,. We are in a building that is built in the 17 thirties, about 40 years before theres any such thing as the United States of america. At that time pennsylvania was a british colony. This was its Capital Building. They would make laws for pennsylvania and each of the 13 colonies has its own government. These are the issues in a lot of ways that will lead to the creation of the United States, most of which will happen in this room, because the colonies, as time goes forward will start to grow dissatisfied with the way the British Government is treating them, is affecting their lives locally. One of the other side issues is americans living in the colonies do not get to vote in british elections. When the parliament in london makes laws for americans, the most famous being various taxes you learned about in school, we will say this is taxation without representation. It is that idea you are not getting the voice. Thomas jefferson would write that government existing with the consent of t
Six years. Peter scott, one of the things that john and i have discussed with many of our guests is interpretation on Civil War Battlefield parks. We have also talked about the partnerships with academics and we have seen with many of our guests, including our guest on thursday, nina Silver Silver was one of the first historians that came to the park and had conversations with the park staff about ways to broaden the interpretation of gettysburg and time and time again john and i have noticed that these connections between academics and public historians, you cannot conclude there is this a great gulf between these two sides as i think there once was. I thought we could open by having you reflect upon how battlefield interpretation, how it changed over time during your career and if you wouldnt mind, i would be interested in what you see as opportunities as we look ahead. Or iimportant observation my girlsy fun fact cameron and isabel carmichael, i have to give them a shout out today b
Feldman analysts is artistic portrayals of the American Revolution and civil war. She talks about the influence of paintings, sculptures, in memorials on how history is remembered. The Smithsonian Associates host to this event. Today we are going to look at the American Revolution and civil war, in particular, but a little beyond that. Controversies about the stories we tell. I am going to focus, because it is impossible to cover such an amount of material in one top. Im going to focus in particular on the nations capital, and the public buildings on the mall, which is after all, the centerpiece of american political culture, and our public culture, where people come from all around the world, and the country to participate in government, to learn about government, to understand our heritage. So i thought what is it we say to those people when they come to washington . What have been some of the controversies . What are some of the issues we should be aware of . And what is missing . S
Next we travel about 15 miles northwest of washington d. C. Where we will take a boat ride, to learn the history of the chesapeake and ohio canal. I would like to introduce myself, my name is chris andrea, and i am a seasonal park ranger heres. I think were going to, cast off here shortly, but we will go ahead and start and give you a brief history, about here on the canal, and its called the chesapeake and ohio canal, and it doesnt go all the way up to chesapeake bay, our the ohio river, which was the intention of the canal we started building it in basically july 4th, of 18 hundreds and 28. And the west was up in ohio, and pennsylvania at that time, and we wanted connect pittsburgh to the chesapeake bay. So what we did, was we started making this, canal and we tried earlier and it was George Washingtons dream to use the Potomac River to transport goods, and back then it would seem as a reasonable thing to do too he had a canal system built while using a system of locks but it did not
Preservation of the white house. And also educating american citizens about the white house and its diverse history. This evening, our guest is jim conroy, the author of jeffersons white house monticello on the potomac. Jim was a lawyer in boston for 38 years before he began writing about American History. His previous book is lincolns white house the peoples house in wartime, which won the prestigious lincoln prize. If you would like to ask jim a question at the end of our broadcast, please type it in the comments section of the facebook feed and we will get to as many questions from our online audience as possible. Jim, welcome to white house history live. James thank you, it is a pleasure to be here. Colleen we are honored to have you. The first question is the setting for your book. There have been numerous books about Thomas Jefferson and about his presidency. You have a unique focus of this book on the white house as the setting for jeffersons two terms in office. Can you tell us