The numbers are staggering.
In a recent report called the National Assessment of Educational Progress, only 18% of high schoolers were said to be rated proficient in history. Of the 75 colleges and universities recently ranked by U.S. News and World Report magazine, only 23 required history majors to successfully complete a course in U.S. history. The numbers from other surveys do not improve upon these measures. 20% of college students do not know the effect of the Emancipation Proclamation and a third of 2015 college graduates could not identify the years in which America’s Civil War occurred.
These facts greeted me in a letter from Jim Lighthizer, the President of the American Battlefield Trust, an organization dedicated to the preservation of American battlefields and the education of citizens on the history related to these hallowed grounds.
As I sat down to write this, the first of what I hope will be many blog entries to come, the topic of the state of awareness of the history of America’s Civil War seemed more than a fitting for an opening volley. History, which some reduce to a mere collection of names and dates, is more than the sum of facts. It provides an avenue into viewing the decisions of the past and learning from the mistakes and successes to form a blueprint for the future. It informs us that humanity is flawed, filled with good and evil, and dotted with larger-than-life personalities whose actions and contributions, no matter the magnitude of scope and importance, have guided us to the present moment in time. As each second passes, it is history.
Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history.
-Abraham Lincoln
From the desert southwest in New Mexico to the farmlands of Maryland, the stories and impact of the American Civil War have reverberated throughout the fifteen decades since hostilities concluded. The event, though filled with terrible tragedy, resulted in the freedom of millions of men, women, and children while also solidifying the states as an indivisible nation. From this result, a nation built on the enterprising endeavors of its individuals rose in prosperity and subsequently contributed to efforts to ensure the liberty of countless millions of others through success in future global conflicts. It is a reflective exercise to observe how just a single event in history can alter the course of others.
Lincoln’s words – “we cannot escape history” – have never had more significant meaning than they do today. History may be bulldozed by greedy land developers, it may be torn down by radical political activists, or it may be ignored in educational institutions across this land, but it is forever there and always being created. The destiny of this nation, and all of humanity, rests on future generations heeding history’s lessons, and Americans from all walks of life have united through organizations such as the American Battlefield Trust to ensure that the events of the past remain in our current memory.
This blog will serve as a telling of my own history. While focusing on my own interest in the American Civil War, it will be peppered from time to time with topics on my other loves: my wife, our pets, software development, genealogy, movies, and perhaps a scholarly writing or two. It is my hope to contribute something meaningful to the discourse of such topics in a time when civil discussion and logical thought has been rendered obsolete.
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Photo taken at the Gettysburg Sesquicentennial Anniversary Battle Reenactment, July 07, 2013.
