Two posts ago, in the comments Kristy wondered if George
Washington canoed in the Potomac, which made me wonder if Geo. Wash. canoed in
the Allegheny, where our scouts canoed.
I decided to ask Google “Did Washington canoe the Allegheny River?” I
got as far as “Did George Washington” and auto-fill-in gave me:
Did George Washington have any
children
Did George Washington smoke weed
Did George Washington own any pets
Did George Washington own slaves
It turns out Mount Vernon is right on the Potomac River (I
should have known that, eh?) so it’s likely that at some point he traveled on
the Potomac by boat, if not by canoe.
Washington also traveled on the Allegheny, but by raft, in the middle of
a freezing, snowy night. He fell in,
nearly froze, but managed to get onto an island. He and his traveling companion waited until
the next day, when the river was completely frozen over, and they could just
walk across it. It wouldn’t surprise me
if G.W. smoked weed after that experience.
Following this great historical tradition, our scouts fell
in the Allegheny, too, managed to get to shore, and then stayed overnight on an
island. It was quite windy that day, but
it was not cold enough for the river to freeze.
I hope to tell you the full story soon, but there’s just too
much going on. Work projects, moving my
MIL to assisted living, birthdays, ever and always transporting teenagers places. Add to
that lack of a decent night’s sleep for many a night, and I’m just about done
in. Maybe I should smoke some weed, in
keeping with historical tradition. Except
there isn’t any in Western Pennsylvania.
We just don’t do that sort of thing around here.
6 comments:
Why are we all so crazy busy lately? And why does transporting teens end up being so time-consuming?
Does life just keep getting more and more hectic until finally we find ourselves being moved into assisted living by our children and their spouses?
Surely it will slow down when they all go off to college. (Fingers crossed)
I think we would really benefit from better public transportation. The kind that drives itself, drops off, comes home, then picks up when needed.
I fell into a river after capsizing a canoe. It was traumatic, but it was in Tennessee, and I've blocked the name out. I just remember clutching the paddle between my thighs, because the place we got the canoes from put the fear of God into us about losing our paddles :-)
At the risk or sounding (further) insanely stupid: Are canoes an Indian (Native American, whatever) invention? Looks like I know nothing about GW. Perhaps I should correct that. Someday.
Glad your scouts neither drowned nor froze to death!
Would that be why the island in the allegheny, off of route 28 is called "Washington's Landing"?
After some Wikipedia research I found this: George Washington reputedly slept on the island after his raft capsized in the Allegheny River while on a diplomatic mission to the French at Fort Le Boeuf near Lake Erie during the French and Indian War.[2] This story led to the renaming of the island on October 24, 1987.
I don't know about Washington's Landing, but apparently the 40th Street Bridge is also called "Washington's Crossing." That's where the event with the raft capsizing occurred. That's what my friend Bridget says, and she grew up right near there, so I'm going with that.
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