The Broadside | Happy Fourth of July!
Tag Archives: georgewashington
Daily Broadside | 250-Year-Old Glass Bottles Filled With Cherry Preserves at Mount Vernon and the Usual Suspects Make Sure to Mention Slavery
Not my typical fare but I call your attention to it because woke institutions need to poison everything. First, though, from the Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association, which doesn’t appear to have been infiltrated by the cultural Marxists (yet).
As part of the landmark privately funded $40 million Mansion Revitalization Project at George Washington’s Mount Vernon, archaeologists have made a significant discovery of two intact European-manufactured bottles in the Mansion cellar. The dark green glass bottles were found upright and sealed, each containing liquid. The bottle shapes are characteristic of styles from the 1740s – 1750s and were recovered from a pit where they may have been forgotten and eventually buried beneath a brick floor laid in the 1770s.
[…]
“As we conduct a historic preservation effort at the iconic home of America’s first President and revolutionary hero, we have been deliberate and intentional about carefully excavating areas of potential disruption,” said Mount Vernon President & CEO Doug Bradburn. “Consequently, we have made a number of useful discoveries including this blockbuster find of two fully intact glass bottles containing liquid that have not been seen since before the war for American independence.”
The dark green bottles are described as containing whole cherries, pits, stems and a “gooey residue,” accompanied by the scent of cherry blossoms. I know what you’re thinking: could these be the cherries from the tree that the young rapscallion George Washington chopped down, but could not lie about having done so? Wouldn’t that be the find of the century?
I hate to burst your cherry-colored bubble, but no.
“As the bottles are shipped off for a complete scientific analysis, we want to share our findings and next steps for this historic archaeological and preservation initiative at Mount Vernon. This discovery comes at the beginning of an exciting and transformational project to strengthen and restore the home of the nation’s first president so that it will be stronger than ever when we celebrate America’s 250th birthday in 2026. This historic preservation project is our birthday gift to America,” Bradburn said.
Don’t forget to mark your calendars. If the country is still standing on July 4, 2026, under a second Trump administration, you may be able to find a celebration unmarred by LGTBQWERTY+ and Palestinian flags where you can gather with friends around your white supremacist grill.
Of course, it’s not enough to just enjoy finding a couple of intact 250-year-old bottles of cherry preserves in the basement of our first president’s house. The enablers in the Leftist press have to throw in some reference to his sins. Can’t let you honor a man who is dishonorable.
Smithsonian Magazine (referencing WaPo): “The cherries weren’t picked by Washington, but by one of the hundreds of enslaved individuals living at Mount Vernon at the time, according to the Washington Post.”
Fox News: “Historians believe that the discovery will not only shed light on how food was preserved at Mount Vernon, but may also reveal new details about slavery on the plantation.”
The Guardian: “The bottles had been imported from England during the colonial era and the fruit could very well have been picked by enslaved people on the estate, the Washington family’s grand mansion overlooking the Potomac River near Washington DC.”
Yahoo News: “The liquid and cherries in the two bottles already discovered has been poured out. It’ll be examined and studied, as historians aim to study everything from food preservation to how enslaved people worked at Mount Vernon.”
USA Today: “‘We’re the first people to touch these objects since they were put in the ground by an enslaved person,’ Boroughs said.”
Someone without an agenda would simply say in that last example, “We’re the first people to touch these objects since they were first buried.”
Exciting find. Garbage media.
Daily Broadside | Be Sure To Celebrate All the Presidents Today
As a kid I remember having Washington’s and Lincoln’s birthdays off from school in February every year. Since 1971 all of our presidents are ‘celebrated’ in a homogenized “President’s Day” on Washington’s birthday. A bill passed by Congress in 1968, called the “Uniform Monday Holiday Act,” consolidated the two birthdays and renamed it for the purpose of creating a three-day weekend.
