Hba 2014

Happy Birthday

AMERICA

July 4 - 11, 2014

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

Light Her Fireworks!

307-686-6666

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1103 E. Boxelder, Suite C Gillette, WY USA 82718

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

July 4 - 11, 2014

The Ladder on Devils Tower

By Jeff Morrison

Devils Tower had long been a favorite site for local ranch families to gather together for casual picnics and special celebrations.

But the July 4th celebration of 1893 proved to be a truly memorable occasion. In addition to the usual food, games, and dancing the festivities would be highlighted by the first–ever accent of Devils Tower.

This feat of daring was to be attempted, not by a professional climber, but by William B. Rogers, a local rancher. Prior to this attempt, the 1,267 ft. laccolith was thought to be un-climbable. Although the practice of rock climbing had been around for centuries, it was still in its infancy as a sport, and most of the technology associated with rock climbing wasn’t developed until the 20th Century. It’s doubtful that either Rogers, or his climbing partner and fellow rancher, Willard Ripley, would have been aware of the latest technologies in any event.

But what the two cowboys lacked in training and equipment was overcome through good old fashioned ingenuity.

Devils Tower’s unique geological structure of vertical hexagonal columns of igneous rock rising hundreds of feet high presented an insurmountable obstacle for most amateur climbers. But the cracks that separated one column from another gave rise to the solution of how two untrained novice climbers could conquer the nation’s first national monument.

Months before their summit attempt, Rogers and Ripley cut large oak, willow, and ash stakes to lengths of 24 to 30 inches long and sharpened them on one end.

They planned to use a crack between two columns that rose on the south face of the tower some 350 feet to the base of a large sloping ledge now known as the Meadows.

By driving their stakes into the crack with a sledge hammer, they planned to create the “rungs” of a crude ladder by which they would be able to scale the mostly vertical portion of the climb. From the Meadows they would be able to climb to the summit without any extra aids.

As soon as the winter snow melted

enough to allow access to the tower base, the two ranchers began construction of their ladder. While the tower itself provided one rail of the ladder, the outside rail was created by fastening 12 foot lengths of 1” x 4” lumber to the outer edge of the stakes with nails and baling wire. The fact that each rung had to be driven into place while standing on the lower rungs made the construction of the ladder more of a dangerous challenge than the actual climb.

As construction on the ladder progressed, so did the preparations for the 4th of July celebration. As part of the event, Rogers planned to raise an American flag on the summit of the tower. The town of Spearfish, South Dakota was to provide the flag, as well as a business card from a Spearfish realtor to also be attached to the flag pole. The business card was provided, but the flag was a no-show, and another flag was provided by the citizens Sundance. The planned celebration also would include speeches from prominent orators, most of who failed to actually show up. A special “Uncle Sam” climbing suit was made for Rogers (who would be the principal climber) by a Deadwood lady’s club. A special handbill was printed to advertise the event.

In the late 1800s and well into the 1900s traveling to Devils Tower was no easy thing. For most people it would mean a long, dusty wagon ride, punctuated by fording the Belle Fourche River several times before finally reaching the meadows below the tower where the celebration was to be held. Although several of the planned speech givers couldn’t make the trip, over 1,000 people did, some travelling as much as 150 miles to see the first climb of Devils Tower.

Most of the spectators were skeptical about the chances of success. But Rogers and Ripley had planned well. In addition to the stake ladder, the route to its base had been prepped over the previous two months with fixed ropes and ladders to facilitate a faster accent. The accent from the Meadows to the summit had also been

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prepared with a long, fixed rope.

In fact, the official “first climb” was nothing more than an exhibition on July 4th.

Rogers and Ripley had been up and down the climbing route many, many times in the course of building the ladder, and had already summited sometime prior to the day of the celebration to erect the 12 foot flagpole. One story has it that it was Willard Ripley who actually went to the top first on the day they brought up the flag pole and climbing rope. According to a local newspaper at the time, there were actually three people on the summit planting the flagpole before sunrise on the 4th.

We will probably never know for sure who the first to summit was, or when he did it. Regardless, the first official summit of Devils Tower was made on the morning of July 4th, 1893, when William Rogers, after a climb of about an hour raised the American flag over the Belle Fourche valley, to the wild applause of the onlookers 1,200 feet below. Later that day, the wind tore the flagpole apart and the flag fluttered down to the base of the tower, where it was cut up and sold for souvenirs.

Rogers and Ripley’s ladder made history again exactly two years later in 1895, when William Rogers’ wife, Linnie, became the first woman to climb the tower, using

the same method. In an interview with the Deadwood Telegraph fifteen years later, Mrs. Rogers said that her climb took 37 minutes – beating her husband’s time by nearly 30 minutes.

Until 1937, when Fritz Wiessner, William House, and Lawrence Coveney became the first men to summit the tower using modern climbing techniques, Rogers and Ripley’s ladder was the only method used to climb to the top. All told, it was used about 25 times from 1893 to 1927. The last climber to use the ladder to reach the top was Babe White, “the Human Fly”, who was famous for climbing multi-storied hotels and capital domes.

The stake ladder eventually fell into disrepair and became more of a climbing danger than an aid. The National Park Service removed the lower 100 feet in the mid1930s to discourage any would-be climbers from using it. In 1972, the remaining portion was restored and decreed a National Historic Landmark. In recent years, for whatever reason, the visitor’s museum at the base of the tower has removed all the photographs and exhibits of the early climbs and turned the space into a Native American interpretive center. But the remnant of the stake ladder itself can still be viewed with binoculars from the trail below.

July 4 - 11, 2014

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

In Their Own Words...

Letter from John Adams to Abigail Adams

Philadelphia July 3d. 1776 Had a Declaration of Independency been made seven Months ago, it would have been attended with many great and glorious Effects . . . . We might before this Hour, have formed Alliances with foreign States. -- We should have mastered Quebec and been in Possession of Canada .... You will perhaps wonder, how such a Declaration would have influenced our Affairs, in Canada, but if I could write with Freedom I could easily convince you, that it would, and explain to you the manner how. -- Many Gentlemen in high Stations and of great Influence have been duped, by the ministerial Bubble of Commissioners to treat .... And in real, sincere Expectation of this effort Event, which they so fondly wished, they have been slow and languid, in promoting Measures for the Reduction of that Province. Others there are in the Colonies who really wished that our Enterprise in Canada would be defeated, that the Colonies might be brought into Danger and Distress between two Fires, and be thus induced to submit. Others really wished to defeat the Expedition to Canada, lest the Conquest of it, should elevate the Minds of the People too much to hearken to those Terms of Reconciliation which they believed would be offered Us. These jarring Views, Wishes and Designs, occasioned an opposition to many salutary Measures, which were proposed for the Support of that Expedition, and caused Obstructions, Embarrassments and studied Delays, which have finally, lost Us the Province.

All these Causes however in Conjunction would not have disappointed Us, if it had not been for a Misfortune, which could not be foreseen, and perhaps could not have been prevented, I mean the Prevalence of the small Pox among our Troops .... This fatal Pestilence compleated our Destruction. -- It is a Frown of Providence upon Us, which We ought to lay to heart.

But on the other Hand, the Delay of this Declaration to this Time, has many great Advantages attending it. -- The Hopes of Reconciliation, which were fondly entertained by Multitudes of honest and well meaning tho weak and mistaken People, have been gradually and at last totally extinguished. -- Time has been given for the whole People, maturely to consider the great Question of Independence and to ripen their judgments, dissipate their Fears, and allure their Hopes, by discussing it in News Papers and Pamphletts, by debating it, in Assemblies, Conventions, Committees of Safety and Inspection, in Town and County Meetings, as well as in private Conversations, so that the whole People in every Colony of the 13, have now adopted it, as their own Act. -- This will cement the Union, and avoid those Heats and perhaps Convulsions which might have been occasioned, by such a Declaration Six Months ago.

But the Day is past. The Second Day of July 1776, will be the most memorable Epocha, in the History of America.

I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more.

You will think me transported with Enthusiasm but I am not. -- I am well aware of the Toil and Blood and Treasure, that it will cost Us to maintain this Declaration, and support and defend these States. -- Yet through all the Gloom I can see the Rays of ravishing Light and Glory. I can see that the End is more than worth all the Means. And that Posterity will tryumph in that Days Transaction, even altho We should rue it, which I trust in God We shall not.

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“The greatest gifts you can give your children are the roots of responsibility and the wings of independence.”

-Denis Waitley

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

July 4 - 11, 2014

Paul Revere’s Ride

By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Listen my children and you shall hear Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere, On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five; Hardly a man is now alive Who remembers that famous day and year.

He said to his friend, “If the British march By land or sea from the town to-night, Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch Of the North Church tower as a signal light,-One if by land, and two if by sea; And I on the opposite shore will be, Ready to ride and spread the alarm Through every Middlesex village and farm, For the country folk to be up and to arm.”

Then he said “Good-night!” and with muffled oar Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore, Just as the moon rose over the bay, Where swinging wide at her moorings lay The Somerset, British man-of-war; A phantom ship, with each mast and spar Across the moon like a prison bar, And a huge black hulk, that was magnified By its own reflection in the tide.

Meanwhile, his friend through alley and street Wanders and watches, with eager ears, Till in the silence around him he hears The muster of men at the barrack door, The sound of arms, and the tramp of feet, And the measured tread of the grenadiers, Marching down to their boats on the shore.

