Long before a single settler felled a tree in Western New York, kings in Europe were dividing it with ink. There were claims or assertions. They could be real or imagined. They were put on parchment, whether it be maps, treaties, or edicts. Rarely, however, were they enforced. After all, you can’t police a territory where you have no police.
Why, then, would the powers of the day go through all the trouble of pretense?
Well, first, it was all pretend. Europeans did come to this New World. Some explored. Some conquered. Many settled. Still, their activities covered only a small fraction of their claims.
But it was the claim itself that rendered prestige. It was a symbol of potency, a symbol of Continue Reading “A European Tug Of War”
The Shot Not Heard ’Round the World: Vermont’s First Taste of Independence
The land lies dormant. But enticing. Open. Exposed. Its potential untapped.
Beyond the mountains, out of sight, Albany holds court, too distant to exercise its authority over the outer reaches of its boundary. Closer, on the opposite shore of the river, New Hampshire saw it as an avenue of expansion.
Both colonies claimed it. Neither controlled it.
Yet, into that void, settlers arrived.
The first colonists to settle what would become Westminster, Vermont, came from Continue Reading “The Shot Not Heard ’Round the World: Vermont’s First Taste of Independence”