What I'm Reading This Month
By Nadine Holder
May 2006
For motivation for my submittal for membership in the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) I have been reading 1776 by David McCullough. With visions of boring high school history class dancing in my head I was soon completely captivated by his story. It reads like a novel and he has put all of his references at the end of the book by page number so you are not distracted as you read. His basis is letters of the time and he has consulted a huge number of them and quotes from them in the context of his story. What is so utterly fascinating about it is how the freedom of this country hung on such a very slender thread and the amazing feats accomplished by barefoot, freezing soldiers. If you visited the DAR exhibit at the Henry Hauser Museum this past month and saw the great exhibit of a soldier and his gear - wipe it from your head. Washington’s army came from all walks of life and brought their gear with them and came in their working clothes for the most part. There was no method for replenishing clothing and little for obtaining food so they were a starving barefoot lot whose weapons often didn’t work in the freezing rain and snow.
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