fun fact about american history: george washington was apparently so sexy that when he was 17 he went swimming a river and some girl that had a crush on him stole his clothes and watched as he walked around naked looking for them
aaron burr, the guy who shot alexander hamilton and also the second vice president of the united states, tried to start an empire out in texas
marquis de lafayette literally had to sneak out of france to come aid america and while some versions of the story claim that he disguised himself as a commoner, other versions say he dressed up like a woman
literally all the founding fathers had daddy issues, specifically alexander hamilton who refused to even befriend george washington initially because he didn’t want to grow close to someone who had the potential to become a father like figure to him
thomas jeffereson kept a bust of alexander hamilton in his house at monticello for no reason other than the fact that hamilton was his sworn enemy and he felt as though he needed a very expensive bust of his sworn enemy in his house
I love all of this please keep going.
they didn’t let hamilton try this one course of study at king’s college because it was so intense that it made one student literally get sick and have to go home for months on end and that student was james madison
george washington made a rule banning snacks during cabinet meetings because thomas jefferson would always eat mac n cheese which wasn’t big in the us at the time and all the other founding fathers thought it was disgusting
aaron burr once set himself on fire because he attempted to light a candle by shooting it because he was too tired to get an actual match and his gun was nearby
Bass Reeves was so dedicated to the law, he even arrested his own son Bennie for the murder of his wife. Bennie was sentenced to life in prison. With over 3000 arrests, 14 kills, went his entire 32 year career in law enforcement without being shot once.
He was assigned to bring in the notorious female outlaw Belle Starr. Once she got wind who was after her she turned herself into the federal court.
Reeves was one of a few Marshalls who would venture into Indian territory *oklahoma*. After the age of 67 he retired in 1907. He enjoyed his short lived retirement as a police officer in Muskogee Oklahoma, his assigned beat had 0 crime reported until he died at the age of 71 of Bright’s disease.
He was one of the true gun slingers of the west.
I would expect nothing less from a man with such a magnificent mustache
I love the story of Bass Reeves!
One of his famous tactics was, if he was captured or in danger by a criminal he was hunting down, he would ask them to read a letter from his wife before they killed him. He used their distraction to free himself and get the upper hand.
He was also a freed slave. George Reeves, his owner and reason for his surname, took Bass with him to fight in the Civil War. However, George became violently angry after Bass beat him at a card game, and Bass was forced to fight him (or kill, on some accounts) in self defense.
After running away and entering Native American territory, Bass learned how to speak the languages of the ‘Five Civilized Tribes’ (Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muskogee, Seminole). This part of his life is where he mastered marksmanship. He got married and had a family after the Emancipation Proclamation was declared, and then later became a Marshal, going on the adventures listed above (and many more… Another famous criminal that Bass captured was Bob Dozier.)
He was the very first black US Marshal. May we never forget him, as history would suffer to lose such an outstanding figure.
You ever read some shit so evil it kinda pumps the brakes on the rest of your day?
Are you fucking ready for this knowledge? To my exasperated followers, give me a break, I haven’t given a good historical rant about her in a few months. Also who the hell uses the word ‘vegetable’ anymore? Yeah, I’m taking over this post. Here we go:
Rosemary Kennedy was JFK’s sister. Joseph Kennedy manipulated his children for years, always wanting them to be the picturesque family to help gain political traction. “Oh, they’re so pretty, oh, they’re so well-behaved, oh, they’re the definition of family ideals” that stuff.
For the most part, the rest of the Kennedy children obliged.
Rosemary?
Rosemary left her boarding school to go on dates.
…Yeah. Yeah, that was it. Rosemary left the boarding school and went on dates. That was her “rebellious nature”. She was a tad bit clumsy, she might have actually had borderline Asperger’s due to her inability to pick up on social cues, and she left her boarding school to go on dates with boys. That last one pissed off Joseph so that, by the time Rosemary was twenty-three (the above cruce post makes it seem like she was a teenager but no, she was twenty-three, I’m not saying this to diminish anything, I’m saying that she was a fully-grown adult and still under her father’s manipulations), he took her to Walter Jackson Freeman without consulting his wife. If you haven’t been privy to any of my rants, Walter Jackson Freeman was a man who used icepicks and knives to cut into people’s heads, chopping off pieces of their brain, a process known as the frontal lobotomy. Icepicks. The things you used to chip ice. Icepicks. Although I’m pretty sure he used a kitchen knife on Rosemary because, you know, that’s so much better. Anywho, not only was she forced into the operation, not only was she forced to sing God Bless America, but she was forced to say The Lord’s Prayer. The. Lord’s. Prayer. Until. She. Couldn’t. Because. They. Paralyzed. Her.
Joseph was so disgusted by her new state (you know, because she was paralyzed) that he sent her to a far-off asylum where she remained for decades. When JFK ran for his presidency and was asked about the whereabouts of his sister, he said that she was away, teaching and/or studying.
Nobody visited Rosemary for decades.
Nobody visited Rosemary for decades.
When her mother finally visited, Rosemary lunged at her in anger and had to be sedated. Her mother’s response? You ready for this? I mean, seriously, are you ready? Like I know what you’re thinking: “Mate, you just went into a rant by memory (yeah, I’m typing this all by memory) about a woman whose brain was hacked up using a butter knife so that she wouldn’t embarrass her family during their political campaign, only for that woman to become paralyzed and institutionalized without visitors for decades, what the fuck can be worse than that?” Seriously though, brace yourselves.
When Rose Kennedy saw her daughter for the first time in decades (after Rosemary was institutionalized as a result of Joseph’s severe medical abuse), when Rose saw her…her first concern…was that she was fat.
Like I said, I wrote this all from memory, but have a bundle of sources confirming everything:
Lobotomies to “correct” misbehaving children weren’t isolated to this family. This was considered a parent’s right. This family isn’t specially cursed, this was fucking “normal” at one point.
Even now, there’s disabled kids who have to fight their parents about invasive and detrimental surgeries and “medical treatments” like this.
It’s part the abuse culture that surrounds parenting – that parents can do what they want to their kids and nobody can tell them otherwise – and part more standard bigotry. The lines between sexism, racism, and ableism tend to blur when it comes to parental abuse culture.
And shit like this is happening in everyday homes,
rip tumblr 