As part of our celebration of America at 250, we’re introducing a weekly newsletter by historian Jonathan Horn. Learn what happened this week in American history, why it matters, and what else you should see and read in The Free Press and beyond. We can’t all squeeze into the same car for a sightseeing tour of two and a half centuries of history, but at least we can share the same guide. That’s what we hope this newsletter can be.
Jonathan is the perfect man to have behind the wheel of our capacious station wagon—a historian who has shown himself comfortable in all the centuries of our nation’s history. His latest book, “The Fate of the Generals,” tells the amazing story of the doomed stand that General Jonathan Wainwright and his men made in the Philippines in 1942 and the great courage he showed afterward as the highest-ranking American prisoner of World War II. Even more relevant for our divided times, though, is his immensely compelling account of George Washington’s final years, showing the twilight of the father of our country and his battles against its new (and violently divisive) politics.
Jonathan begins his inaugural newsletter with the 300th birthday of the “forgotten” founder who planted the seeds for the Bill of Rights and was a major inspiration for parts of the Declaration of Independence, too. To get this newsletter in your inbox every week, sign up here.
—The Editors
Happy Birthday, George (Not That One)
In 1825, the year before the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, an elderly Thomas Jefferson received what must have been a most unwelcome letter. Henry “Black-Horse Harry” Lee, best remembered today for being the half brother of Robert E. Lee but known back then for his scandalous marital indiscretions, wrote to insinuate that the credit Jefferson had received for the Declaration more properly belonged to a fellow Virginian, George Mason. Mason wasn’t among the Declaration’s signers, but with this week marking his 300th birthday, it’s time to acknowledge his great influence.
Born on December 11, 1725, Mason was widely admired by his fellow founders. Jefferson called him “one of our really great men and of the first order of greatness.” Though George Washington himself may never have called Mason a mentor, historians have often viewed their relationship that way. When the master of Mount Vernon sought advice on political developments in the run-up to the revolution, it was only natural to look a few plantations down the Potomac to Gunston Hall, where the erudite older Mason lived.
