Woah! That’s the city where I was born and lived the first two years of my life. My parents bought their first house there, but after two years of living in “the armpit of America” (their words, not mine) they decided they’d had enough and moved to California.
What is the matter with that city? My parents generally like Ohio, but not that town. It was so bad that they wouldn’t even take me to see the house where I lived my first two years because “that city is too depressing.” (We have lots of family in Ohio and I went there almost every year for “vacation”. Some kids get to go to the Grand Canyon, Hawaii, or Alaska for vacation… I went to Ohio. At least Cedar Point was cool.)
There was a good show on the History channel about the war of 1812 a few weeks ago. Something I hadn’t heard was that New England statesmen had met to consider leaving the US to avoid war with Britain.
There was a good show on the History channel about the war of 1812 a few weeks ago. Something I hadn’t heard was that New England statesmen had met to consider leaving the US to avoid war with Britain.
Until the end of the war in 1814, there was more talk of secession in the north than in the south. While impressment probably bothered the northeast the most, very few actually wanted to go to war over it. Likewise, few in the north supported Jefferson’s embargo a decade before although it was also in response to European stubbornness.
You’ll find that most history classes taught to kids here skip over that period for the most part. I don’t even think it has to do with the fact that we lost, but with the fact that in most schools history teachers “start over” at the beginning of each new year, so you get the whole “beginning of man up to WW2” in a single grade-school year, each year, about seven times over.
It’s part of why most Americans have no idea how WW1 started, other than a few might have heard that it involved someone getting shot. American Revolution -> Civil War -> World War II. Those three events often get crammed into the last few weeks of the school year, leaving large bits of US history out.
Or, at least that’s my personal experience with schools here.
You’ll find that most history classes taught to kids here skip over that period for the most part. I don’t even think it has to do with the fact that we lost, but with the fact that in most schools history teachers “start over” at the beginning of each new year, so you get the whole “beginning of man up to WW2” in a single grade-school year, each year, about seven times over.[/quote]
My experience in school was similar to Derek’s, except that our history curriculum “started over” a little bit further along each time. So we actually did cover the War of 1812, but not very thoroughly, and it definitely wasn’t emphasized.
Unfortunately, we were taught that we won the War of 1812, more or less. According the version I was taught, we fought the War because of British impressment, Washington was burned, but overall we proved that we couldn’t be pushed around, and we gave as good as we got. I had no idea that we invaded Canada at all, let alone three (!) times.
The feeling I got is that the version we got was being taught because of inertia, not because of a desire to whitewash American history. Lord knows, we were taught all about the mistreatment of Native Americans, slavery, and America’s true reasons for entering WWI and WWII. The War of 1812 seems to have just slipped under the educators’ radar, for some reason.
I think there’s a whole thread waiting to happen about things your teachers never taught you, unintentionally or not, as well as things they taught incorrectly.
In fact, I’m off to Everything Else to do that right now … ;)
