and we move on.”

Oh.

Really?????

Now, I like Gone with the Wind as much as the next southern belle, and I really don’t mind students watching the movie, but I have a real problem when teachers allow the movie to stand in the place of real content.   They are merely passing along myths of the “Old South” instead of correcting them.   A formal academic view of the Civil War should help students connect to the prevalent myths, but it most certainly should correct them as well.   The movie can be shown, but the proper context should be present.

Gone with the Wind, the movie, is Hollywood entertainment at its very best with a few facts thrown in.   Gone with the Wind, the book, by Margaret Mitchell, won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and yes….there is a reason why I present the word “fiction” in bold face.

There ARE historical inaccuracies with Gone with the Wind. 

 

From the website Internet Movie Database we find there are inaccuracies with dates.   When Mr. O’Hara announces the war is over because Lee surrendered the movie makes no note that Lee’s surrender had no real effect on Georgia.  In fact, Georgia state troops didn’t surrender until the following month, and General Kirby Smith’s surrender in Texas on May 26 is considered the end of the Civil War.  

When Melanie is nursing a soldier he tells her he hasn’t heard from his brother since the Battle of Bull Run.   A Confederate soldier would never have referred to the battle by that name.   It was known in the North as the Battle of Bull Run, but Southerners knew the battle as The Battle of Manassas.

   

When Frank Kennedy is killed we assume he and other men in Atlanta were attending a Ku Klux Klan meeting, but the group is never identified. They are mysteriously absent yet were part of the true story.

Margaret Mitchell was dismayed at the scale of the Tara and Twelve Oaks sets.   She advised, “I grieve to hear that Tara has columns.  Of course, it didn’t, and looked nice and ugly like Alex Stephens’ Liberty Hall in Crawfordville, Georgia.”(See image here)  Mitchell advised nothing like the movie versions of Tara and Twelve Oaks were ever seen in Clayton County and advised further, “When I think of the healthy, hardy, country and somewhat crude civilization I depicted and then of the elegance that is to be presented, I cannot help yelping with laughter…”  

IMBd also advises the problems regarding the scene commonly referred to as “the Burning of Atlanta.”  It was not the actual burning of the city by General Sherman in November, 1864.  Instead, the scene represents the night, two months earlier, when the retreating Confederate army torched its ammunition dumps to keep the Union army from capturing them.

Then there are the convicts Scarlett O’Hara leases from the state to work at the sawmill.  Discussing this with students would provide an opportunity to connect the end of slavery to the next unit of study regarding Reconstruction.  If you go back and watch the scene the convicts are depicted as white prisoners.  In truth this is very incorrect.   It is highly likely that the workforce Scarlett would obtain from the convict lease program would have been black and the charges that had resulted in their incarceration would be highly suspect today.

Convict leasing became a common practice following the Civil War.   In his book titled Going up the River: Travels in a Prison Nation, Joseph T. Hallinan advises, “After the war, many Southern states strapped for cash, leased their convicts to private businesses.   Their best customers were those that offered some of the worst work:  railway contractors, coal mines, and lumber and turpentine companies.”   

 I agree with Hallinan…..unfortunately, the lease system largely resembled slavery.   Hallinan advises, “Most Southern convicts after the Civil War were black and under most lease systems employers virtually owned the convicts they leased.  They were free to move them around the state unsupervised.  The system led to horrible abuses, many inmates were flogged, shackled or placed in the stocks.   Inmates were often ill clothed and ill fed, and many of them died.   In Louisiana, as many as 3000 inmates died under the convict lease system.”

I’m almost certain there is a reader out there wondering the two words that signify indifference, so I’ll insert them here:

So what?

I can see your point.   They were prisoners.   Murderers, rapists, thieves, and were just getting what they deserved, right?

Have you ever heard of the Black Codes?  Those were laws passed in the South immediately following the war that controlled the labor and migration of newly freed slaves.    This newspaper article advises most of the convicts were charged with minor offenses such as jumping a freight train, adultery, or gambling.   Many were merely deemed to be vagrants – a person without a settled home or work, and when they couldn’t prove they were employed the state sentenced them to many months of hard labor.  At that point their contracts were sold to private companies under the convict lease system.

In his book, Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II, Douglas A. Blackmon advises The Tennessee Coal, Iron and Railroad Company was one of the largest users of convict leasing for coal mining labor in Alabama.  Eventually TCI was bought by U.S. Steel   During their first year oownership…..1908…..almost 60 convict workers died from workplace-related accidents. 

One of the U.S. Steel mines….the Pratt Mine in Birmingham…..had over 1,000 men working the mine requiring them to dig and load coal.   Their daily quota was 8 tons or they could expect to be whipped.   They were chained at night.  The men suffered from disease and when they died they were dumped in shallow graves.  Most worked off their sentences at the rate of $12.00 per month.

Blackmon’s website seen here discusses the term “neoslavery” – a term that encompasses all of the various ways black men across the South were sold into bondage or involuntary servitude.