It was fun having a day off from school but I don’t remember my parents making any effort to impress on me the importance of Washington or Lincoln to our way of life. I don’t fault them for that; I’m sure that they, like most Americans of that era, took for granted that an abiding sense of gratitude and freedom would be passed along through our shared culture and values. However, their lack of concern to pass along the weight of Washington’s and Lincoln’s contributions to the life and preservation of our union is reflected in the formal law passed by Congress — along with others that have shifted the priorities of what we choose to recognize.
For the sake of convenience and leisure, we anonymized two holidays and lumped the two luminaries in with every other president we’ve had. It’s the principle of the participation trophy: if everyone is special, then no one is special.
Exactly what — and who — are we celebrating on President’s Day? Are we just observing the fact that we have presidents? Is that somehow noble? More noble than kings or prime ministers?
Is that worth a day off?
Are all of our presidents worthy of celebrating? Are some more worthy than others? Do we really want to lump the likes of Carter and Obama in with true statesmen like Washington and Lincoln?
My advice to families with young children: make it a point to emphasize the lives and impact of Washington and Lincoln and why they are worth remembering. Add Reagan in there, too.
If I had my way, I’d go back to celebrating Washington and Lincoln separately. If Mondays are still important, give us two three-day weekends in February — one for Washington and one for Lincoln. But if you can’t do that, then get rid of “President’s Day” altogether. It’s meaningless and makes a mockery of the observances we used to have.
Daily Broadside | The Obvious Big Missing Object of Thanksgiving Today
Daily Verse | 1 Corinthians 8:9
Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak.
Thursday’s Reading: 1 Corinthians 9-11
Thanksgiving has deep roots in the history of the United States. We all know the story of the Plymouth colonists and the Wampanoag people sharing an autumn harvest feast in 1621 that is known as the first Thanksgiving. Michael Hollan shares a brief history of Thanksgiving becoming a formal holiday.
Before it became an official holiday, President George Washington issued a proclamation that Thursday, November 26, 1789, would be a day of “public thanksgiving and prayer,” according to the Unites States Office of the Historian. It wasn’t until 1863, however, that President Abraham Lincoln said that Americans should recognize the last Thursday of every November as a day of Thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving became an official national holiday in 1870, along with Christmas, New Year’s Day and Independence Day, the government website states. At that time, it was decided that the president would decide the date of Thanksgiving. Most followed Lincoln’s lead and chose the last Thursday of November, according to the Office of the Historian.
This continued until President Franklin D. Roosevelt moved it to the third Thursday of November, according to the Office of the Historian. At the time, the country was still reeling from the Great Depression, and Roosevelt hoped to help businesses by extending the holiday season.
The move was controversial, however, and the House passed a bill in October of 1941 that made the last Thursday of November the official date for Thanksgiving.
Some 80 years later, we continue to celebrate Thanksgiving as one of our major national observances and as a lead-in to “the holiday season.” But the spirit of the day in our current era is a far cry from what the original intent of the celebration was.
In many American households, the Thanksgiving celebration has lost much of its original religious significance; instead, it now centers on cooking and sharing a bountiful meal with family and friends.
No kidding. Here’s how George Washington described the day:
Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be– That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks–for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation–for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war–for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed–for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted–for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.
Here’s how Abraham Lincoln described the day:
No human counsel hath devised, nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.
It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American people. I do, therefore, invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a Day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens. And I recommend to them that, while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners, or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged,
In our secular world, the idea of thanksgiving has been boiled down to having a huge meal with family or friends and watching a football game while we enjoy a day off of work. If we’re trying to inject something meaningful into our observance, we might share what we’re thankful for: family, friends, financial security, good weather, safe travels, the new job, baby, house or car.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with those things, but we seem to be missing the implied object of our thanks. The word is thanks-GIVING. To whom are we giving thanks?
The Pilgrims, Washington and Lincoln all had it right. Our thanks is to be directed to God, “that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be,” and “to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens.”
“But who am I, and who are my people, that we should be able to give as generously as this? Everything comes from you, and we have given you only what comes from your hand.”
1 Chronicles 29:14
Today, as you observe Thanksgiving, remember that all that we have comes from the hand of the Lord. Celebrate appropriately.
