Years ago I watched the movie Gettysburg on the big screen. I was astonished at how much it affected me. Then I ripped through the Civil War literature like Sherman...well, you know.
There was a good crowd of maybe a thousand people. Before the main battle began I walked through the camp where folks washed clothes and jerked teeth the way people did back then. There was an authentic camera of that era taking real photographs, using tin-types--metal plates with a gelatin full of silver colloid chemistry, I think.
The owner of the camera was most inhospitable but I did learn that the lens was a Bausch & Lomb. Golly gee, I thought they just made disposable contact lenses. I wonder if they were in Rochester back then? Is that why Eastman made Brownies in that town? Is that why the university there is famous for its optics department? How marvelous it is that humans and their economy show a locality like desert flowers choosing soil and slope!
I loved the black bellows, the dark wood, and most of all the brass. Noble brass.
The main show featured cannon that made you jump out of your skin. Were real cannon louder? Viewed purely as entertainment, the show was a bit lackluster. A war movie can shock better.
But when a traveler fails to be amused by the obvious, he has to bring in heavier artillery, like his imagination, analogies and history. The hokeyness of a crowd on folding chairs watching the "show" bothered me at first, until I remembered that they did the same thing outside Washington DC in the first couple battles in 1861.
Soon I lost interest in the battle and became interested in the crowd. Out of a thousand spectators there were only about 5 Negroes. Why so--wasn't the War about Freeing them?
One of the booths was displaying a...blush...a Confederate Flag. How awful! Why wasn't Jesse or somebody here to protest! At least they didn't allow that flag to be close to the I-10.
Towards the fringe of the crowd, on a rocky knob... sigh, think of Day Two in the Battle of Gettysburg...a lad waved the bonnie blue flag with great enthusiasm. Some kind of uniform and badge was right behind him. There was an irony to this that floored me far more than the cannon did.
On the very top of the Rocky Knob was another of Father Abraham's agents. Maybe he works for Homeland Defense, and I'm violating some post 9-11 law by showing his picture. I don't want any of my lady readers to swoon at the sight of this Big, Powerful Man, with more firepower on his belt than most regiments in the Civil War.
What was he doing, actually? Protecting us, certainly, but from whom exactly? Who knows--all that counts is that the Government of the People, by the People, for the People, must get more power so it can protect us.
For instance this area is rife with Flower Snatchers at this time of year--you know, grandmothers in Subarus, armed with Tilley hats, and blasting away with digital Canons. There was even an electronic sign on I-10 screeching Flower Traffic Exit Here.