Then he climbed the tower of the Old North Church, By the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread, To the belfry chamber overhead, And startled the pigeons from their perch On the sombre rafters, that round him made Masses and moving shapes of shade,-By the trembling ladder, steep and tall, To the highest window in the wall, Where he paused to listen and look down A moment on the roofs of the town And the moonlight flowing over all.

Beneath, in the churchyard, lay the dead, In their night encampment on the hill, Wrapped in silence so deep and still That he could hear, like a sentinel’s tread, The watchful night-wind, as it went Creeping along from tent to tent, And seeming to whisper, “All is well!”

A moment only he feels the spell Of the place and the hour, and the secret dread Of the lonely belfry and the dead; For suddenly all his thoughts are bent On a shadowy something far away,

Where the river widens to meet the bay,-A line of black that bends and floats On the rising tide like a bridge of boats.

Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride, Booted and spurred, with a heavy stride On the opposite shore walked Paul Revere.

Now he patted his horse’s side, Now he gazed at the landscape far and near, Then, impetuous, stamped the earth, And turned and tightened his saddle girth; But mostly he watched with eager search The belfry tower of the Old North Church, As it rose above the graves on the hill, Lonely and spectral and sombre and still.

And lo! as he looks, on the belfry’s height A glimmer, and then a gleam of light!

He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns, But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight A second lamp in the belfry burns.

A hurry of hoofs in a village street, A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark, And beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, a spark Struck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet; That was all! And yet, through the gloom and the light, The fate of a nation was riding that night; And the spark struck out by that steed, in his flight, Kindled the land into flame with its heat.

He has left the village and mounted the steep, And beneath him, tranquil and broad and deep, Is the Mystic, meeting the ocean tides; And under the alders that skirt its edge, Now soft on the sand, now loud on the ledge, Is heard the tramp of his steed as he rides.

It was twelve by the village clock When he crossed the bridge into Medford town.

He heard the crowing of the cock, And the barking of the farmer’s dog, And felt the damp of the river fog, That rises after the sun goes down.

It was one by the village clock, When he galloped into Lexington.

He saw the gilded weathercock Swim in the moonlight as he passed, And the meeting-house windows, black and bare, Gaze at him with a spectral glare, As if they already stood aghast At the bloody work they would look upon.

It was two by the village clock, When he came to the bridge in Concord town.

He heard the bleating of the flock, And the twitter of birds among the trees, And felt the breath of the morning breeze Blowing over the meadow brown.

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And one was safe and asleep in his bed Who at the bridge would be first to fall, Who that day would be lying dead, Pierced by a British musket ball.

You know the rest. In the books you have read How the British Regulars fired and fled,--How the farmers gave them ball for ball, >From behind each fence and farmyard wall, Chasing the redcoats down the lane, Then crossing the fields to emerge again Under the trees at the turn of the road, And only pausing to fire and load.

So through the night rode Paul Revere; And so through the night went his cry of alarm To every Middlesex village and farm,--A cry of defiance, and not of fear, A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door, And a word that shall echo for evermore!

For, borne on the night-wind of the Past, Through all our history, to the last, In the hour of darkness and peril and need, The people will waken and listen to hear The hurrying hoof-beats of that steed, And the midnight message of Paul Revere.

July 4 - 11, 2014

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

The Washington of the West

By Jeff Morrison Most of us are familiar with the major battles and campaigns of the American Revolution: Bunker Hill, Trenton, Yorktown, and the like. For much of the war Continental forces attempted to match the British in the stand-and-take-it style of conventional warfare the British excelled at. Most of these encounters ended badly for the colonists. Meanwhile, on the frontier west of the Alleghenies, a very different sort of war was being waged.

George Rogers Clark was born in 1752, the second son of John Clark and Ann Rogers of Virginia Colony. A surveyor by trade, as well as a former soldier in the Virginia Militia, he was also an early Kentucky pioneer.

Both his knowledge of the frontier and his familiarity with Indians and Indian-style fighting would serve him well throughout his lifetime. At the outbreak of the Revolutionary War, Virginia Governor Patrick Henry gave Clark a commission of major in the Kentucky Militia and 500 pounds of gunpowder, with the instructions to defend the western frontier against the British and their Indian allies. Clark was just 24 years old.

Despite his youth, older frontiersmen, like Daniel Boone respected, Clark instinctively. Although never commanding an army of more than 200 volunteers, Clark was able to get the best out of his men throughout the war. He successfully repelled several skirmishes made against the Kentucky settlers by Indian bands who were raiding at the behest of British lieutenant governor Henry Hamilton, commander of the British forces at Fort Detroit.

Since the end of the French and Indian Wars earlier in the century, Britain con-

trolled the Northwest Territories that included what is today Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Michigan, from the old French strongpoint of Fort Detroit and several small forts scattered throughout the Ohio Valley. Had Hamilton been given the manpower, he could have conceivably invaded Virginia from the west, with very little to stop him. He was never given enough troops to carry out such a campaign, and relied on orchestrating a proxy war through his Indian allies against the Kentucky frontiersmen instead.

Major Clark understood the potential danger that Fort Detroit represented. He believed that the only way to end the constant Indian raiding and end the invasion threat was to mount a preemptive campaign against the British forts across the Ohio River and, ultimately, against Detroit itself. He presented his plan to Governor Henry in 1777, who responded by promoting Clark to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and authorized Clark to recruit his army.

This was much easier said than done.

Clark had been given very little logistical support for carrying out his orders. He recruited volunteers with promises of postwar land grants, and procured supplies for his troops with promissory drafts against the Continental Congress, neither of which were honored after the war. In the end, Clark was barely able to muster a force of 175 men, which he led north of the Ohio in July, 1778. On July 4th, Clark’s army captured Kaskaskia, in modern Illinois. Within a few weeks they captured several villages and forts under British control, including Vincennes, Indiana. Fort Sackville, at Continued on Page 7

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A Nation’s Strength

By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow What makes a nation’s pillars high And its foundations strong?

What makes it might to defy The foes that round it throng?

It is not gold. Its kingdoms grand Go down in battle shock; Its shafts are laid on sinking sand, Not on abiding rock.

Not gold but only men can make A people great and strong; Men who for truth and honor’s sake Stand fast and suffer long.

I Hear America Singing: by Walt Whitman I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear; Those of mechanics—each one singing his, as it should be, blithe and strong; The carpenter singing his, as he measures his plank of beam, The mason singing his, as he makes ready for work, or leaves off work;

Locally Owned and Operated dba MACHINE PRODUCTS INC Bob & Marilyn Hakl Owners 307-299-0467 401 N. Burma Ave Gillette, WY 82716 307-682-2518 General Machine Shop • Welding/Fabrication • RKI Dealer Complete Trailer Repair • Truck Accessories • Powder Coating

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

The Washington of the West...

Continued from Page 6

Vincennes was captured without a shot being fired.

By December, Lt. Governor Hamilton retook Fort Sackville and Vincennes. Clark responded by conducting a surprising march up the flooded Wabash Valley in February.

He and his men slogged through nearly waist deep water for most of the march, but despite the hardship he was able to arrive on the battlefield without the loss of a single man along the way. After a brief siege, Vincennes was retaken, and Lt. Governor Hamilton found himself a prisoner of war.

In 1780 a combined force of British and Indian fighters invaded Kentucky, capturing two fortified settlements and taking over 100 prisoners. Clark led a counter attack that culminated in a victory at the Shawnee village of Peckuwe. In 1781, the Continental Army finally promised to send 1,000 soldiers to the newly promoted Brigadier General Clark, in order for him to carry out his long-delayed mark on Fort Detroit.

But along the way, the regulars, under the command of Archibald Lochry were ambushed and wiped out by a combined force of British and Indiians Finding that his army lacked sufficient numbers, Clark was forced to abandon his plan to march against Detroit, this time for good.

In August of 1782, ten months after George Washington defeated Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown, another combined British/Indian force raided across the Ohio River into Kentucky, laying siege to a settler’s stockade at Bryan Station. A relieving force of 182 Kentucky militiamen, which included Daniel Boone, was routed at the Battle of Blue Licks the next day. It was the largest defeat the Kentuckians had suffered in the entire war.

Many settlers blamed Clark for not stopping the invasion, even though he was not present at the battle. He responded by raiding across the Ohio one last time, this time with a force of over 1,000 men. But there was no one to fight. Clark’s army burned five Shawnee villages, which had been deserted prior to his arrival, then returned home. Clark returned home a war hero, second only to George Washington in the

eyes of the western frontiersmen. He was just 30 years old.

Being a war hero did not pay very well, as Clark was to discover. The Continental Congress reneged on most of the promissory notes Clark had financed his army with. He was forced to pay much of them off with his own money. From 1784 to 1788, he supervised the land grant surveys for the Virginia veterans, which included his own militiamen.

Clark was asked to lead one last expedition against Indian villages along the Wabash River in 1786, in the opening stages of the Northwest Indian War. The expedition ran out of supplies and over 300 of his men deserted. At the same time a rumor was circulated that Clark was drunk for most of the campaign. It was later learned that the rumors were being spread by James Wilkinson, who was a Spanish secret agent.

Clark demanded an official inquiry, but the request was denied and he was forced to leave the service of Virginia.

