Supernatural Central Short and Quick Interview
Tell me a little bit about your main character of this book.
Well, I do not think that I have a main character in my book. It is a nonfiction historical narrative, centered around the ritual of toasting. However, I can say that the person who received the most toasts between 1775 through 1815 would have to be George Washington. He was honored in life, but especially in death. I rarely found any toast list that did not include some type of sentiment to him.
I would like to mention that if there was another character of note who received toasts, it would be Aaron Burr. He was the recipient of some incredibly harsh and negative toasts from many, especially after he shot and killed Alexander Hamilton.
Do you believe in the paranormal and if so, do you have an experience you can share?
I cannot say for sure if I believe in the paranormal. However, I do feel at times that someone is watching over me from another realm. Let me explain:
My father died suddenly several years ago. He was relatively young, and his passing has left an unfillable hole in my life and that of my extended family. But there have been at least two times that I have felt his presence. The first was when I was delivering newspapers late at night in a residential complex. I walked by this one unit and thought that I heard someone calling for help. I was in a bit of a hurry, so I pretty much ignored it. I got in the car and headed to my next stop. The strange thing was that I could not get the thought out of my head that I had to go back and check. This thought was almost coming across as a shout in my mind., and it would not stop. I went back and discovered a woman had fallen out of her bed and could not get up. I called 911 and stayed with her until the paramedics arrived. I know that my father was the one shouting in my mind.
The second time was similar. This time it was a rainy night, and I was heading home from work. I saw that there had been a minor car accident at this crazy intersection, and a family was standing outside their disabled car. They had obviously been involved with the crash. It was two kids and their parents. I drove by and sure enough, that thought of going back was shouting in my head. So, I actually said, “Okay Dad, I will go back.” I returned to the crash site and gave the family my umbrella, since they were outside in the rain getting wet. I just walked over and gave it to them and said that they really needed it. They looked at me with big smiles on their faces and thanked me. I think that my father wants to make sure that I continue to do things that he would have done.
What titles are you working on now that you can tell us about?
I am thinking about writing a second-part to my book. This time I will research the toasts of the nation between 1816 and 1865, covering the Civil War. The working title of the book right now is Another Round: Toasts of a Divided Nation, 1816-1865.
Excerpt:
Israel Putnam of Connecticut, who led the rebels at Bunker Hill in June, was one of the first to be singled out for honors when the war began. The Connecticut Gazette printed toasts from a July 25 dinner in London attended by the Freeholders of Middlesex. General Putnam was toasted “and all those American Heroes, who, like men, nobly prefer death to slavery and chains.” Sons of Liberty leader Dr. Joseph Warren, who was killed on the battlefield, received the following toast from the Field Officers of the Sixth Brigade in Cambridge: “Immortal Honor to that Patriot and Hero Doctor Joseph Warren, and the Brave American troops, who fought the Battle of Charlestown on the 17th of June 1775.” This list of toasts, appearing in the August 21, 1775, issue of the Boston Gazette, or Country Journal started with a toast to the Continental Congress instead of to the British monarch. The officers raised their glasses instead to all the colonies, the Stamp Act riots, Lexington and Concord, and an end to the “present unhappy Disputes.” Dr. Warren would be a consistently toasted figure into the early 1800s.
George Washington replaced George III as the main recipient of toasts, becoming the most toasted individual in the new nation. The King was now the enemy. Even English supporters of colonial rights, such as John Wilkes and Edmund Burke, were replaced by American military heroes. English support for the rights of the colonists, however, had not disappeared. The Virginia Gazette printed toasts the London Association made in October 1775. Association members wished for “axes and halters, at public expence, to all those who attempt to trample on the liberties of their fellow subjects, either in Great Britain or America,” and that “kings remember that they were made for their subjects, and not their subjects for them.”
The former British corset-maker Thomas Paine brilliantly explained why the colonists should no longer rely on the King to protect their liberties. His pamphlet, Common Sense, demanded that Americans free themselves of Britain’s control. Paine wrote that “One of the strongest natural proofs of the folly of hereditary right in Kings, is that nature disapproves it, otherwise she would not so frequently turn it into ridicule, by giving mankind an Ass for a Lion.” His words reached everyone in the colonies, and so he and his work were toasted: “May the INDEPENDENT principles of COMMON SENSE be confirmed throughout the United Colonies.”
Most colonies had already taken Paine’s advice to heart and declared themselves to be independent states. Members of the Virginia convention calling for a resolution for national independence gave toasts in May: “The American independent states” and “The Grand Congress of the United States, and their respected legislatures.” Washington attended a feast at the Queen’s Head Tavern in New York City, where toasts were given to the Continental Congress and the American army, and to the memory of General Richard Montgomery, killed in the disastrous invasion of Quebec in December 1775. The final toast was “to ‘Civil and religious liberty to all mankind’—mankind, that is, except Tories.” Tories, the conservative supporters of the Crown, received extra abuse in the Patriots’ toasts: “Sore Eyes to all Tories, and a Chestnut Burr for an Eye Stone.”
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