Growing up, in popular media and my school textbooks, we learned certain foundational myths about the United States, the Founding Fathers, and other key figures around Colonial times and the American Revolution.
replyCome to find out that so many of these myths were not actually true: that they were legends built through the centuries to fluff up the importance and gravity of the United States in the eyes of naïve schoolchildren.
It was with some sadness that these myths were dispelled for me, but no less a sense of wonder to learn what had actually happened in this relatively recent history. There is still plenty of room for myth and legend in the popular imagination.
What, specifically, are you talking about?
replyNot OP, but I learned just last week that Paul Revere would have never said “The British are coming!” because colonists considered themselves British. It’s more likely he would have said “The regulars are coming”, because that was the term used for permanent soldiers at the time. He’s one of many who would have spread the word, but the one who was named and lives on in infamy. The phrase changed in popular culture in the mid 1800s. Not terribly important in the grand scheme of things, but hundreds of millions of school children are taught a very specific quote that was never actually said.
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