Clark moved to Indiana, where he was involved in a failed plot to take the Spanish controlled ports along the Mississippi River by force by the revolutionary French government. The pressure of mounting debt and alcoholism caused Clark’s health to quickly decline. In 1809, Clark fell into a fireplace while suffering a server stroke. His leg was so badly burned it had to be amputated. The rest his life he lived with family member, including his youngest brother, William Clark, of Louis and Clark fame. In 1818, Clark died from another stroke.

Although he died in abject poverty and has been largely ignored by history, the accomplishments of George Rogers Clark during the Revolution had far-reaching consequences. His victory at Vincennes emboldened the government of Virginia, and later the government of the United States, to claim the Northwest Territories. As a result, the British relinquished their claim on the territories after the war, and thus George Rogers Clark, often referred to as the Washington of the West, had effectively doubled the size of what became the United States.

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July 4 - 11, 2014

July 4 - 11, 2014

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

The Declaration of Independence, America’s Greatest Document

The Declaration of Independence, America’s Greatest Document IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America, When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.-That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long estab-

lished should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the

In Their Own Words...

We set off for Concord, and were overtaken by a young gentleman named Prescot, who belonged to Concord, and was going home. When we had got about half way from Lexington to Concord, the other two stopped at a house to awake the men, I kept along ....

In an instant I saw four of them, who rode up to me with their pistols in their bands, said ‘’G---d d---n you, stop. If you go an inch further, you are a dead man.’’ Immediately Mr. Prescot came up. We attempted to get through them, but they kept before us, and swore if we did not turn in to that pasture, they would blow our brains out, (they had placed themselves opposite to a pair of bars, and had taken the bars down). They forced us in. When we had got in, Mr. Prescot said “Put on!” He took to the left, I to the right ...

Just as I reached it, out started six officers, seized my bridle, put their pistols to my breast, ordered me to dismount, which I did.

– Paul Revere, “Account of Midnight Ride to Lexington” (1775)

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accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dan-

gers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

Continued on Page 9

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

July 4 - 11, 2014

Declaration of Independence...

In Their Own Words...

Continued from Page 8

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation: For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us: For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States: For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world: For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent: For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury: For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies: For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments: For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

Letter From John Adams to Abigail Adams

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

Philadelphia July 3. 1776 It is too high and lifted up, for me; who delight in nothing so much as Retreat, Solitude, Silence, and Obscurity. In private Life, no one has a Right to censure me for following my own Inclinations, in Retirement, Simplicity, and Frugality: in public Life, every Man has a Right to remark as he pleases, at least he thinks so.

Yesterday the greatest Question was decided, which ever was debated in America, and a greater perhaps, never was or will be decided among Men. A Resolution was passed without one dissenting Colony “that these united Colonies, are, and of right ought to be free and independent States, and as such, they have, and of Right ought to have full Power to make War, conclude Peace, establish Commerce, and to do all the other Acts and Things, which other States may rightfully do.” You will see in a few days a Declaration setting forth the Causes, which have impell’dUs to this mighty Revolution, and the Reasons which will justify it, in the Sight of God and Man. A Plan of Confederation will be taken up in a few days.

When I look back to the Year 1761, and recollect the Argument concerning Writs of Assistance, in the Superiour Court, which I have hitherto considered as the Commencement of the Controversy, between Great Britain and America, and run through the whole Period from that Time to this, and recollect the series of political Events, the Chain of Causes and Effects, I amsurprized at the Suddenness, as well as Greatness of this Revolution. Britain has been fill’d with Folly, and America with Wisdom, at least this is my judgment. -- Time must determine. It is the Will of Heaven, that the two Countries should be sundered forever. It may be the Will of Heaven that America shall suffer Calamities still more wasting and Distresses yet more dreadfull. If this is to be the Case, it will have this good Effect, at least: it will inspire Us with many Virtues, which We have not, and correct many Errors, Follies, and Vices, which threaten to disturb, dishonour, and destroy Us. -- The Furnace of Affliction produces Refinement, in States as well as Individuals. And the new Governments we are assuming, in every Part, will require a Purification from our Vices, and an Augmentation of our Virtues or they will be no Blessings.

The People will have unbounded Power. And the People are extreamly addicted to Corruption and Venality, as well as the Great. [The letterbook copy of this letter includes the following sentence:] [ I am not without Apprehensions from this Quarter.]-- But I must submit all my Hopes and Fears, to an overruling Providence, in which, unfashionable [ as] the Faith may be, I firmly believe.

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July 4 - 11, 2014

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

238 Years Later

By Glenn Woods

I love to see a Midwestern town draped in waving red, white, and blue on the Fourth of July. As flags go, I think the American flag is one of the best designed, if not the prettiest, on the planet. Then there is the bunting on the stores, and people wearing red, white, and blue clothing. Flags whip down the road on the backs of motorbikes and pickup trucks. It is an inspiring site, and just a heck of a lot of fun.

What other nations celebrate with the smell of BBQ across the backyards and the sounds of children playing on front yard blowup water slides? Then there are the small town parades where everyone stands and cheers when the veterans go marching by.

Nothing beats laying out in the grass of the town park, watching a dog chase a Frisbee. That same dog will later be hiding under the car as the fireworks get underway.

Except for that part where those annoying politicians get up and make speeches, it’s a great day.

But like all July 4th celebrations, we should take an honest, long, hard look at where America is, and reassess where we are going.

Through slavery, civil war, and world wars, America has been tested by everything imaginable. Yet if you think about it, we have been tested by nothing short of what every other nation has been tested by. Like every other nation, we have not been perfect. But, there is

no nation on earth that is, or has been. There is no nation on earth that has come from the testing fires as we have. Overall, I think we, as a nation, should be very proud of ourselves.

I will not pretend that we are not still making mistakes. We will make more.

But, America remains the light of freedom and justice when compared to the rest of the world.

How many other nations will send an army of volunteers to fight to free helpless people around the world from the boot of tyranny?

How many other nations rush so quickly to help after a natural disaster? The people of our nation reach into their pockets to send their own money, and send more than is offered by our own government. Who else in the world can say that?

Can we keep it? We have lost so much over the past few decades. We have lost so much over the past few years.

The predictions that were made about us, even by our own founding fathers, have born true. This experiment in personal freedom may not come to an end because of outside forces.

We might be the cause of our own demise, if we do not make some important changes.

Our nation was founded on the idea that each individual has the right to pursue their lives as they see fit, and the only role that government is to play is that of protector of our freedoms and liberties.

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We have lost generations to the government dole and the idea of a free handout.

We have lost some of that independent, don’t-tell-mewhat-to-do spirit that kept government in its place.

But, we should never throw in the towel and cry that all is lost. Considering all that this nation has been through, a few obnoxious, snobbish, pushy, loud-mouth politicians and bureaucrats in office should not dissuade us from bringing back that independent spirit.

Our fathers before us worked hard, and sacrificed everything, to build a free nation. Then, they passed that precious gift to their children. We are those children, and we owe it to our children to make sure that that precious and rare gift of free will, in a world of socialist, tyrants, and dictators, is not taken.

The argument is a simple one when you think about it: You like that free phone the government gave to you? What happens when they tell you what you can, and can’t, do with it? What will you do when they can no longer afford to offer it to you and they take it back? Well, if you paid for that phone yourself, then no one could tell you what you could, and could not, do with it, and no one could take it from you. It would be yours. Same goes for your healthcare, your house, your car, and your freedom of expression, freedom of thought, and freedom to travel. If you accept the un-

earned, you must then accept the rules that go with it.

Better that you earn it yourself, so then you can make your own rules.

Simple lessons, like the one above, need to be taught to the children that are playing on that Slip -nSlide out in the front yard this Fourth of July.

The Fourth is about celebrating our independence.

It takes an independentminded person to properly celebrate it. That free-thinking spirit is what we must work to restore.

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

July 4 - 11, 2014

July 4 - 11, 2014

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

The Forgotten Founding Father

By Nicholas DeLaat My Dearest Friend The second day of July 1776 will be the most memorable epocha in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated to be commemorated as the Day of Deliverance by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations from one end of this continent to the other from this time forward forever more.

-Letter from John Adams to his wife Abigail Adams the written the night of July 02, 1776 Monday, July 1, 1776 began hot and steamy in Philadelphia, and before the morning was ended a full-scale summer storm would break. John Adams, as usual, was out of bed before dawn. “This morning is assigned the greatest debate of all,” he said in a letter to former delegate Archibald Bulloch that was written by Adams that morning before walking to the State House. “A declaration, that these colonies are free and independent states, has been reported by a committee some weeks ago for that purpose, and this day or tomorrow is to determine its fate. May Heaven prosper the newborn republic.”

Everything that could or need be said on the question of independence had been exhausted in Congress. Presumably, the question could be put forth and decided on with little further ado. But it was not to be. John Dickinson, the Quaker from Pennsylvania, had resolved to make one last appeal, and Adams would be obliged to answer.

John Adams had already been very involved in events leading up to this monumental time. He had defended the British soldiers that shot the Americans at the Boston Massacre, stating that “If, by supporting the rights of mankind, and of invincible truth, I shall contribute to save from the agonies of death one unfortunate victim of tyranny, or of ignorance, equally fatal, his blessings and years of transport

will be sufficient consolation to me for the contempt of all mankind.”

He was selected on to the committee to draft the Declaration of Independence that was currently put before Congress, along with Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman, and Robert Livingston. These Declaration’s authors came to be known as the ‘Committee of Five.’

