Virginia History Stops

Four History Stops in Virginia

August 12+

Written October 27

Dear Friends and Families,

Being away on business in the States is a bit of a pain, but it has enabled me to see some of the places in Virginia that represent the country's history. Here are four quick illustrated tours of places you may not have seen before.

	Poplar Forest	http://www.poplarforest.org
Thomas Jefferson and his family came to this remote corner of Virginia, just out side Lynchburg, to escape the British invasion in 1781.	Jefferson built an octagonal home, a form he favored. Unlike at Monticello, touring Poplar Forest was a very quiet and casual affair.	The view from the back showed the not-quite-functional back porch. Note that there is no rail and anyone venturing out here risked a dangerous fall.
Off to either side of the main house were two brick outhouses. As such facilities go, it was quite deluxe.	The kitchen too was outside the main house, in this case in a low wing connected to the house with an open, but covered, walkway. The cooking facilities were very modern, with special insets for baking, as well as for pots with sauces and stews.	Quite possibly, some servants and slaves shared the basement storage rooms.

	National D-Day Memorial	http://www.dday.org
Not far from Poplar Forest and Lynchburg is a modern memorial to the US landing at Normandy.	The synthetic beach is complete with a landing craft and simulated bullet hits on the water.	There is even a reproduction of the climb soldiers had to make up beach-side cliffs.
There is an example of one of the frail aircraft that were used for communication on the war front.	And in back, General Eisenhower glowers over it all.	In the end, I found I did not like the feeling of this D-Day Memorial. The bronzes and the granite architecture reminded me too much of classic Soviet monuments -- monuments to the glory of war. Besides, we'd been to the fields and beaches of Normandy. There the sacrifice is all too plainly demonstrated by the rows and rows of crosses and stars.

	Red Hill	http://www.PatrickHenry.com
This part of Virginia was also home to Patrick Henry. After his time in Washington, he settled here at a place called "Red Hill".	Every American school child knows Henry's famous "Give me liberty or give me death!" (Actually a 1765 speach against British taxes.) At the time of the American Revolution, he was an orator and civic leader and he was one of the Virginians who helped galvanize the British subjects in the New Country to seek their independence.	Red Hill is a very humble home, just five rooms in all. The house held from nine to eleven family members at a time!
The main room downstairs was both bedroom and dining room. Such use of space is elegantly efficient, when you think about it. The two functions never overlap!	The separate kitchen was basic as well.
Henry maintained a law office in a neighboring building.	His office furniture is still largely in tact, including a small table with expanding wings, suitable for the maps needed by an attorney dealing largely in land matters.	Patrick Henry and his wife were buried at Red Hill, where their graves remain in a quiet grove on the edge of the farm.

	Booker T. Washington's Birthplace	http://www.nps.gov/bowa/
Not all famous Virginians were presidents or revolutionary orators. Booker T. Washington was born in 1865 to a slave family that worked a poor farm a ways south of Red Hill.	Washington's family home was a small structure like this, with one room down and one up. Reportedly, the master's house was slightly bigger and not much more elaborate. On this farm, both free and slave were poor.	Inside the Washington house.
Vegetables came from the farm garden.	And fruit from the vineyard and a few fruit trees.	Down along the creek, a few outbuildings held the farm's animals.
Some sheep.	A few geese	And some giant hogs, resting before their next meal.
	After the Civil War, Washington's family was freed and they moved to West Virginia. Eventually, Booker developed a thirst for learning and even before his teens, he had left home for a special school for poor, black children. From that beginning, Booker T. Washington advanced to found one of the most prestigious black universities, in the small Alabama community of Tuskegee.

All in all, it's been nice seeing the U.S. history that Virginia has to offer, especially in these small parks where it is easy to imagine real people living on the land.

John and Marianne.

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