More than four million people a year visit Valley Forge, one of
America's most celebrated historic sites. Here, amid the rolling
hills of southeastern Pennsylvania, visitors can pass through the
house which served as Washington's Headquarters during the famous
winter encampment of 1777-1778. Others picnic and jog in the huge
park, complete with monuments, recreated log huts, and modern
visitor center, all built to pay tribute to the Valley Forge
story.
In this lively book, Lorett Treese shows how Valley Forge
evolved into the tourist mecca that it is today. In the process,
she uses Valley Forge as a means for understanding how Americans
view their own past. Treese explores the origins of popular images
associated with Valley Forge, such as George Washington kneeling in
the snow to seek divine assistance. She places Valley Forge in the
context of the historic preservation movement as the site became
Pennsylvania's first state park in 1893. She studies its "Era of
Monuments" and the movement to "restore" Valley Forge in the spirit
of Rockefeller's enormously popular colonial Williamsburg.
Treese describes a Valley Forge fraught with controversy over
the appropriate appearance and use of a place so revered. One such
controversy, the "hot dog war," a brief but intense battle over
concession stands, was spawned by Americans' changing perceptions
of how a national park was to be used. The volatile Vietnam era
prompted the state park commission to establish its "Subcommittee
on Sex, Hippies, and Whiskey Swillers" to investigate park
regulation infractions. Even today, people differ over exactly what
happened at Valley Forge during the winter of 1777-1778. The modern
visitor sees the remains of over a century of commemoration,
competition, and contention. The result, Treese shows, is a
historic site that may reveal more about succeeding history than
about Washington's army. This book will give its readers a new way
to look at Valley Forge--and all historic sites.
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