Thomas Jefferson originally authored two pages, and in them called for freeing the slaves. Adams and Franklin removed the second page and edited much of the first page. Although both of them were abolitionists, Adams and Franklin agreed that the southern states would not sign if slaves were freed, and the war was not winnable without all thirteen colonies. Jefferson hated the drafted document presented to congress, and later wanted only to be remembered (as is currently written on his grave) to be remembered for his proudest achievement, to establish a freedom of religion in the Virginia Constitution.

Adams, borrowing a statement from the Pennsylvania Constitution that declared “All men are, and by nature equal and free: no-one has a right to any authority over another without his consent: all lawful government is founded on the consent of those who are subject to it,” used this statement to help edit the beginning of the Declaration; personally stating in his diary the evening of the edit (June 21, 1776) that “Nature throws us all into the world equal and alike…The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man (Kings and all officials included) to endanger public liberty.”

Adams was one of the first publicly elected figures that had fought verbally and politically for independence from the beginning. He had struggled to keep a balance with the need for all possible haste, on one hand, and the need to keep from pushing too fast and forcing events too soon, on the other hand. “The only question is concerning the proper time for making a Continued on Page 13

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Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

July 4 - 11, 2014

The Forgotten Founding Father...

specific declaration in words,” Adams wrote.

No one in Congress had worked harder or had done more to bring about a break with Britain. But it was the fact of independence more than the words on paper that concerned Adams. Especially for what it would do to unify the colonies and bring “spirit” to American military operations.

“Facts are stubborn things,” he had argued in defense of the British soldiers after the Boston Massacre, and as stubborn as any of the large facts bearing heavily on his mind now was, “the bloody conflict we are destined to endure.”

At ten o’ clock, with the doors closed, John Hancock sounded the gavel. Richard Henry Lee’s prior motion calling for independence was again read out loud. The Congress resolved itself to a committee of the whole and “resumed consideration.”

Immediately, Dickinson, gaunt and deathly pale, stood to be heard. He had contracted the flu the day before, but resolved to be present. With marked earnestness, he marshaled all past argument and reasoning against “premature” separation from Britain. “He had prepared himself apparently with great labor and ardent zeal,” Adams would later write in his letter to Abigail.

“He conducted the debate not only with great ingenuity and eloquence, but with equal politeness and candor.”

“To proceed now with a declaration of independence,” Dickinson said, “would be to brace the storm in a skiff made of paper.” When he sat down, all was silent except for the rain that had begun spattering against the windows. No one spoke, and no one rose to answer him, until Adams was at last ‘determined to speak.’

“I wish now as never in my life,” Adams began, “that I had the gifts of the ancient orators of Greece and Rome, for I am certain none of them ever had before them a question of greater importance.” Outside the wind picked up. The storm struck with thunder, lightning, and pelting rain. In his schoolmaster days at Worcester, Adams had recorded how such storms “unstrung” him. Now he spoke on steadily, making the case for independence as he had so often before, but with great vigor. Though he was still young (40 years) he carried a cane for the occasion to use during his

speech. His voice cut through the silence for more than an hour, echoing off the walls through the sound of rain outside.

Using timing, when he noticed lightning flashes, he would quickly raise his voice and bash his cane into the floor making a loud thud just before the thunder shook the room, raising his voice to his points as the sounds would wither.

“Objects of the most stupendous magnitude, measures in which the lives and liberties of millions, born and unborn are most essentially interested, are now before us.

We are in the very midst of revolution, the most complete, unexpected, and remarkable of any in the history of the world.”

No transcription was made, and the only bits of Adams’ famous speech that remain, lay in other delegates’ personal diaries.

Jefferson wrote that Adams that day was “not graceful nor elegant, nor remarkably fluent, but spoke with a power of thought and expression that moved us from our seats.”

Richard Stockton, one of the delegates from New Jersey wrote that “Adams was the Atlas of the hour, the man to whom the country is most indebted for the great measure of independency…It was he who sustained the debate, and by the force of his reasoning demonstrated not only the justice, but the expediency of the measure.”

All remembered that it was the most powerful and important speech heard in Congress since it was first convened, and the greatest speech of Adams’s life, without question. Afterwards Hewes of North Carolina, who had long opposed separation from Britain, started suddenly upright, and lifting up both his hands to Heaven, as if he had been in a trance, cried out “It is done! And I will abide by it.”

But when later that evening a preliminary vote was taken, four colonies unexpectedly held back, refusing to proclaim independence. The all-important Pennsylvania delegation, despite popular opinion in Pennsylvania, stood with John Dickinson and voted no (Franklin as well, but so he could move the vote later, using his master of diplomacy). The New York delegates abstained, saying they favored the motion but lacked specific instructions. South Carolina, too, surprisingly voted no, while Delaware, with only two delegates pres-

Continued from Page 12

ent, also abstained. Edward Rutledge rescued the moment by moving that a final vote be postponed until the next day. The atmosphere that night at City Tavern and in the lodging houses of the delegates was extremely tense. The Question now was how many of the rest who were in league with Dickinson would on the morrow continue, in Adams’s words, to “vote point blank against the known and declared sense of their constituents.” To compound the tension that night, word reached Philadelphia of the sighting off New York of a hundred British ships, the first arrivals of a fleet that would number over four hundred.

Though the record of all that happened the following day, Tuesday, July 2, is sparse, it appears that just as the doors to Congress were about to be closed at the usual hour of nine o’clock, Ceasar Rodney, mud-spattered, ‘booted and spurred,’ made his dramatic entrance calling out “I am here, and here for my delegation from Delaware to vote independence.”

Yet more important than the arrival of Rodney, which turned South Carolina and Delaware delegations to vote for independence, were two empty chairs among the Pennsylvania delegation. Refusing to vote for independence but understanding the need for Congress to speak with one voice, John Dickinson and Robert Morris had voluntarily absented themselves from the proceedings, thus allowing Franklin to vote Pennsylvania into Independence.

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That night before, both Dickinson and Morris had been visited by Franklin and Adams and upon finding that Dickinson was a Quaker and Morris against direct violence, Adams asked “but do you see the need for Independence? The British have already killed, we are no longer a part of our government…so what do you suggest, put our children in chains?”

Dickinson is known to reply “yes, I know we must be independent, but I cannot vote for blood, my own or others, of any kind.” Franklin then responded “But what if you’re not present to vote?”

The vote was then cast. And so it was done that on July 02, 1776, in Philadelphia, the American colonies declared independence.

Why do we celebrate Independence day on July 04? Because most of the documents, other than the Declaration of Independence, itself, including orders, documents, logs, journals, and letters from the actual delegates, went missing until the 20th century. When the holiday was first proposed, the date on the top of the document was used, which was the day it was signed - not decided.

John Adams, though not on the same pedestal as Washington, Franklin, and Jefferson, may be our greatest founding father. He is, at least, one who deserves much more of our attention, and one to whom we absolutely owe our freedom and our country, too.

July 4 - 11, 2014

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

We Need More Rebels A Commentary by Campbell County Observer Publisher Nicholas DeLaat So, what is July Fourth all about? Rebellion. A celebration of Rebellion.

If you currently turn on the news, you see many of the problems that our supposed ‘free’ society currently has. You have a tax collecting agency performing an extreme amount of AD’s (accidental discharge of firearms), the same agency that is now in charge of government-run health care (though their union is threatening to strike if they have to abide by it). Oh, and let’s not forget that that same agency is specifically targeting a percentage of law abiding, tax-paying citizens because of their political beliefs.

We see Benghazi. But I am not sure if we ever will get the truth of why our soldiers died simply because of bad politics. Also, there is the justice department illegally listening to the private phone conversations of journalists. This causes their valuable sources to disappear, along with the ability to hold government accountable to the people via the press.

In many other recent acts, the Supreme Court found that it is ok to fine a person for choosing not to have health insurance and paying doctors with cash. States have been enacting firearm laws to the point where citizens cannot protect themselves against threats to themselves and their property, which the second amendment was designed to protect. Property rights have been replaced by policies that say that your property is too grand, and others (the needy) need it more, which enables legalized theft. There is monitoring, tracking, and recording of law abiding citizens, as well as restrictions on business that have brought entrepreneurship to a complete halt in this country…and we could go on and on and on.

I have always been a self-taught historian on our founding fathers, colonial times, and the American Revolution. I rarely read biographies or books about the time period; preferring instead to read letters, journals, pamphlets, old newspapers, and orders directly from the hands of our founding fathers. When I hear “Our founding fathers

would have rolled over in their graves,” I always sigh and state, “Which one?”

Two of our four most active founding fathers wrote a string of letters about political philosophy, religion, theology, oration, agriculture, family, history, politics, events, and the future of the United States of America.

John Adams and Thomas Jefferson were vastly different in thought but were both so vital in the formation of our country that it wouldn’t exist as it does today without those two.

As I was doing research for this special edition of the Campbell County Observer’s ‘Happy Birthday America,’ I realized a few things that all of our founding fathers would have been in agreement on. Mainly that this is not the country that they envisioned.

Just look at gun rights. In 1775, Lieutenant Colonel Francis Smith received orders from General Gage on the afternoon of April 18, with instructions not to read them until his troops were underway. He was to proceed from Boston “with utmost expedition and secrecy to Concord, where you will seize and destroy... all Military stores...

But you will take care that the soldiers do not plunder the inhabitants or hurt private property.”