During an interview with NPR, Blackmon advised:

On July 31, 1903, a letter to President Theodore Roosevelt arrived at the White House from Carrie Kinsey, a barely literate African American woman in Bainbridge, Georgia. Her fourteen-year-old brother, James Robinson, had been abducted a year earlier and sold to a plantation. Local police would take no interest. "Mr. Prassident," wrote Mrs. Kinsey, struggling to overcome the illiteracy of her world. "They wont let me have him. . . . He hase not don nothing for them to have him in chanes so I rite to you for your help." Like the vast majority of such pleas, her letter was slipped into a small rectangular folder at the Department of Justice and tagged with a reference number, in this case 12007. No further action was ever recorded. Her letter lies today in the National Archives.

In a Newsweek interview Blackmon was asked why the U.S. government allowed “neoslavery” to continue even though it was investigated as early as 1903.  Blackmon responded:

All the investigations that began in 1903 failed for various reasons, but the main one was that it wasn't a crime in America to hold a slave. The 13th amendment passed in 1865 made slavery unconstitutional. There was no federal statute that made it a crime to hold a black person as a slave. When the U.S. attorney general in the South began investigating slavery in 1903 and attempted to bring charges, they realized they did not have a clear federal statue. So the prosecution was brought under other crimes that were similar but in the end all the prosecution failed because the laws were not applicable and no [Southern] jury would convict a white man for any crime against blacks.

Blackmon was also asked the connection between the end of neslavery and the beginning of World War II.   He responded:

The end of neoslavery came as a direct result to the attack on Pearl Harbor. When President Franklin Roosevelt convened his cabinet to discuss retaliation, the main issue was propaganda and the Japanese ability to effectively embarrass America for the treatment of blacks in the South. Immediately President Roosevelt passed a congressional law criminalizing lynching. Four days after Pearl Harbor, the U.S. attorney general ordered a memorandum that instructed all federal prosecutors to aggressively prosecute all cases of involuntary servitude.

Reading the textbook, throwing a few worksheets around, and showing Gone with the Wind does not teach students about the war. It merely marks time until the next unit leaving students to own the myths they had when they walked into the classroom.   Find out what they already know or THINK they know and move from there. Provide opportunities for students to discover the truth.
        

PBS will be airing a documentary based on Blackmon’s book on February 13^th.  The documentary is a mix of interviews with historians, dramatic reenactments filmed in the Deep South, and emotional testimony from descendants of both enslaved blacks and their captors….”

I strongly urge educators to watch.

The Telfair Museum in Savannah, Georgia is currently showing an exhibit inspired by Douglas A. Blackmon’s research created by Robert Claiborne Morris using mixed media such as portraits of the enslaved, maps of the slave mines, newspaper articles and letters to the Department of Justice.   This link takes you to more information regarding the exhibit.

The black and white photos with this post came from Douglas A. Blackmon's website.

HighBeam.com Spotlights History Is Elementary!

Many months ago I set up a Facebook page for this blog where folks could like the page and could have yet another way to keep up with updates.    

Last week I was surprised to see someone had placed something on my wall that really made me smile.  HighBeam.com had stopped by my Facebook home to advise the following:

To thank you for all your hard work and dedication we would like to acknowledge you by including History Is Elementary in our Top 10 Favorite Blogs for educational research.

Now, isn’t that nice?!?  Notice my little badge is over in the sidebar.

HighBeam's blog shared a link to this blog along with the other nine.  Here they are:

Homeroom: The Official Blog of the U.S. Department of Education

Honors College Admission Blog: The Honors College Admission Blog for Western Kentucky University with valuable commentary and tips

The College Solution: The Blog of Lynn O’Shaughnessy, a nationally recognized college expert, higher-ed journalist, consultant and teacher

The Quick and the Ed: Published by Education Sector, this blog offers in-depth analysis on the latest in education policy and research

NYC Private Schools: An online community that encompasses all aspects of NYC private, independent, and religious schools

Cool Cat Teacher Blog: Written by Vicki Davis, a full time teacher and blogger, who strives to share her insights on how to reach this generation of learners with teachers and parents

Tween Teacher: Heather Wolpert-Gawron discusses the latest news in education, curriculum design, educational policy and how to enjoy teaching

Generation YES Blog: Thoughts on empowering the current generation of learners with current technology

The Wired Campus: The Chronicle of Higher Education featuring the latest news on tech and education

In case HighBeam is new to you….it’s a paid search engine including the archives from newspapers such as The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, and Associated Press.   They also have numerous trade magazines such as Advertising Age and Auto Week and journals like The Journal of Education Research and The Journal of Social Psychology.   All total a subscription to HighBeam provides access to over 6,500 publications.

Many thanks HighBeam for the nod!

I would like to start posting something a little more regularly on the Facebook page to interact with you.  While I don’t want to clog up your newsfeed I would like to interact with you a bit more.     

You are important to me…..I appreciate each and every one of you so much!  

So far I’ve gotten in the habit of linking to new postings as I publish them….eventually I hope to get in the habit of updating the page with pictures, a thought, etc. each day.   Don’t give up on me!

A Christian Nation? Be Careful What You Preach

A good friend sent me this article the other night written by Rob Boston and published in the Pittsburg Post-Gazette.  My friend wanted to know my thoughts about the article.   He also wanted to know if the article was factual. 

