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Lesser-Known Facts about the Fourth of July
You’ve been placed on high alert.
By Ed Goldman
Most of us patriotic, God-loving, Caucasian Americans—even those of us who accessorize our pickup trucks with rifle racks and don’t realize that orange baseball caps clash with almost every one of our wardrobe ensembles—think we know the significance of July 4th.
Today is when we celebrate our separation from an autocrat who tried to deny us freedom of the press, could unilaterally declare war, enriched himself many times over while he sat on the throne and even sometimes when he left the throne room where he often went to scribble messages on parchment paper.
Please don’t think I’m drawing a comparison to our beloved BLOTUS (Bloviator of the United States). The men were very different. King George, for example, was known to be a faithful husband.
Now is when we commemorate our escape from tyranny by eating hot dogs with potentially fatal ingredients, consuming many bottles of an alcohol that smells like horse urine and has perhaps the same nutritional content—and then, after sunset, find as many ways as we can to ignite our rhododendrons and blow off some of our fingers.
1. Its original name was W.A.S.O.O.H. Day (“We Are So Out Of Here”). And it was supposed to happen a few days earlier than it did but, as always, it took everyone longer to pack than expected. The word “Independence” also made too many of the Founding Fathers uncomfortable since most of whom were no longer spring chickens and “Independence” sounded too much like they were saying they were “In Depends, Hence.” Eventually, Thomas Paine wrote in 1775, “Oh, stop being such silly geese,” and everyone thought that made Common Sense.
2. The famous painting of George Washington crossing the Delaware was achieved largely through the special effects of that era: The boat on the other side of the river, which contained the painter, his crew and equipment, was reflected in the water and removed via an archaic form of image editing called PaintOver.
3. Paul Revere’s legendary ride in which he yelled that the Brits would be landing a bit ahead of their posted ETA, gave him laryngitis about halfway through his mission (he had never received proper vocal training which emphasizes using one’s diaphragm rather than lungs for breath control). “What can I say?” he is alleged to have rasped to the tavern-keeper who helpfully made Revere some hot tea with lemon, “I’m a silversmith, not a silver throat! Cut me some slack.”
4. The Boston Tea Party, which took place three years before the Declaration of Independence, began as an actual tea party until one of the men in attendance insulted the hostess (“Do ye actually call this thin bacterial discharge tea, Madam?”). The offended hostess demanded that her husband challenge the guy who’d insulted her to a pistol duel at dawn. But her husband, sampling the tea, had to agree with the assessment of its undesirability, saying, “And besides, My Good Lady, who wants to get up at dawn? If ye does, be mine guest.” This cracked up everyone, including the offended wife—and just to show there were no hard feelings, the attendees got together and dumped 342 chests of tea from the British East India Company into Boston Harbor.
5. Finally, the fireworks. At some point, patriotic, God-loving Americans with rifle racks felt collectively guilty for not having been born in time to fight the British as well as for the enjoyment they discovered by streaming “Downton Abbey,” “The Crown” and “Absolutely Fabulous,” all British imports. To atone, some of them began detonating M-100 firecrackers while simultaneously burning nitrite-packed frankfurters for their family. By multitasking without any heretofore talent for it, the outcomes were not pretty—though one man was said to exclaim as he watched one of his limbs and middle child fly into the night sky, “God bless America!”
Don’t forget! A new Goldman State Podcast drops every Friday!
Ed Goldman's column appears almost every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. A former daily columnist for the Sacramento Business Journal, as well as monthly columnist for Sacramento Magazine and Comstock’s Business Magazine, he’s the author of five books, two plays and one musical (so far).