The second amendment was written specifically to protect you and your family’s lives and property, as well as the lives and property of your neighbors. It was also intended to provide protection from invasion; the militia of the state being essential as a military reserve. However, what most people forget is, it was also intended to provide protection from, and to be a check and balance against our own government.

I once had a debate with an anti-gun person who agreed with basic firearms but not assault rifles, saying that civilian personnel should not have military grade weapons.

My response was the march from Concord to Boston. If you research those initial Revolutionary battles in detail, you will find that it was the newly developed long rifles of the frontiersmen that allowed the Americans to

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We Need More Rebels...

Continued from Page 14

gain the upper hand over the lesser, inadequate British smooth-bore muskets. Of course times have changed, but in a world of drones, satellites, long range missiles, tanks, nuclear powered ships, and complete surveillance networks, is having the best hand-held weapon for self-protection and the protection of those around you so much to ask?

So, I have a tradition where every year I sit down and read the Declaration of Independence to my children on July 4th (yes, I know our actual Independence Day is on the 2nd, but let’s not confuse them yet they need to pass their state PAWS test, after all) I am going to do something a little different this year. As I read the justifications for the Declarations that were made, I am going to compare them to today’s time.

Let’s look at a few of them now: *He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.”

The public good will never be made by entitlement, as in the words of Ben Franklin “I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. In my youth I travelled much, and I observed in different countries, that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer.” *He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.”

The Federal Government has put a stranglehold on states by ignoring the 10th amendment of the Constitution while threatening the states and ordering policies against their wishes such as No-Child Left Behind, educational practices, firearm laws, AFCA, the Patriot Act, and much more. They financially punish the economically viable states (like Wyoming) for the need of the welfare states. Founding Father Joseph Story stated that “The state governments have a full superintendence and control over the immense mass of local interests of their respective states, which connect themselves with the feelings, the

affections, the municipal institutions, and the internal arrangements of the whole population. They possess, too, the immediate administration of justice in all cases, civil and criminal, which concern the property, personal rights, and peaceful pursuits of their own citizens.” *He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

Do you mean the hundreds of bills that are always hundreds if not thousands of pages long, while keeping as much as they can from the media so the people will only know what they want them to know? I dare you to name one public official Federal and Local that has provided full disclosure of all of his duties, votes, speeches, and opinions of public policy. Founding Father Patrick Henry Stated that “The liberties of a people never were, nor ever will be, secure, when the transactions of their rulers may be concealed from them.” *He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

Executive orders, bureaucratic written policies, and laws made by the court of appeals and our supreme court make our laws now, not our stalemate and partisan elected representatives. Alexander Hamilton wrote “[The Judicial Branch] may truly be said to have neither FORCE nor WILL, but merely judgment; and must ultimately depend upon the aid of the executive arm even for the efficacy of its judgments. It is up to the elected legislators alone, the only branch representing the people, to create the polies to be enforced by executives and approved by judges.” *He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

Does it seem that the worst crimes in this country (besides pedophilia) are performed by the government? Theft, manslaughter, privacy invasion, unwarranted information gathering, property rights attacks, and much more…including, treason (or if they were not public officials many would be charged with treason). Samuel Adams wrote ““If ever time should come, when vain and aspiring men shall possess the highest

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seats in Government, our country will stand in need of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin.” *He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

Um…Supreme Court and Court of Appeals admitting to creating policy based on their personal political agenda ring a bell?

Lest they worry about their careers. Justice Kagan stated in her conformation that her constitutional values were not valid as a supreme court judge, but that her American Policies for the general welfare of the public was the only information necessary.

Thomas Jefferson wrote “[T]he opinion which gives to the judges the right to decide what laws are constitutional and what not, not only for themselves, in their own sphere of action, but for the Legislature and Executive also in their spheres, would make the

Judiciary a despotic branch.” *He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.”

There are currently an estimated 22,461,691 Federal employees. Add in the harassment of State, County, Township, and local employees, and we now have 26.4% of our entire population being employed by government. Thomas Jefferson wrote, “I think we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious.” *He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:”

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Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

We Need More Rebels...

Continued from Pages 14 & 15

The defining of the powers in our constitution is no longer used, and I dare you to name one amendment to the Bill of Rights that you are currently protected under. In a short list, there are ardent restraints on Speech, Assembly, Press, Warrant, Search and Seizure, States Rights, Personal Protection and Due Process. Patrick Henry wrote “The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government -- lest it come to dominate our lives and interests.” *For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States: *For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world: *For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent: *For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury: *For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments: *He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.”

On April 14, 1775, General Gage received instructions from Secretary of State William Legge, Earl of Dartmouth, to disarm the rebels, who were known to have hidden weapons in Concord, among other locations, and to imprison the rebellion’s leaders - especially Samuel Adams and John Hancock. Dartmouth gave Gage considerable discretion in his commands. Most say that an event like this could never happen in this current society.

Now, you may say, “Why are you writing this kind of editorial?” Yes, I have been called a ‘rabble rouser’, an ‘instigator’, a ‘provocateur’, and even a ‘demagogue’ by many local people and very recently. But assumptions are usually a person’s worst enemy; making leaders and intelligent people into just another part of the ignorant masses. People have said that I use my newspaper to push a political agenda. My answer? Of course I do.

Benjamin Franklin once said, “The freedom of the press only extends to those that

own one.” I have spent a lifetime learning about economics, politics, history, and philosophy (and have a lifetime more to learn), specifically to obtain my own freedom and to understand how it can be taken away. I have volunteered for military service overseas specifically to serve other free people of equal thought. I will always continue to fight to maintain for future generations of my family what the Declaration of Independence clearly defined as the American way of thought.

No, I am not calling for the citizens to take up arms against their government. But there are other ways of fighting. To prepare to fight you must educate yourself, with some of that education being what you may not want to hear. You must study philosophy in order to interpret all of your information, and to know what is good for all of mankind.

But most of all, all governments, even with good intentions, will grow to slowly take away a man’s freedom for the sake of its own; and in a government of the people, only the people can stop it.

What am I celebrating this Fourth of July?

That a few great men did just that, against the world’s greatest super power…and won. Why do we all celebrate this holiday?

Because being a ‘rabble rouser’, an ‘instigator’, a ‘provocateur’, and even a ‘demagogue’, is nothing short of being called a true American in heart, blood, and soul… and I am proud to be called a veteran, an American, and to be born on July 02…our actual Independence Day! “Now more than ever before, the people are responsible for the character of their Congress. If that body be ignorant, reckless and corrupt, it is because the people tolerate ignorance, recklessness and corruption. If it be intelligent, brave and pure, it is because the people demand these high qualities to represent them in the national legislature.... If the next centennial does not find us a great nation ... it will be because those who represent the enterprise, the culture, and the morality of the nation do not aid in controlling the political forces.”

James Garfield, the twentieth president of the United States, 1877 “Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote!”

Benjamin Franklin

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“I’m not afraid to go, and I haven’t a man that’s afraid to go.”

-Captain Isaac Davis of the Acton, Massachusetts Militia, declared his willingness to defend a town not their own.

In Their Own Words...

Letter from Abigail Adams to John Adams, 13 - 14 July 1776

Sunday July 14, 1776 By yesterdays post I received two Letters dated 3 [John to Abigail, 03 July 1776] and 4 of July [No letter written by JA on 4 July 1776 is known, but JA sent a second letter on 3 July [John to Abigail, 03 July 1776 (second)] .] and tho your Letters never fail to give me pleasure, be the subject what it will, yet it was greatly heightned by the prospect of the future happiness and glory of our Country; nor am I a little Gratified when I reflect that a person so nearly connected with me has had the Honour of being a principal actor, in laying a foundation for its future Greatness. May the foundation of our new constitution, be justice, Truth and Righteousness. Like the wise Mans house may it be founded upon those Rocks and then neither storms or temptests will overthrow it.

I cannot but feel sorry that some of the most Manly Sentiments in the Declaration are Expunged from the printed coppy. Perhaps wise reasons induced it.

I suppose you have heard of a fleet which came up pretty near the Light and kept us all with our mouths open ready to catch them, but after staying near a week and makeing what observations they could set sail and went of to our great mortification who were [prepared?] to for them in every respect. If our Ship of 32 Guns which [was] Built at Portsmouth and waiting only for Guns andan other of [ . . . ] at Plimouth in the same state, had been in readiness we should in all probability been Masters of them. Where the blame lies in that respect I know not, tis laid upon Congress, and Congress is also blamed for not appointing us a General. -- But Rome was not Built in a day.

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

July 4 - 11, 2014

Would There Have Been an American Revolution Without Newspapers or Mail?

Re-printed with the expressed written consent of Professor Isaiah Thomas - Boston University The Problem of Becoming “One” Although Benjamin Franklin proposed “We are One” as one of the mottos to be printed on Continental Currency in 1776 and designed a logo of interlocking rings to reinforce his message, it was not an easy matter for the thirteen original colonies to come together in the Revolutionary Era. Before you can agree with another person or group or feel connected to them in any meaningful way, you need to be able to share information and exchange ideas.

In the twenty-first century, you may have an interesting encounter with a person you meet on a trip, but unless you continue your face-to-face conversations in some other form by exchanging letters, emails, or phone calls, you are unlikely to be able to build a real friendship. The kinds of quick

long-distance communication that we take for granted were not, however, available to the colonists.

