Delaware: the First State.  Another bit of American history that I seem to have forgotten.  They were first to vote to ratify the Constitution…and one of the few to do so unanimously.  They are pretty proud of that First and celebrate it all around Dover.  Interpreters in period costume lead tours of historic buildings.  The docent in the old State house does a great job taking his audience back to 1800.  The celebration goes full swing this weekend at “Dover Days”.

Another historical tidbit; the DE state bird is a chicken. Not just any chicken; the Blue Hen variety.  Apparently it’s a pretty feisty chicken and won a lot of cockfights back in Colonial times.  It makes for a better than average story on how a state bird was chosen.

“The Penman of the Revolution”, John Dickinson

Dickenson authored pamphlets that explained new world governing (British taxation policy, the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution…), to the common man.  He was a well to do Quaker with several impressive homes including one along the Jones River here in Delaware where his brick mansion stood in starke contrast with the small one room log and slab wood homes of most of his local contemporaries.

Vocabulary word of the day. Manumission: the freeing of a specific, named group of slaves by their owner.  It’s sort of the personal version of emancipation which applies to the freeing of an entire group of enslaved persons.