The dénouement .....

Hard to believe that just 4 days ago I was standing on "the green" in Lexington, MA, reflecting on the events of 1775, and now I am at West Yellowstone, MT, reflecting on the events of 1877. Both locations are the gateways to great National Park experiences (Minuteman National Park and Yellowstone). Both sets of events are about freedom.

In the events that followed those at Lexington in 1775, some Americans gained their liberty and rights as individuals. In the events that followed those here in Yellowstone in 1877, some Americans lost their rights and freedom. I am talking about the Nez Perce War of 1877, commonly know as the Chief Joseph War. If you are interested you can learn more from this Google Earth piece. It is part of the work I did for the Nez Perce National Historic Trail Foundation, I am making a presentation on it here later today.

It is interesting to see where America had progressed to 100 years after it started its journey to independence.

This blog - Will be working on the blog from time to time to add post scripts, edit, and link in a few more Google features. Also will be updating a few of the existing Google components so that they integrate with other Google tools, spreading the blog's potential reach on the web. Have also hooked this blog to Google Analytics so that we can track usage/clicks over time, along with other things like where in the world people are that are reading these words.

We chose to write this blog about a trip so that the events would have a beginning and an end, rather than become like a journal, which keeps rolling along ..... like history. That said, we will be checking in from time to time, and if you want to leave a comment or thought anywhere, please do so. We appreciate the feedback, and you can become part of the "trip" as well.

Trip Home - A Fall Ride ....

Had a great "fall" day in Concord yesterday. Started out at Walden Pond, where we took a "reflective" hike around the pond ("more like a lake" Shaelyn pointed out). Lots of school kids there doing the same thing .... including a large group from a local boy's school that took their clothes off and went swimming in the lake (Shaelyn pointed them out as well).

Then on to a few famous early American authors homes (women and men) - interesting to see where they lived when they wrote - check out this work by my friend Beryl Reid sometime.

Finally headed west, back to Emma Willard. Beautiful fall day - all across the state the leaf colors were starting to turn. Late this year, like they were waiting for us ....

Stopped to replenish Shaelyn's stock of dorm snacks - top ramin, mac and cheese, popcorn. Then a great meal of mini "sliders" at Valencia's Pub in Troy. Dropped my gear at the guest house, checked Shaelyn in and went up and watched an episode of Sherlock (BBC modern adaptation). Gave her a hug, and left to go back to the guest house to teach an online class with students on the west coast (no rest for the Google Geek).

Woke up this morning feeling older, but with a smile on my face.

Make it a good day.

Literacy Day

For today, instead of learning about the Revolutionary War, we went to the homes of famous writers such as Nathaniel Hawthorne and Louisa May Alcott as well as the Old Manse which Hawthorne had also lived in. (more on that later.)

We began at the house of Nathaniel Hawthorne, author of the Scarlet Letter, however we could not go inside because it was closed. It was a shade of pink on the outside and there was a very interesting looking thing for a top floor. Following this, we went to the home of Louisa May Alcott who wrote Little Women. Little Women was based on Louisa's real life youth and it was very interesting to learn more about that. Her family was extremely smart and talented, and had very forward ideas for the time. Lastly we went to the Old Manse, an old Scottish word for a preacher's house. The name Old Manse came from Hawthorne's book, Mosses from an Old Manse meaning stories from an old preacher's house. (This is where we heard a lot of funny stories about Hawthorne… for now, I'll just say he was a terrible tenant.) 

Battle Road - No Rest for the Weary

We had a great day today. Weather was warm, with the sun peeking through from time to day. Sometimes it made me wonder if there was similar conditions back on April 19, 1775,  when the events we were learning about all day were unfolding.

Part of the reason we enjoyed ourselves was because of all the efforts made by guides/rangers - well informed and often in period dress - to give us a human/oral perspective on the events of that day. There is nothing like "hearing" and "seeing" to make an experience like a site visit to a historical place take vivid shape.

The scale of the place allowed us to walk most of the venues, and there were plenty of interpretative signs ... which had a "cell phone" tour (978 224 4905) or recordings.

Shaelyn also shot a cell phone video of the park ranger (pictured above) demonstrating how to clean a musket - here is the You Tube link. She used iMovie to edit it.

Will try embedding below:

Paul Revere and John Hancock (III)

After Paul Revere was captured, the British let him go somewhere else and he had to walk all the way back to Lexington, and when he did he returned to the Hancock-Clark House, only to find Hancock right where he left him when he was supposed to leave or be killed by the English (he had been charged with treason.) Once he finally had gotten rid of Hancock, someone arrived, telling him that Hancock had left some personal papers that he should go retrieve in a trunk. Of course, when Paul gets there he finds not a little trunk, but a big, bulky one that he will have to carry out and sneak away with. In other words, Paul Revere had a very long night even after the midnight ride.

"The British are coming!" "But WE'RE British!!"

Today, we went to Lexington and took a tour of the Hancock-Clark House and the Buckman Tavern.
(P.S. Paul Revere never actually said "The British are coming" because if he had the colonists' reply would've been that they are British so what's the matter?)

The Hancock-Clark House was pretty fun to hear about since I heard that John Hancock (III, there were three generations of John Hancock's, the first one being the III's grandfather and he was a preacher that apparently very much liked his exclamation points!!) was quite the prima-donna and gave Paul Revere quite a lot of grief. (See here…)

After we went to the Hancock-Clark House we went to the Buckman Tavern. There we got to look at the men's half of the tavern, where the men waited for the British to arrive when the war began, and we saw the original door of the tavern which had a hole in it because of people shooting holes through the door during the battle. (It is believed that the first shot was fired through the third floor of the tavern.) We also saw the ladies room where the women would be since they were not allowed in the men's side and we also saw the workroom which had a bed and a desk. (The bed being for a servant/apprentice/helper because the owner of the tavern never had any children to help run the tavern and fully functioning farm.)

Halfway Point - Adult Reflections on Trip Blogging

Well we are at the midway point of our trip and have some thoughts to share if you are ever considering something like this ...

• Prepare
• Prepare
• Prepare
• Figure out a reasonable amount of events/sites to both visit about and blog about as you go (recommend using Google Earth for trip planning - might think about drawing the kids into this as well)
• Be "wifi" and electric outlet aware (comes naturally with kids that have been brought up with a cell phone as their teddy bear) - lots of the spots in Boston were supposed to have public wifi, but we ended up ducking into coffee places/cafes (or scamming their wifi) from time to time
• You can blog/post to Blogspot from a cell phone
• Cell phone also are great for grabbing pics
• Blog as you go - makes for a nice rhythm some time for recap/refection on what you just saw with your child/student
• Save a reasonable amount of time at the end of the day for putting things in order - remember one of the wonderful things about the digital world is it's editing capabilities
• Let the kids blog their own way
• Create some other web tools to help orient folks to what they are hearing about - pics (Picasa web albums), videos (YouTube), and maps (Google Maps) are just a few suggestions - use the blog as an excuse to learn more about these tools, maybe learn from the young ones
• Walk whenever possible (personal preference) - clears the head and is good for burning off all the calories from Starbucks pitstops for wifi.
• Have fun

Got to run .... I mean walk.