I like history
I was once very interested in history, and attempted to become a
history student. Unfortunately, while I was very good at reading the
books, I was very bad at analyzing the content, and subsequently I
often felt like a jerk. I’d get frustrated, and my history stuff
would, throughout the term, would become less of a priority, and then
at the end I’d desperately try to write some paper that made sense.
Sometimes it worked, but often it didn’t.
The trouble is, as I found out, is that there’s two kinds of
history—popular history, and then actual history. Popular history is
like History Channel stuff—wars, boats, kings, that sort of thing.
Actual history includes that stuff, but is largely composed of stuff
like how rubber tariffs caused Midland manufacturing to move to
Rochester, and their subsequent success in transforming Rochester into
an inland boomtown thanks to the Eerie canal, and stuff like that.
More gifted people than I can make something interesting out of that.
I, unfortunately, could not.
Popular history is a little easier. It’s like this: “The Civil War.”
And then it just tells you what happened during the Civil War, and
make it sound like the whole thing was just a dust up between
Stonewall Jackson and Sherman. And then they signed some shit over at
Appottomax, and it was all over, and a new day dawned. Meanwhile,
there were a lot of cool uniforms and muskets and things like that.
Ken Burns slowly zooms in on a photo of young guy holding onto a horse
bridle, and the narrator says “In the Civil War, brother fought
brother.” You know, I don’t really see that as a great tragedy. At
least one of those motherfuckers was on the right side!
Or it’s even more vague, like “Battleships of the West.” This kind of
history is more aimed at people like myself, you know, history
dillettantes. Which is what I am. This kind of history is sort of
like collecting. You read about battleships, watch movies about
battleships, maybe go walk on a battleship, and then you know a lot
about battleships and wars in which battleships were used. You don’t
have any insights into battleships, and could sort of give a shit
about what conditions battle ships are made under, or whatever. Maybe
battleships are a bad example. What the fuck! I try.
If that wasn’t mundane enough, there’s all these popular history books
that are like “Lightbulbs: The Invention that Changed the World,” or
“Chairs: The Invention that Changed the World,” or “Microbes: The
Microbes that Did Things.” Or just “Thimbles!”
I didn’t really come here to put myself down. Instead, I came to
share an interesting story wiith you all. Part of my job requires me
to research odd things from time to time in order to clarify facts,
write captions, etc. And I learned that, not far from where my
apartment building now stands, one of the most important battles of
the RevolutionaryWar was fought. It was called the Battle of the
Gowanus, in reference to the Gowanus Canal, which is not far from me
at all. In fact, my mother, who lived not far from the canal as a
girl, still remembers its distinctive odor. Recently, while
investigating the Gowanus for PCBs or dioxins or some fucking thing,
they tried to measure how deep it was. The thing is though, the
Gowanus has no “bottom.” It’s just dozens off feet of sludge and silt
and chemicals.
Another good Gowanus story I have involves Sarah and I walking home,
and seeing three jellyfish (no shit) floating along. They looked ill,
as if they were suffering. I know you’re probably thinking “how can
you tell that htey were suffering? They don’t have brains!” Well,
you don’t have the kind of empathic connection to the living world
that I do, and you’re nothing but a shit-eating philistine.
Anyway, the Battle of the Gowanus took place in 1781, and involved the
forces of commander Thomas Greene, a second cousin to George
Washington. Greene encamped in the area now known as Brooklyn
Heights, concealing the inferior numbers of his forces by setting up a
main camp behind a ridge, where it was concealed from the sight of the
British, and settting up a decoy camp in plain sight of the redcoats.
The British, led by Col. Nigel Beamish, crossed the Gowanus on
purebread mottled roans, many of which would miraculously survive the
ffurious hail of musket balls that Greene’s forces rained down upon
them from ttheir position on the ridge.
It’s amazing to think that such a simple tactic would trick Beamish,
who was well known for his relentless tactics on the battlefield. Of
course, such an analysis overlooks the fact that the British were used
to fighting in rows, and had little to no experience fighting a “wily”
enemy. That day, the Gowanus ran red with British blood. There is
nothing to mark the location of the battle besides a weathered
historical marker, which is easy to miss if you’re not looking out for
it.
