We weren't necessarily going anywhere today. A crammed schedule ahead of us was looming and I was happy to stay put. Then you throw in something we needed to get to Ducky and the opportunity for a free showing of George Washington's inaugural Bible and we were off!
Thursday I was checking my Facebook newsfeed and found this on one of the local history groups I belong to via the Kansas Grand Lodge:
How often is that going to happen 1/2 hr. from where you live? Even if we didn't need to get something to Ducky, we just might have made the trip anyway ;)
We met Ducky at the hotel hosting the event. When we walked in we saw a room with a sign saying something about Masonic historical items. We saw Bibles and assumed we were in the right place. Wrong place, but we took a look around anyway. We found some wonderful old Bibles, including a Martin Luther Bible from the 1680s.
Reminded me of our trip to see the
Passages exhibit in Springfield. While Ducky ran around with Shorty and Mookie and Bubby explored one way I rotated the other and found this:
A bunch of old Masons on the steps of the Kansas capitol from 1914. Cool pic and wouldn't mean anything unless your great-grandpa was a Kansas Mason. So I scoured the picture and found him!
The archivist had told me that the guys in the front couple of rows especially were only the top guys. Grandpa Elmer Gentry was the highest level Mason you can be, so I wasn't too surprised he was among the group. To tell the truth, him being a high level Mason isn't something I'm particularly proud of. But, it is part of our family and history in general - so it opened another teaching moment for the kiddos. I've said it before, but there is such an advantage to helping the kids personalize
history.
I almost could have gone home after finding that. For a genealogist something like that can make your year! But, in all seriousness we couldn't miss George's Bible. So on we journeyed.
This gentleman brought the Bible from New York where it is housed with one of the Lodges there. I have blanked his face because I did not ask to take the picture. He did a fantastic job of telling the kids the story of how it came to be used by Washington for his inauguration, which Presidents have used it since and misc. other stories (Shorty was giving me a run for my money at this point so I did not have a chance to listen to the whole speech which I was sad about but not unexpected with a lively 4 year old boy). The gentleman encouraged the kids to come behind the Bible and get their pictures taken.
Pretty darn cool! It makes me wonder how many things like this are out there and available to visit for the general public, but aren't widely known. We feel very blessed to have had this opportunity!
No comments:
Post a Comment