Fort Ticonderoga Launches New Graduate Fellowships
Fort Ticonderoga is launching the Edward W. Pell Graduate Fellowships for students seeking practical, hands-on internship experience at a historic site and museum with cutting-edge programs. The fellowships run from June 15 to August 15, 2015, and include internships in Collections, Exhibitions, Education, and Interpretation. “These fellowships for graduate students in museum studies, museum education, […]
A Layer of Ice Shielding Infinite Layers of History
From May to November you can find Fort Ticonderoga bustling with the sounds of history. Often, you will witness the flash of musketry, the march of soldiers and the echoing of the Fife and Drum Corps. It is hard to fathom that on a white, wintry day like today, it is quiet enough to hear […]
Fort Ticonderoga Purchases Carillon Cruise Boat: Waterway tours will be offered beginning in spring 2015
Fort Ticonderoga, a not-for-profit educational organization and major cultural destination, announced today that it has purchased the Carillon cruise boat, formerly located on the shores of Lake Champlain in Shoreham, Vermont. Waterway tours will be offered by Fort Ticonderoga beginning in the spring of this year. The acquisition of the boat is part of a […]
Damnatio Memoriae
In Latin the phrase damnatio memoriae means “to condemn the memory.” It refers to the practice of erasing someone’s presence from history by removing images or references to them. Whether legally sanctioned or spontaneous, it was a powerful form of punishment. Damnatio memoriae could take many forms. In ancient Rome portraits and statues were often […]
“Lodging as the Nature of the Campaign will Admit”
The 4th Pennsylvania Battalion, along with the other regiments of their brigade, completed their fortifications along the Old French lines by early September in 1776. Officers and men had lived in tents since they encamped on this hill in July. With the works finished, Colonel Anthony Wayne issued the order to begin building better housing […]
“by Taylors of their respective Companies”
Many of the documents from 4th Pennsylvania Battalion Quartermaster John Harper reside in the collection of Fort Ticonderoga today. These papers document many aspects of the supply of this regiment, including its resupply with clothing and materials while encamped at Ticonderoga in 1776. These papers include receipts for large amounts of cloth for the regiment […]
Seeing Red
Visitors to our Founding Fashions exhibit in the Mars Educations Center are often confused by seeing three scarlet uniforms lined up in the gallery. Nowhere else in North America can you see so many 18th-century uniforms in one place, but you might ask, why only redcoats? What about the Americans? In fact, only one of […]
A Sword with Three Centuries of History
Fort Ticonderoga preserves an extensive collection of swords spanning more than two centuries encompassing an encyclopedic array of styles and types. While the memory of who used most swords faded away long before they became part of the museum’s collection, a few notable examples have important provenances. One such sword is that owned by […]
Ensuring that Present and Future Generations Learn From History
Fort Ticonderoga states that our mission is to “ensure that present and future generations learn from the struggles, sacrifices, and victories that shaped the nations of North America and changed world history.” While many museums and historic sites have some version of “preservation and education” in their missions, Fort Ticonderoga steps out on a limb—not […]
“Too Opposite Characters”
Today in the United States, broad regional differences are part of the national character, but in the early years of the Revolutionary War, regional differences were far more acute. As thirteen unique colonies allied together for their mutual independence, soldiers from these colonies, and eventually states, were often like foreigners brought together in the same […]