Twisted History

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I. Sofie, the Brave

Sofie, The Crow, writes that she has visited George Washington's Fort Necessity, which makes me want to leap in the car and drive a thousand miles to see it too.
But I don't have a car.

Sofie also e-mailed her Bad Hair entry, left.
I was struck by how much she looks like actress Juliette Lewis, right.

Sofie's tale of how she got her hairstyle wins the Best Story category:

"I was 14 and had decided to trim my bangs, then 'trimmed' other areas on the sides and back.
I didn't know we were to have school pictures taken the next day."

II. “It's quiet, George...Too quiet.”


Well, you know me---I always want to tie popular culture into whatever I'm thinking about.

After all, if you're anything like me, you learned a lot of your history from the movie version.

Luckily, Hollywood made few movies about the French and Indian War,
or I'd be even more confused than I already am.

I've already mentioned Northwest Passage, which turned one of the bloodiest bits of a bloody war--the Rogers Rangers massacre of an Abenaki Indian village--into some kind of romance...

Now I find a wonderful post about How GW Won the Battle of Fort Necessity, according to the Hollywood flick When the Redskins Rode (1951).
Somewhat historically problematic,
as the 22-year-old Washington did no such thing.

In a different twist, for once it's the "Redskins" who ride to George's rescue, just as he's getting wopped by the French in his first ever official battle.

In reality, GW's Iroquois allies wisely decamped before the disastrous battle... and did not come back.

Their leader, Tanacharison, known to the English as Half King, later reported (in real life, not the movies) that George Washington was
"a good-natured man but had no experience, ...[and] would by no means take advice from the Indians,"
and that he, Half King, saw no reason to sit around in a swampy hollow waiting for the French to arrive.

Neither When Redskins Rode nor Northwest Passage appear to be on DVD, so I can't watch them.
(Please don't tell me if I'm mistaken.
I don't want to sit through movies with lines such as "It's quiet George... Too quiet,"
unless they have flying saucers in them.)

However, there are zillions of versions of The Last of the Mohicans, set during the F&I War.
I remember the 1992 version being like a 2-hour Breck Shampoo commercial, as Daniel Day Lewis spent most of it running through the woods, his long, gleaming hair streaming behind him...

But I hear the 1920 silent version is worth watching, so maybe I'll start there.