News:

We need volunteers in sales, marketing, PR, IT, and general "running of an organization." 
Maximize your Appleseed energy to make this program grow, and help fill the empty spots
on the firing line!  An hour of time spent at this level can have the impact of ten or a
hundred hours on the firing line.  Want to help? Send a PM to Monkey!

Main Menu

Veterans of the 2014 Michigan Battle Road Trip...

Started by Oz, July 19, 2015, 01:17:23 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

Oz

(And anyone else with advice!   :)  )

Zazzles and I are headed out to Boston for the first week in August to see the places we've been learning and teaching so we can become better at both.  Advice would be greatly appreciated.

I'm totally geeked that there is a NPS-led 3-1/2 hour walking tour of Battle Road from Meriam's Corner back toward Lexington on our first available day.  It's only scheduled twice this year and it worked out that we can be there. 

Apart from that, here's my current list of things I'd like to see.  Probably too much for 1 week (and there will be certain family compromises) but it's a starting point.  Some are walk-bys or drive-bys of things that are no longer present, just to help me get a feel for how close things were, some visits to graves because it feels like the right thing to do. 

Any thoughts on "must dos", things I missed, things that could be omitted, or general tips would be very welcome!  Thank you in advance!  John

--Lexington Green, visitor's center, Buckman & Monroe taverns, Hancock-Clarke house
--Revere capture location
--Minuteman NHP visitor center & walking tour from Miriam's Corner east
--North Bridge, Wright Tavern, Minuteman NHP visitor center
--Jason Russell house
--Whittemore monument
--location of ammunition train capture
--Spy Pond
--Foot of the Rocks

--Old North Church
--Paul Revere house
--Gage's headquarters (location)
--location of Dr. Joseph Warren house (location)
--Granary Burying Ground
--Old South Meeting House
--Tea Party ships and museum
--Faneuil Hall
--Copp's Hill Burying Ground
--Green Dragon Inn (location)
--Old State House / Boston Massacre

--Charlestown powder house
--Bunker Hill monument
--Isaac Davis monument & grave, Acton
--Sudbury Center Burying Ground (Deacon Josiah Haynes)
"You don't know they're all Riflemen.  They might just be people with rifles." - Zazzles, 9/22/12

"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot,
Nothing is going to get better. It's not."
― Dr. Seuss, The Lorax

"There are no accidents in my philosophy. Every effect must have its cause. The past is the cause of the present, and the present will be the cause of the future." - Abraham Lincoln

"My biggest decision this week?  Well...long story short, I went with the mild sauce."

SteelThunder

NRA Patron Member, SAF Life Member
NRA Certified Rifle Instructor, RSO
Warlord of the West

Ultima vox civis
"Learning occurs only after repetitive, demoralizing failures." - Pat Rogers
"Silence in the face of evil is itself evil; God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act." - Dietrich Bonhoeffer
"So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart." - Tecumseh
"Never attribute to treachery, that which can adequately be explained by incompetence" - Bonaparte, Hanlon, et al

number6

Many of the museums move items around.  The drum we saw in 2013 was not at the Hancock-Clarke house in 2014 as it was on loan to another museum.

My Suggestions:
I liked the fact we went to the North Bridge early in the AM, before any crowds, of course it was April and there was still a bit of mist off the water.

Col. Barretts house has been reconstructed, don't know if it's open on non Patriots Day events.

Pitcarin's pistols were at the Munroe Tavern in 2014.

The "Liberty Ride" tour is a telling of the three strikes on a trolley at the locations it happened, there are tidbits you may pick up from the tour guides that you may not know.  It leaves from the Lexington Historical Society office (at the SE tip of the green) you should call for reservations, or buy them a day in advance.

CALL the Arlington (Menotomy) Historical Society in advance as the Russell house may not be open.  Also, don't set your expectations too high for Menotomy.

--Lexington Green, visitor's center, Buckman & Monroe taverns, Hancock-Clarke house - YES, all three tours can be bought LexHistSociety Office or at the museums themselves.

--Revere capture location - It's a Stone Circle in the reported location, in a field, in the park.

--Minuteman NHP visitor center & walking tour from Miriam's Corner east - YES, and the reported Parkers Revenge site is just behind the visitor center.

--North Bridge, Wright Tavern, Minuteman NHP visitor center - YES, the NB Visitor Center is the Buttrick House.

--Jason Russell house - See note above about calling ArlingtonHistSoc.
--Whittemore monument
--location of ammunition train capture


You still have a choice. You can still salvage your right to be individuals. Your rights to truth and free thought! Reject this false world of Number Two . . . reject it NOW!!
Number 6, The Prisoner, Episode 11 "A Change of Mind"


"To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them..." � Richard Henry Lee, "Letters from the Federal Farmer to the Republic"

"Rifles don't read" YellowHouseJake

"Lots of work?  Yup.  You wanna grow?  Suck it up, cupcake." - SteelThunder

ITB

If you want to try to "walk a mile in someone's shoes," meaning the Redcoats, I highly recommend walking all of Battle Road.  It's not the whole distance, but the roughly five miles from Merriam's Corner to Fiske Hill. 

We parked at the lot right near Merriam's Corner.  Gibson and I did the walk in about four hours for the ten-mile round trip.

