The study of history through the excavation of discarded items, exploring people's attics, flying drones, and stuff….
This spike tomahawk head was found, in the ground, by metal detector by Robert Bennett, in the vicinity of Harbor Springs, Michigan at the site of L’ Arbre Croche, a series of Ottawa Villages existing in the mid 1700s, and otherwise a highly traveled spot near Fort Michilimackinac at the Straits of Mackinac……
“More than one hundred men sailed across the Atlantic in 1606 to found the Jamestown colony in Virginia. The roster for the expedition lists fifty-nine of them as “gentlemen.” One of those gentlemen, Captain John Smith, wasn’t born with his title. He earned it beheading three Turkish soldiers in a series of single combat duels. Suffice it to say, Smith was not your average English gentleman. Before he sailed for the Virginia wilderness and had his famous encounter with Pocahontas, Smith had been a mercenary, a pirate, a slave, and a mutineer.”
As the 45-year-old frontiersman began his careful descent along the steep western slope of the long flat mountain he had climbed earlier that morning, he could faintly make out rays of daylight ahead, a sure sign of a clearing in the forest, as dark forest turned to bright meadows in the foothills below. Being a veteran longhunter, Joseph Swope immediately recognized the old clearings ahead….
When I first took this photograph of the grave of Captain Mathew Arbuckle, I thought there was a body in the grave. But I was wrong . . . . We forget about such things today, but in 18th century America, you stood a realistic chance of being killed by a tree, which is exactly …
Read moreCapt. Matthew Arbuckle: a good life, but a bad death
Renick’s Fort was a small frontier “Indian Spy” style fort, in the chain of Greenbrier Valley Virginia frontier forts, during the 1770’s. As is usually the case, there’s nothing left of it, and we actually don’t even know where it stood, despite the fact that records give us the exact location – at least down …
Read moreThe Search for Renick’s Fort, and the life of an “Indian Spy”
Being a trial lawyer with the last name of Bryan, I’ve always been interested in what many people consider to be the most famous and high-profile trial in American History, the Scopes Trial, or the Scopes “Monkey Trial.” Long before O.J. Simpson even thought of choosing the color of his new Ford Bronco, the country …
Read moreThe Scopes Trial, Leopold and Loeb, Darrow, and William Jennings Bryan
I came across the story of Quannah Parker’s house, which still stands today in Cache, Texas – though it’s not in its original location. It’s been moved a couple of times. But it is complete, and still full of Quannah’s furniture. His house is recognizable from the stars on his roof. Apparently he figured that …
Check out the podcast version of the Thomas Brown story. The true story, told by young ranger with Major Robert Rogers, about his harrowing ordeal during the French and Indian War, starting with a five hour firefight in the winter wilderness, while wearing snowshoes . . . . Or, check out the blog post version …
I came across this interesting Rev War pension application, signed by one John Kincaid, with some cool local details, pertaining to the harshness of the winter of 1778-1779 in what is now Lewisburg, (West) Virginia, and as always, one thing leads to another, including a doppleganger John Kincaid, references to our fort, other forts, scandal, …
A local historian friend sent me this scan of an original 1777 document, signed by early frontiersmen of the Greenbrier Valley, where they are leasing the mineral rights of property belonging to one Jacob Mann, containing a cave with valuable saltpeter, which was used to make gunpowder. From the best that I can read it, …
Read moreThe “Singing Cave” of Indian Creek and the making of gunpowder by frontier settlers