In some respects, it was easier for a colonist to communicate with those in England than with people in other colonies. The workings of both government and trade relied on regular exchanges between the colonists and the “mother” country. And to a large extent colonists thought of themselves essentially as “British” and as members of a particular British colony. When people described themselves as “Americans” in the first half of the eighteenth century, they were generally talking about themselves as members of a group of people who shared certain practical, political, and economic concerns. The term “American” had not yet gained the weight of meaning it has since

accumulated and was not yet connected to any deep sense of an identity based on a unified set of beliefs, practices, laws, and traditions. In fact, it was the 1770’s that our present-day understanding of what it means to be an American truly began to develop.

As Andrew Burstein writes in Sentimental Democracy, Inventing a nation entails giving definition to the character of the people, identifying their compatible qualities and common understandings, cultivating a sense of moral community. In the United States, this process is still going on.. . . Almost every such attempt to define the nation’s identity can be linked in some way to an embellishment of the language and events of the American Revolution . . . .

A single colony would not have had the

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power to establish independence from England. Revolution required unity, and the only way to make “from many, one” was to establish a serious and continuing conversation among the American people that could transcend geographical boundaries and connect the people of the green mountains of Vermont to their counterparts in the back country of Virginia. The conversation also needed to transcend boundaries of class and connect mechanics, merchants, farmers, ministers, land owners, sailors, women, servants, and all other members of the society. Finding a way to connect with one another despite their differences was one of the major challenges confronting the colonists as their troubles with Britain began to

Continued on Pages 18, 19 & 20

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Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

American Revolution Without Newspapers or Mail... Continued from Page 17 deepen. In the years after the war, John Adams explained conditions in the years leading up to the Revolution in this way: The colonies had grown up under constitutions of government so different; there was so great a variety of religions; they were composed of so many different nations; their customs, manners, and habits had so little resemblance; and their intercourse had been so rare and their knowledge of each other so imperfect that to unite them in the same principles in theory and the same system of action was certainly a very difficult enterprise.

Loyalist Daniel Leonard, writing on January 9, 1776 as Massachusetts in the Boston Gazette, used precisely this sense of division as a basis for warning that a revolution would be disastrous for “Americans”: Earlier Attempts to Join (or Die!) In the years leading up to the 1770’s, there had been a few periods of intense “conversation” in the face of other crises such as the French and Indian War and the Stamp Act Crisis. For example, in 1754, representatives from seven colonies worked together at the Albany Convention to arrange a treaty with the Iroquois. Always ready to seize any opportunity to encourage the exchange of ideas and coordinated action, Benjamin Franklin put forth a Plan for Colonial Union similar in many ways to the Plan for Union proposed by William Penn in 1697 to the London Board of Trade.

Both proposals called for each colony to send representatives to regular meetings for the purpose of conferring, making joint decisions, and speaking with one voice on behalf of the American people.

The crown’s unwillingness to allow the colonies to coordinate their affairs suggests why a revolution was later required in order to achieve independence. But the fact that the assemblies of several colonies also voted down the proposal indicates that there were more immediate obstacles to unity. Franklin would, no doubt, have been pleased had he known that many of the recommendations both he and Penn proposed would be incorporated into the United States Constitution when it was adopted in 1787. However, it is also easy to imagine how exasperated he would have been to learn that over thirty years would lapse before the union he sought would be achieved.

Frustrated by the unwillingness of colonial legislatures to accept his “Plan for

Colonial Union”out of fear they might lose individual power by agreeing to work jointly, Franklin designed and published this simple warning: “Join, or Die.” This icon would later gain popularity and importance as a revolutionary symbol.

Consider, then, the difficulties faced by the thirteen colonies. Separated by vast distances and in many cases quite different from one another in their beliefs, business transactions, and cultures, what hope was there that they could unite in a common cause against England? If Benjamin Franklin was right and it was important to “Join, or Die,” how could the colonists find means of communicating so they could join together?

The Communications Revolution that Made the American Revolution Possible The fact that the colonists succeeded in “becoming one” made the revolution particularly worthy of study for John Adams.

He marveled: The complete accomplishment of it in so short a time and by such simple means was perhaps a singular example in the history of mankind. Thirteen clocks were made to strike together: a perfection of mechanism which no artist had ever before effected.

Adams hinted at the nature of the “mechanism” when he directed Americans interested in finding how the Revolution had come about to look at the “records, records, pamphlets, newspaper, and even handbills, which in any way contributed to change the temper and views of the people, and compose them into an independent nation.”

So effective was the exchange of every mode of print, speech, and handwritten material as a means of uniting the colonies, that, for example, revolutionary language by 1773 was sounding in virtually every adult ear in Massachusetts, and that there was a fluid continuum of discourse joining the Boston press and town meeting and the talk in meetings and taverns throughout the Province.

In pictures commemorating the reading of the Declaration of Independence, we see how that exchange worked. The final version of the Declaration, a piece of writing that had been drafted by a committee and revised in response to countless debates, was copied by hand and printing press so it could be sent out to the people. Riders carried copies to George Washington and

a series of towns and cities, and at each location a person would read the Declaration aloud to the people. In the depiction below, we can see how the reading of the document inevitably led to countless other conversations, meetings, and pieces of writing.

Edwin Austin Abbey’s “Reading the Declaration of Independence By John Nixon, From the Steps of Indepedence Hall, “ Philadelphia July 8 1776 - p.573 Harper’s Weekly 15 July 1876.

In a very real sense, the American revolution could NOT have happened without Newspapers and the other systems by which Americans exchanged ideas. Building consensus and a communal identity required a shared understanding that could only be developed through an ongoing civic conversation that took place through the use of informal conversations, letters, speeches, meetings, newspapers, pamphlets, broadsides, and books.

History of Revolutionary Newspapers in America Isaiah Thomas clearly believed that newspapers and other forms of printing served an important role in the revolution.

He wrote: Common sense in common language is necessary to ifluence one class of citizens, as much as learning and elegance of composition are to produce an effect upon the other. The cause of America was just, and it was only necessary to state this cause in a clear and impressive manner, to unite the American people in its support.

In the following excerpt from The History of Printing in America, Isaiah Thomas describes the ways in which specific newspapers supported the revolution.

The Growth of Newspapers in the Revolutionary Era In 1754, four newspapers only were printed in New England, these were all published in Boston, and, usually, on a small sheet.; They were published weekly, and the average number of copies did not exceed six hundred from each press. No paper had then been issued in Connecticut, or New Hampshire. Some years before, one was printed for a short time in Rhode Island, but had been discontinued for want of encouragement. Vermont as a state did not exist, and the country which now composes it was then a wilderness. In 1775, a period of only twenty-one years, more copies of a newspaper were issued weekly from the village press at Worcester, Massachusetts,

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than were printed in all New England, in 1755; and one paper now published contains as much matter as did all the four published in Boston, in the last year mentioned.

At the beginning of 1775, there were five newspapers published in Boston, one at Salem, and one at Newburyport, making seven in Massachusetts. There was, at that time, one published at Portsmouth; and no other in New Hampshire. One was printed at Newport, and one at Providence, making two in Rhode Island. At New London there was one, at New Haven one, one at Hartford and one in Norwich; in all four I Connecticut;and fourteen in New England.

In the province of New York, four papers were then published; three in the city and one in Albany. In Pennsylvania there were, on the first of January, 1775, six; three in English and one in German, in Philadelphia, one in German, at Germantown; and one in English and German, at Lancaster.

Before the end of January, 1775, three newspapers, in English, were added to the number from the presses I Philadelphia, making nine in Pennsylvania. In Maryland, two; one at Annapolis, and one at Baltimore. In Virginia, there were but two, and both of these at Williamsburg. One was printed at Wilmington, and one in Newbern, in North Carolina; three at Charleston, South Carolina; and one at Savannah, in Georgia. Making thirty-seen newspapers in all the British colonies, which are now comprised in the United States. To these may be added one at Halifax, in Nova Scotia; and one in Canada, at Quebec.

In 1800, there were at least one hundred and fifty publications of this kind printed in the United States of America, and since that time, the number has increased to three hundred and sixty. Those published before 1775 were weekly papers. Soon after the close of the Revolutionary war, daily papers were printed at Philadelphia, New York, &c., and there are now, 1810, more than twenty published, daily, in the United States.

It was common for printers of newspapers to subjoin to their titles ‘Containing the freshest Advices both Foreign and Domestick;’ but gazettes and journals are now chiefly filled with political essays. News do not appear to be always the first object of editors, and, of course, ‘containing the freshest advices,’ &c., is too often out of the question.

Continued on Pages 19 & 20

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July 4 - 11, 2014

American Revolution Without Newspapers or Mail... Continued from Pages 17 & 18 For many years after the establishment of newspapers on this continent, very few advertisements appeared in them. This was the case with those that were early printed in Europe. In the first newspapers, advertisements were not separated by lines from the news, &c., and were not even begun with a two line letter; when two line letters were introduced, it was some time before one advertisement was separated from another by a line, or rule as it is termed by printers. After it became usual to separate advertisements, some printers used lines of metal rules; others lines of flowers irregularly placed. I have seen in some New York papers, great primer flowers between advertisements. At length, it became customary to ‘set off advertisements,’ and from using types not larger than those with which the news were printed, types of the size of French canon have often been used for names, especially of those who advertised English goods.