After reading the entire piece I advised my friend the article was indeed factual even though it was contrary to those who happen to think certain members of the Founding Fathers were Christians in the same sense the Religious Right profess to be.

For the most part while I tend to be a Conservative in political matters, I also tend to part ways with the Religious Right in this county who follow a hard-line stance regarding their view concerning our nation was founded on Christian beliefs.  

  

It really comes down to understanding what the Religious Right believes a Christian to be and how the majority of our Founding Fathers actually viewed Christianity when you place them under a microscope.

I advised my friend, “We have to remember these were all educated men during their time and as such their classical education included views of the Age of Enlightenment….science and fact took the lead.  While they believed in God their views regarding Christianity don’t exactly match up with the Christian Right today.

Boston brings up the issue of Deism when discussing George Washington.  Deists believed in God but didn't necessarily see him as active in human affairs. He set things in motion and then stepped back.

Washington saw religion as necessary for good moral behavior but didn't accept all Christian dogma. He seemed to have a special gripe against communion and would usually leave services before it was offered.

Stories of Washington's deep religiosity, such as tales of him praying in the snow at Valley Forge, are pious legends invented after his death.

I have to agree with Boston.   Back in 2007, I wrote about Washington praying in the snow at Valley Forge here and here.   I’ve also examined the controversy about Washington’s inauguration and the fact that there really isn’t any true documentation regarding those little words, “So help me God!” here.

Boston didn’t just pick on historical myths regarding Georgia Washington.   He discussed John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and Thomas Paine as well.

Boston states John Adams was Unitarian, although he was raised a Congregationalist and never officially left that church. Adams rejected belief in the Trinity and the divinity of Jesus, core concepts of Christian dogma. In his personal writings, Adams makes it clear that he considered some Christian dogma to be incomprehensible.

In February 1756, Adams wrote in his diary about a discussion he had had with a conservative Christian named Major Greene. The two argued over the divinity of Jesus and the Trinity. Questioned on the matter of Jesus' divinity, Greene fell back on an old standby: some matters of theology are too complex and mysterious for we puny humans to understand.

Adams was not impressed. In his diary he wrote, "Thus mystery is made a convenient cover for absurdity."

As president, Adams signed the famous Treaty of Tripoli, which boldly stated, "The government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion ..."

It is very well known among historians that Thomas Jefferson, our third president, did not believe in the Trinity, the virgin birth, the divinity of Jesus, the resurrection, original sin and other core Christian doctrines. He was hostile to many conservative Christian clerics, whom he believed had perverted the teachings of that faith.

Boston goes on to discuss what is known as The Jefferson Bible…..

Although not an orthodox Christian, Jefferson admired Jesus as a moral teacher. In one of his most unusual acts, Jefferson edited the New Testament, cutting away the stories of miracles and divinity and leaving behind a very human Jesus, whose teachings Jefferson found "sublime." This "Jefferson Bible" is a remarkable document -- and it would ensure his political defeat today. (Imagine the TV commercials the religious right would run: Thomas Jefferson hates Jesus! He mutilates Bibles!)

While I have written about James Madison and his college days at Jersey College….we know it today as Princeton… I have left his religious beliefs alone until now.   Boston doesn’t.  He advises….Nominally Anglican, Madison, some of his biographers believe, was really a Deist. He went through a period of enthusiasm for Christianity as a young man, but this seems to have faded. Unlike many of today's politicians, who eagerly wear religion on their sleeves and brag about the ways their faith will guide their policy decisions, Madison was notoriously reluctant to talk publicly about his religious beliefs.

Madison was perhaps the strictest church-state separationist among the founders; taking stands that make the ACLU look like a bunch of pikers. He opposed government-paid chaplains in Congress and in the military. As president, Madison rejected a proposed census because it involved counting people by profession. For the government to count the clergy, Madison said, would violate the First Amendment.

Madison, who wrote the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, also opposed government prayer proclamations. He issued a few during the War of 1812 at the insistence of Congress but later concluded that his actions had been unconstitutional. He vetoed legislation granting federal land to a church and a plan to have a church in Washington care for the poor through a largely symbolic charter. In both cases, he cited the First Amendment. 

Finally, we come to Thomas Paine.  The man who never held office but wrote a little pamphlet we remember as “Common Sense.”  

Boston advises he was also a radical Deist whose later work, "The Age of Reason," still infuriates fundamentalists.

In the tome, Paine attacked institutionalized religion and all of the major tenets of Christianity. He rejected prophecies and miracles and called on readers to embrace reason. The Bible, Paine asserted, can in no way be infallible. He called the god of the Old Testament "wicked" and the entire Bible "the pretended word of God." (There go the Red States!)

Boston states, “There was a time when Americans voted for candidates who were skeptical of core concepts of Christianity like the Trinity, the divinity of Jesus and the virgin birth. The question is, could any of them get elected today? The sad answer is probably not.

Based on this knowledge, wouldn’t it would be interesting to see the founding of our nation played out in more contemporary times?

I have a feeling it would be as much of a circus as our primary and election seasons have become today.