Here’s to 235 more, if we can keep our republic. Famille Historiann made it out of the wilderness and back to Durango last night, so today is a travel day for me. For a remembrance of Independence Days past, here are a few posts from the past that capture the spirit of 1776:
- I’m in a roadside motel again like last year, and like last year, HBO is running a John Adams miniseries marathon again. See my review from last year here. (Short version: if you want seasonal entertainment, watch the musical 1776 instead. My prediction is that HBO’s tedious verisimilitude won’t wear nearly as well as the sunny song-and-dance version.)
- Here’s my review from 2010 of Marla Miller’s Betsy Ross and the Making of America.
- The history and politics of “tea-drinking” and U.S. diplomacy are discussed here in this post from 2009.
- Scenes from a small town rodeo, from 2008.
Finally, this one just never gets old. Enjoy!
Historiann 
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Glad ya’ made it safely down-slope. Just came back from a parade in Philly that had something for everytone, from a Mummers kitchen sink to a Home School marching band from Michigan to a Falun Gong drum unit.
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Happy 4th to you, Historiann! Thanks for the link to Marla Miller’s book–I’ve been wanting to read it ever since I originally read your review–just ordered it on interlibrary loan.
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Happy 4th, Historiann. I spent the day in Paris, to thank our friends for their work all those years ago. Actually, it’s odd to be somewhere where the date is irrelevant.
And thanks for the clip. I’ve never seen the movie (I don’t think)but my HS history class went to see it on Broadway in (I think) 1970.
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Susan: so envious of you!!! Anytime of the year at all is a wonderful time to be in Paris. One can always escape the mad heat in the BN or the Louvre, no?
Since we were driving across the state yesterday, drinking in the fabulous scenery on highways 550, 50, and 285, our experience of the holiday was limited to seeing the American flags that every motorcyclist had attached to hir rig. Made it home in time to watch the Rodeo fireworks, though, so that was good.
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A year ago I spent 14 Juillet (a Paris waiter made it clear that only besotted Americans actually call it “Bastille Day”) on a large island on the Atlantic coast of France, where the celebration was both dignified and deeply-felt. We only got there late in the afternoon, but as it got dark, in the village I was staying in, les citoyens sort of spontaneously filed out of their houses and into a relatively quiet impromptu parade to the beach, which faced the Continent across several miles of water. It took incredibly long for it to get dark enough for the fireworks, during which we watched the fireworks from another island nearby and within view. Then they spent about a half hour shooting off the explosives and everyone paraded back into town. Not a floppy foam statue of liberty head-thing was in sight. Somebody might have read out a passage from _What is the Third Estate_, or not, but I wouldn’t have recognized it.
Glad you got back across that big state in time for the Stam-pede. I hope we’ll hear about the narrow gauge railroad at some point.
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