In the troublesome times, occasioned by the stamp act in 1765, some of the more opulent and cautious printers, when the act was to take place, put their papers in mourning, and, for a few weeks, omitted to publish them; others not so timid, but doubtful of the consequence of publishing newspapers without stamps, omitted the titles, or altered them, as an evasion; for instance the Pennsylvania Gazette, and some other papers, were headed ‘Remarkable Occurrences, &c.’ -other printers, particularly those in Boston, continued their papers without any alteration in title or imprint.

From the foregoing it appears that, from the time when the first public journal was published in the country, viz. in April, 1704, to April 1775, comprising a period of seventy-one years, seventy-eight different newspapers were printed in the British American continental colonies; that during this period, thirty-nine, exactly one-half of that number, had been, occasionally, discontinued; and that thirty-nine continued to be issued by the several establishments at the commencement of the revolution. The papers published in the West Indies are not included in this computation.

In the course of thirty-five years, newspaper establishments were, as previously remarked, multiplied in a surprising degree; insomuch, that the number of those printed in the United States in June, 1810, amounted to upwards of three hundred and sixty.

A large proportion of the public papers at

that date were established, and supported, by the two great contending political parties, into which the people of these states are usually divided; and whose numbers produce an equipollence; consequently, a great augmentation of vehicles for carrying on the political warfare have been found necessary.

I cannot conclude what I have written on the subject of publike journals, better than by extracting the following pertinent observations on newspapers, from the Rev. Dr. Miller’s Retrospect of the Eighteenth Century.

‘It is worthy of remark that newspapers have almost entirely changed their form and character within the period under reviewFor a long time after they were first adopted as a medium of communication to the public, they were confined, in general, to the mere statement of facts. But they have gradually assumed an office more extensive, and risen to a more important station in society.

They have become vehicles of discussion, in which the principles of government, the interests of nations, the spirit and tendency of public measures, and the public and private characters of individuals, are all arraigned, tried, and decided. Instead, therefore, of being considered now, as they once were, of small moment in society, they have become immense oral and political engines, closely connected with the welfare of the state, and deeply involving both its peace and prosperity.

‘Newspapers have also become important in a literary view. There are few of them, within the last twenty years, which have not added to their political details some curious and useful information, on the various subjects of literature, science, and art. They have thus become the means of conveying, to every class in society, innumerable scraps of knowledge, which have at once increased the public intelligence, and extended the taste for perusing periodical publications. The advertisements, moreover, which they daily contain, respecting new books, projects, inventions, discoveries and improvements, are well calculated to enlarge and enlighten the public mind, and are worth of being enumerated among the many methods of awakening and maintaining the popular attention, with which more modern times, beyond all preceeding example, abound…

The Royal American Magazine A Prospectus of this work appeared many

months before the magazine; but the disordered state of public affairs, and the difficulties which individuals experienced from them, prevented it from being sooner put to press; and after a few numbers had been published, the distress occasioned the inhabitants of Boston by shutting up and blockading their port, obliged its editor to suspend the publication.

The first number for January, 1774, was published at the close of that month. It was printed on a large medium paper in octavo, on a new handsome type. Each number contained three sheets of letter press, and two copperplate engravings. The title was, The Royal American Magazine, or Universal Repository of Instruction and Amusement. The type metal cut in the title page, represented, by an aboriginal, America seated on the ground; at her feet lay a quiver, and near her a bow on her right hand rested; in her left hand she held the calumet of peace, which she appeared to offer to the Genius of Knowledge standing before her dispensing instruction. Imprint, ‘Boston: Printed by and for Isaiah Thomas, near the Market.’ Then follow the names of several printers on the continent who sold the work.

The editor, after having been at considerable trouble and expense in bringing the work before the public, published it six months, and then was obliged, first to suspend, and afterwards to relinquish it; but Joseph Greenleaf continued the publication until April following, when the war put a period to the magazine.

This was the last periodical work established in Boston before the revolution. It had a considerable list of subscribers.

The Universal Instructor in all Arts and Sciences: And Pennsylvania Gazette. This was the second newspaper established in the province; it has been continued under the title of The Pennsylvania Gazette to the present time, and is now the oldest newspaper in the United States.

No. 1, was published December 24,1728,

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by Samuel Keimer, on a small sheet, pot size, folio. In No. 2, the publisher adopted the style of the Quakers, and dated it “The 2d of the 11th mo. 1728.” The first and second pages of each sheet were generally occupied with extracts from Chambers’s Dictionary; this practice was continued until the 25th of the 7th mo. 1729, in which the article Air concludes the extracts.

When the paper had been published nine months, the printer had not procured one hundred subscribers.

Franklin, soon after he began business, formed the design of publishing a newspaper, but was prevented by the sudden appearance of this Gazette: he was greatly disappointed; and, as he observes used his endeavors to bring it into contempt. He was successful, and the publisher, being obliged to relinquish it, for a trifling consideration resigned it to Franklin. At this time Franklin was in partnership with Hugh Meredith; they began printing this paper with No. 40, and published it a few weeks on Mondays and Thursdays, on a whole or half sheet, pot, as occasion required. The price “ten shillings per annum.” The first part of the title they expunged, and called their paper “The Pennsylvania Gazette. Containing the freshest Advices Foreign and Domestick.” The Gazette, under their management, gained reputation, but until Franklin obtained the appointment of postmaster, Bradford’s Mercury had the largest circulation; after this event, the Gazette had a full proportion of subscribers and of advertising custom, and it became very profitable.

Meredith and Franklin separated in May 1732, Franklin continued the Gazette, but published it only once a week. In 1733, he printed it on a crown half sheet in quarto.

-Imprint, “Philadelphia: Printed by B. Franklin, Post-Master, at the New Printing-Office near the Market. Price 10 s. a year. Where Advertisements are taken in, and Book-

Continued on Page 20

“Tens of thousands of brave Americans died to break the chains of British tyranny so that the principles of our Declaration of Independence could take fold and flourish in the birth of a new nation.”

- Jim Gerlach

July 4 - 11, 2014

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

American Revolution Without Newspapers or Mail...

Continued from Pages 17, 18 & 19

Binding is done reasonably in the best manner.” In 1741, he enlarged the size to a demy, quarto half sheet, and added a cut of the Pennsylvania arms in the title. In 1745, he reverted to foolscap folio. In 1747 the Gazette was published “By B. Franklin Postmaster, and D. Hall;” it was enlarged to a whole sheet, crown, folio; and afterward, by a great increase of advertisements to a sheet, and ofte4n to a sheet and a half demy. On the 9th of May, 1754, the device of a snake, divided into parts, with the motto-”Join or die,” I believe, first appeared in this paper. It accompanied an account of the French and Indians having killed and scalped many of the inhabitants in the frontier counties of Virginia and Pennsylvania. The account was published with this device with a view to rouse the british colonies, and cause them to unite in effectual measures for their defence and security, against the common enemy. The snake was divided into eight parts, to represent, first, Newengland; second, Newyork; third, Newjersey; fourth, Pennsylvania; fifth, Maryland; sixth, Virginia; seventh, Northcarolina; and, eighth, Southcarolina. The account and the figures appeared in several other papers, and had a good effect.

The Gazette was put into mourning October 31, 16i5, on account of the stamp act passed by the British parliament, which was to take effect the next day. From that time until the 21st of November following, the publication of it was suspended. In the interim, large handbills, as substitutes, were published, headed “Remarkable Occurrences.” - “No Stamped paper to be had,” &c. When revived, it was published without an imprint until February 6, 1766, it then appeared with the name of David Hall only, who now became the proprietor an the printer of it. In May following, it was published

by Hall and Sellers, who continued it until 17777; but, on the approach of the British army, the publishers retired from Philadelphia, and the publication

was suspended while the British possessed the city. On th4e evacuation of Philadelphia, the Gazette was again revived, and published once a week until the death of Sellers in 1804. After this event, it was printed by William and David Hall, and is now published

by Hall and Pierrie every Wednesday.

Hall the present partner is grandson of David, and the son of William Hall.

The Pennsylvania Magazine, or American Monthly Museum. This Magazine was first published in January, 1775, by Robert Aitken. The celebrated Thomas Paine, author of Common Sense, &c. was one of the principal compilers and writers of the Museum. It was a work of merit; each number contained forty eight pages, octavo, with an engraving. The war put a period to it.

Aitken contracted with Paine to furnish, monthly, for this work, a certain quantity of original matter; but he often found it difficult to prevail on Paine to comply with his engagement.

On one of the occasions when Paine had neglected to supply the materials for the Magazine, within a short time of the day of publication, Aitken went to his lodgings, and complained of his neglecting to fulfil his contract. Paine heard him patiently, and coolly answered, “You shall have them in time.”

Aiken expressed some doubts on the subject, and insisted on Paine’s accompanying him and proceeding immediately to business, as the workmen were waiting for copy. HE accordingly went home with Aitken, and was soon seated at the table with the necessary apparatus, which always included a glass, and a decanter of brandy. Aitken observed, “he would never write without that.” The first glass put him in a train of thinking; Aitkin feared the second would disqualify him, or render him untractable; but it only illuminated his intellectual system; and when he had swallowed the third glass, he wrote with great rapidity, intelligence and precision; and his ideas appeared to flow faster than he could commit

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them to paper. What he penned from the inspiration of the brandy was perfectly fit for the press without any alteration, or correction. *Aitken was a man of truth, and of an irreproachable character. This anecdote came from him some years before his death.