Make sure you wear REALLY comfortable shoes/boots.  We did this walk near the beginning of a two-week NY/Boston vacation, and I was hobbling around for the rest of the trip from the blisters.  Gibson, of course, at the end of the walk says, "OK, it's only 2 PM.  What's our next walk?"
"I will either set my country free, or shed my last drop of blood to make her so." -  Dr. Joseph Warren

" ITB glides through the highways of the Midwest like a Velvet Fog, unfettered by mortal speed limits, leaving only the knowledge of American Heritage and Marksmanship (and a faint whiff of ghost pepper sauce) in his wake." - Oz

CF KD requal - Muenster, TX  11/25/23

Hammer Forged

Be sure to stop by the Charlestown Navy Yard to see the USS Constitution!   It's in Dry Dock and you can only go on the Spar Deck, the lower decks are undergoing restoration (I don't know why - they looked perfect in 2014) but it's still worthwhile!!  And you'll be able to see the entire Hull, out of the water!!

I'm jealous! :wb:
Tinnitus?    No, its Liberty calling!

"Those who HAMMER their guns into plows will plow for those who do not." ~Thomas Jefferson

Oz

Thanks for the advice!  I'm hoping the NPS "walk" is all the way to Fiske Hill...and if it stops at the visitor center, I'll be a-finishing it (if necessary, while my wife rests)!

I did see that the Jason Russell house (#1 on Zazzles' list of things to see) appears to only be open 12-4 Sat & Sun.  I will call to confirm.  Since I'll be on Battle Road 1230-1600 Saturday, that tells me where I need to be Sunday (after confirming!)

HF--I do plan on it!  Going to school out there, I only made it over to the Navy Yard once--USS BUNKER HILLwas being commissioned and would you believe it, CONSTITUTION was closed!)  But to tell the truth, an even bigger draw to me is USS CASSIN YOUNG.  One of my grandfathers served on a FLETCHER-class DD (USS HAGGARD) and I've never seen one in real life...yet.  His ship had a pretty eventful year--sinking 2 submarines (one by ramming) and coming under fire from HARUNA off Samar, before being knocked out of the war by a kamikaze off Okinawa.  It doesn't seem like a bad thing, mixed in with paying tribute to our 1770s forebears, to take a few minutes for Grandpa and his shipmates, who held up their end in their day.

It's going to be a great trip!
"You don't know they're all Riflemen.  They might just be people with rifles." - Zazzles, 9/22/12

"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot,
Nothing is going to get better. It's not."
― Dr. Seuss, The Lorax

"There are no accidents in my philosophy. Every effect must have its cause. The past is the cause of the present, and the present will be the cause of the future." - Abraham Lincoln

"My biggest decision this week?  Well...long story short, I went with the mild sauce."

mac66

#6
Obviously you'll want to do the Freedom Trail in Boston which covers most of the things you listed. Starts on Boston Commons where you can pick up a free map,  ends at Bunker Hill with all that other stuff in between. The Bunker Hill museum is now across the street from the monument. They have a nice diorama of the battle on the second floor.  Takes about all day to walk the Freedom Trail so plan one day there.

Also suggest the Concord museum which when we were there in 2014, had Isaac Davis' sword, Abner Hosmer's hatband and powder horn, William Diamond's drum, James Hayward's powder horn, as well as one of the lanterns from the north church.  As 6 said they move around from museum to museum so you might have to track them down.

And the Fisk farm/fisk hill is where Hayward from Acton met the Redcoat at the well and exchanged fire with him. Both were mortally wounded. His powder horn with a round bullet hole in it was in the Concord Museum in '14.  For some reason that story fascinates me. The farm isn't there anymore but there is a monument at the site of the well. If I remember correctly is is just west of Lexington but east of the visitor center.  Hayward is buried with Issac Davis and Abner Homer in Acton.
Status quo, you know, is Latin for 'the mess we're in'.
Ronald Reagan

Even if you are on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there. Will Rogers

The King has degenerated into a tyrant and forfeits all rights to his subjects' obedience."  Patrick Henry, 1765

Motivation?...The best solution to morale problems is to kill all the unhappy people  Ghenghis Khan

Oz

Well, we're back.  Thank you for all the advice.  It was a great trip.  We were there 7 days, spent 4 of them Concord-Lexington-Menotomy, 1 on the downtown Freedom Trail, 1 at USS Constitution & Bunker Hill, 1 at the Boston Tea Party museum and JFK library (so the trip was nearly all things I wanted to see with one that my wife really wanted to see...I'm a little worried that my next week's vacation will be entirely "Bridges or Madison County" or somesuch, with 1 afternoon where I pick something.   ;D And that would be fine with me, this was completely worth it.)  The days got a little shorter as the week went on, as we got tired and sore and as folks wanted to eat at restaurants rather than beef jerky in the car between sights.

I saw a TON that helped me feel even more of a personal connection to the people and the story, and I believe it will make me a better instructor.   I will write something up, but it will take a while to think it through (and work it in as I catch up with real life.)

Thinking about the experience, it also gives me a different perspective on the Battle Road patch.  It's not just to show that you've been there.  It's to show that you've been there--in the hope that folks will ask you about the experience, and give you an opportunity to help them make a better connection with the people and the story, and their responsibility as a participant in the still-ongoing American experiment in liberty.
"You don't know they're all Riflemen.  They might just be people with rifles." - Zazzles, 9/22/12

"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot,
Nothing is going to get better. It's not."
― Dr. Seuss, The Lorax

"There are no accidents in my philosophy. Every effect must have its cause. The past is the cause of the present, and the present will be the cause of the future." - Abraham Lincoln

"My biggest decision this week?  Well...long story short, I went with the mild sauce."