Our connections to early US history, aren’t really all that distant.
Each day, they take one more step into the future, but really, our country isn’t very old.
We’re within just a few generations of the beginning of American democracy.
For example, my father’s great-grandfather was born in 1809.
James Madison had just taken the reins of the US government from Thomas Jefferson when he was born!
That seems like such a long time ago.
But in terms of generations, it’s not.
Civil War Connections
We know that for some people, the War Between the States may never end.
And why should it?
People with personal connections to the war have only recently died.
My same father met a Civil War veteran in 1936 when dad was in first grade.
I asked my friend Jo, born in 1918, if she had heard any Civil War stories while growing up in Virginia.
“My uncle told them all the time,” she said. He fought for the Confederate States of America (CSA).
The Army was still paying a Civil War pension as late as 2004 when the final widow of a CSA veteran died, nearly 140 years after the war ended.
Personal Connections with History
I’ve written about my maternal grandfather’s experiences in World War I here.
Born in 1890 in a Sicilian fishing village, he emigrated to the United States in 1908.
He lived to nearly 103.
Realizing he was 28 in 1918, I asked him if he remembered when the Russian Tsar Nicholas II died.
“Yes, that was very sad. They shot him and his family,” Grandpa answered.
I was 28-years-old when I asked the question. Of course, he remembered.
The first airplane he ever saw was the Wright Brothers’ original plane at Chicago’s Field Museum.
Queen Victoria sat on the throne when he was born. The incandescent light bulb hadn’t been invented yet.
But Grandpa lived long enough to have good conversations with my husband–a naval officer on a nuclear submarine.
Such a long, yet short, expanse of time, technologically speaking.
US history felt so close, I did touch it!
Prairie Life
My paternal grandmother grew up in a small town in Utah.
As a child, her grandmother (who had emigrated to the US from Denmark and then walked across the Mormon Trail to Utah), sent her to the local store to buy kerosene with an egg.
She carried a small pitcher for the kerosene, which now sits on the organ I inherited from her.
But what caught my attention was her remark about being careful with the “Indians around.”
I’d been reading Laura Ingalls Wilder stories and her comment shocked me.
It wasn’t the local Native Americans who posed a problem.
Her grandmother had never quite gotten over the fear when she crossed the great plains. She warned my grandmother (who lived with her) on every trip to the store.
Adventures in US History
My Sicilian grandparents entered the United States through Ellis Island.
My grandmother smuggled a bottle of champagne through customs in my mother’s diaper–it was during Prohibition.
Other relatives made alcohol in the bathtub during the same time frame. They delivered it to customers in a baby carriage.
My paternal grandfather helped build the Alaskan Highway. He told of being stuck for two weeks in the woods and having to build a bridge before they could continue.
My uncle lost his hearing from serving on a bomber in England during WWII. My father arrived in Korean waters on an aircraft carrier the day the US signed the armistice ending the Korean War.
And, of course, my father-in-law helped save Apollo 13.
How to hear the stories
They’re all around us, we just need to be open to asking the questions and hearing the answers.
US history isn’t all that very old.
Many veterans, in my experience, don’t much like to talk about what happened during their wars.
But their stories are important–for us and for them.
Try asking other family members what they were doing during a historic period of time.
Or ask about your ancestors.
The founding periods of US history are closer than you may think.
Tweetables
How short a time span is US history? Here’s a photo of Dolley Madison. Click to Tweet
Family stories in US history–they’re closer than you think. Click to Tweet
My grandmother remembered Indians coming into their house in NE Nebraska without knocking, and indicated they wanted to trade “dress goods” for cash or chickens. One day they came when her father wasn’t home. I can imagine her mother sending her oldest daughter (my grandmother) out to catch a chicken or two to trade for dress fabric. When the men left, they laughed at the family mules when they brayed.
Amazing, isn’t it?