Alexander and James Robertson James Robertson first set up his press in New York, in 1768. After remaining there a short period, he entered into partnership with his brother.

They published in that city The New York Chronicle, which, after a trial of about two years, was discontinued, and they moved to Albany. Until that time, New York was the only place in the colony where printing had been introduced.

The Robertsons were the first who opened a printing house in Albany.

They were patronized by Sir William Johnson, then superintendent of Indian affairs, who advanced them money to purchase a press and types.

They began business there about the year 1771, and soon after published a newspaper.

They set up press in Norwich, Conn., in 1775, in company with John Trumbull, but continued their printing house in Albany until the commencement of the revolutionary war; when, being detected in publishing and circulating in a private manner, highly obnoxious handbills, etc., in support of the royal cause which they decidedly espoused, they judged it expedient hastily to leave the city, and went to Norwich. They left their press and types in the care of a friend who resided in the vicinity of Albany. This friend removed them privately to his farm and there buried them. They were afterwards taken up and sold to Solomon Balantine, who began the establishment of a second newspaper in that city in 1782.

The Robertsons remained in Norwich until the British army, in 1776, took possession of New York, when they went to that city, and there published The Royal American Gazette.

Trivia Question What is important about the date, July 4, 1826?

Look on Page 22 for the answer

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July 4 - 11, 2014

In Their Own Words...

Lt. Col. Smith’s Report to Gen. Gage

In obedience to your Excellency’s commands, I marched on the evening of the 18th inst. with the corps of grenadiers and light infantry for Concord, to execute your Excellency’s orders with respect to destroying all ammunition, artillery, tents, &c., collected there, which was effected, having knocked off the trunnions of three pieces of iron ordnance, some new gun carriages, a great number of carriage wheels burnt, a considerable quantity of flour, some gunpowder and musket balls, with other small articles thrown into the river. Notwithstanding we marched with the utmost expedition and secrecy, we found the country had intelligence or strong suspicion of our coming, and fired many signal guns, and rung the alarm bells repeatedly; and were informed, when at Concord, that some cannon had been taken out of the town that day, that others, with some stores, had been carried three days before ....

I think it proper to observe, that when I had got some miles on the march from Boston, I detached six light infantry companies to march with all expedition to seize the two bridges on different roads beyond Concord. On these companies’ arrival at Lexington, I understand, from the report of Major Pitcairn, who was with them, and from many officers, that they found on a green close to the road a body of the country people drawn up in military order, with arms and accoutrements, and, as appeared after, loaded; and that they had posted some men in a dwelling and Meeting-house. Our troops advanced towards them, without any intention of injuring them, further than to inquire the reason of their being thus assembled, and, if not satisfactory, to have secured their arms; but they in confusion went off, principally to the left, only one of them fired before he went off, and three or four more jumped over a wall and fired from behind it among the soldiers; on which the troops returned it, and killed several of them. They likewise fired on the soldiers from the Meeting and dwelling-house. We had one man wounded, and Major Pitcairn’s horse shot in two places. Rather earlier than this, on the road, a country man from behind a wall had snapped his piece at Lieutenants Adair and Sutherland, but it flashed and did not go off. After this we saw some in the woods, but marched on to Concord without anything further happening. While at Concord we saw vast numbers assembling in many parts; at one of the bridges they marched down, with a very considerable body, on the light infantry posted there. On their coming pretty near, one of our men fired on them, which they returned; on which an action ensued, and some few were killed and wounded. In this affair, it appears that after the bridge was quitted, they scalped and otherwise ill-treated one or two of the men who were either killed or severely wounded, being seen by a party that marched by soon after. At Concord we found very few inhabitants in the town; those we met with both Major Pitcairn and myself took all possible pains to convince that we meant them no injury, and that if they opened their doors when required to search for military stores, not the slightest mischief would be done. We had opportunities of convincing them of our good intentions, but they were sulky; and one of them even struck Major Pitcairn. On our leaving Concord to return to Boston, they began to fire on us from behind the walls, ditches, trees, etc., which, as we marched, increased to a very great degree, and continued without the intermission of five minutes altogether, for, I believe, upwards of eighteen miles; so that I can’t think but it must have been a preconcerted scheme in them, to attack the King’s troops the first favourable opportunity that offered, otherwise, I think they could not, in so short a time as from our marching out, have raised such a numerous body, and for so great a space of ground. Notwithstanding the enemy’s numbers, they did not make one gallant effort during so long an action, though our men were so very much fatigued, but kept under cover.

– Lieutenant Colonel Smith, 10th Regiment of Foot, letter to General Gage (April 22, 1775)

2014

“Look, half the men who signed the Declaration of Independence were either in debt or bankrupt. The remaining half, most of them lost all their possessions.

The only reason Monticello didn’t get burned to the ground was that the British patrol missed the road.”

-Eric Massa

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July 4 - 11, 2014

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

“These are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in a crisis, shrink from the service of his country against his government.”

- Thomas Paine

Trivia Answer

What is important about the date, July 4, 1826?

Death of the founding fathers Thomas Jefferson and John Adams John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, the second and third presidents of the United States, respectively, die on this day, the 50th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. Both men had been central in the drafting of the historic document; Jefferson had authored it, and Adams, who was known as the “colossus of the debate,” served on the drafting committee and had argued eloquently for the declaration’s passage.

After July 4, 1776, Adams traveled to France as a diplomat, where he proved instrumental in winning French support for the Patriot cause, and Jefferson returned to Virginia, where he served as state governor during the dark days of the American Revolution. After the British defeat at the Battle of Yorktown in 1781, Adams was one of the negotiators of the Treaty of Paris that ended the war, and with Jefferson he returned to Europe to try to negotiate a U.S.-British trade treaty.

After the ratification of the U.S. Constitution, Adams was elected vice president toGeorge Washington, and Jefferson was appointed secretary of state. During Washington’s administration, Jefferson, with his democratic ideals and concept of states’ rights, often came into conflict with Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, who supported a strong federal government and conservative property rights.

Adams often arbitrated between Hamilton and his old friend Jefferson, though in politics he was generally allied with Hamilton.

In 1796, Adams defeated Jefferson in the presidential election, but the latter

In Their Own Words...

Abraham Clark to Elias Dayton

My Dear friend, Phila. July 4th. 1776.

Our Seeming bad Success in Canada, I dare say gives you great uneasiness.

In Times of danger, and under misfortunes, true Courage and Magnanimity can only be Ascertained. In the Course of Such a War we must expect some Losses. We are told a Panick Seized the Army. If so it hath not reached the Senate. At the Time our Forces in Canada were retreating before a Victorious Army, while Genl. Howe with a Large Armament is Advancing towards N. York, Our Congress Resolved to Declare the United Colonies Free and independent States. A Declaration for this Purpose, I expect, will this day pass Congress, it is nearly gone through, after which it will be Proclaimed with all the State & Solemnity Circumstances will admit. It is gone so far that we must now be a free independent State, or a Conquered Country.

I can readily guess at your feelings upon hearing that Genl Howe with 130 Transports are between N. York & the Hook. This was our last Acct., no express hath come in this morning. All seems Uncertainty where they will Land, I assure you I don’t feel quite reconciled at being here and the Enemy by

my door at home. All reports Agree that New Jersey is all in motion to meet the Enemy in Case they pay our Province a Visit, or to Assist N. York as Occasion may require. Had Genl. Howe Landed his forces as soon as he Arrived he might have Carried all before him. Possibly while I am Writing this he may be reaping the Fruits of a Victory. This seems now to be a trying season, but that indulgent Father who hath hitherto Preserved us will I trust appear for our help, and prevent our being Crushed; If otherwise, his Will be done.

I am Among a Consistory of Kings as our Enemy Says. I assure you Sir, Our Congress is An August Assembly-and can they Support the Declaration now on the Anvil, they will be the greatest Assembly on Earth.

We are now Sir embarked on a most Tempestious Sea, Life very uncertain, Seeming dangers Scattered thick Around us, Plots Against the Military, and it is Whispered, Against the Senate.

Let us prepare for the worst, we can Die here but once. May all our Business, all our purposes & pursuits tend to fit us for that important event. I am Dr sir, Yours & Mr Caldwells most Obedient & Huml Servt.Abra.

Clark

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became vice president, because at that time the office was still filled by the candidate who finished second. As president, Adams’ main concern was America’s deteriorating relationship with France, and war was only averted because of his considerable diplomatic talents. In 1800, Jefferson’s Democratic-Republicans (the forerunner of the Democratic Party) defeated the Federalist party of Adams and Hamilton, and Adams retired to his estate in Quincy, Massachusetts.

As president, Jefferson reduced the power and expenditures of the central government but advocated the purchase of the Louisiana Territory from France, which more than doubled the size of the United States. During his second administration, Jefferson faced renewed conflict with Great Britain, but he left office before the War of 1812 began. Jefferson retired to his estate in Monticello, Virginia, but he often advised his presidential successors and helped establish the University of Virginia. Jefferson also corresponded with John Adams to discuss politics, and these famous letters are regarded as masterpieces of the American enlightenment.

By remarkable coincidence, Jefferson and Adams died on the same day, Independence Day in 1826, the 50th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. Adams’ last words were, “Thomas Jefferson still survives,” though his old friend and political adversary had died a few hours before.

Campbell County Observer • 2014 Happy Birthday America Guide

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