Aaron Burr News 2009
10/24
Dear Friends:
An article concerning Burr written by Ray Swick and myself titled: A Recruit for Aaron Burr: Lewis Wetzel and the Burr "Conspiracy," has just been published in the West Virginia History Journal. We are still waiting on the books. But, you can read a summary of the article on the web at: http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/west_virginia_history/toc/wvh.3.2.html
I look forward to seeing you both at the end of the month.
Brian Hardison
N.J. dorm named for Frank Sinatra
http://www.upi.com/Entertainment_News/Movies/2009/10/23/NJ-dorm-named-for-Frank-Sinatra/UPI-79611256356168/Coming in at No. 2 was writer Walt Whitman, with 125 votes, followed by scientist Albert Einstein, with 119 votes. Whitman and Einstein died in New Jersey. Students cast 2,379 votes. Other names considered were John Holland, George Inness, Alfred Kinsey, Doris Duke, Milton Freedman, Thomas Edison, Margaret Bourke-White, Paula Danziger and Aaron Burr. There were several write-in candidates, as well, The Montclarion said. Those who received votes had ties to New Jersey.
10/1
Danville News
It is an example of the Burr Arch Truss, a design invented in 1804 by Theodore Burr, cousin of Vice President Aaron Burr. According to Wikipedia, a Burr ...
10/1
Dear Aaron Burr Enthusiasts, On Tuesday, October 13th, 3:00 pm, I will be giving a presentation on John Vanderlyn, protege of Aaron Burr at the Senate House in Kingston, NY. It will be held on the 2nd floor, or the same place as last year's ABA guest speaker meeting spot for those of you who were able to attend. Due to that presentation, several people in the Kingston area approached me over the past year to tell me about the Vanderlyn works in their own private collections, or asked for help when purchasing Vanderlyn paintings at auction. I was able to document most of these works to date and so will be giving a presentation that updates last year's. In addition, more developments have come to pass regarding Vanderlyn's "Nag's Head" portrait of Theodosia Burr Alston which Harry Anderson and I investigated last spring. In a nutshell, the theory I presented last year that the Nag's Head portrait was likely a timely hoax designed by wily art sales agents has received further verification following discussions with the conservation staff at the Smithsonian. I will be discussing this and other developments in Vanderlyn scholarship. This presentation will become an annual event for updating discoveries until my Vanderlyn documenting project nears completion; following that the annual event will focus more on interpretations of his works by contributing scholars. I hope many of you will be able to attend! Thanks also to everyone for sending updates that have helped me with this project. As always, you know how much it is appreciated! Please pass this email on to anyone else whom you think may be interested in our artist, John Vanderlyn. With Best Wishes, Katherine -- Katherine C. Woltz Ph.D candidate; American Art Carl H. and Martha S. Lindner Center for Art History University of Virginia, Charlottesville VA 22902 "History is a gallery of pictures in which there are few originals and many copies." --Alexis de Tocqueville
9/26
Peter,
On the evening of September 14, 2009, I had the pleasure of renewing my acquaintanceship with Mr. Justice Antonin Scalia, of the Supreme Court of the United States. I attended a book-signing event, preceded by a discussion to the packed audience by Justice Scalia (and His Honor took questions), concerning his 2008 book, MAKING YOUR CASE: The Art of Persuading Judges (coauthored by Bryan A. Garner, editor in chief of Black's Law Dictionary). The event was held at the Friendship Heights Village Center, Chevy Chase, Md , an upscale venue just across the District of Columbia line, into Montgomery County, Md.
When I briefly was able to approach Justice Scalia as he signed my copy of his book, in single-file fashion, I handed him, as a modest gift, my copy of the October, 2009, issue of American History magazine (thank you for suggesting that I subscribe to this interesting periodical, which I did, earlier in the year). The cover story of the October issue of the magazine is Professor Jonathan Turley's piece on his list of the nine greatest Supreme Court Justices, and the ten worst. Justice Scalia told me he had been unaware of the piece, and he thanked me for the magazine. The regular session of the high court does not begin until the first Tuesday in October, so I hope Justice Scalia reads the magazine I gave him (it also has an excellent articele about Monticello, and its brand new museum, in Charlottesville, Va.), especially because I inserted into the American History magazine both Helena & my Jan. 1st, '09, ABA newsletter announcing our Annual Meeting, and the May 1st Reservation Form.
I quickly reminded Justice Scalia that he was my Conflicts of Law course professor at the University of Virginia Law School in the 1960's. I did not get a chance to thank him for participating in the Treason Trial oral arument reenactment at the Supreme Court, which you and I , Helena, Brian, Harry and Katherine attended a few years ago. The Supreme Court police detail wanted me to move-on, as there was a long line behind me, waiting to have their books signed.
You may want to put this email letter on the ABA Web page.
The October 26-31st Annual Meeting is right on track, and will be well-attended.
Thanks,
Stuart F. Johnson, ABA President and Meeting Co-Planner
9/1 Massachusetts politics and the John Jay standard American Thinker - Bellevue,WA,USA ... startling victory over the Federalist incumbents in the state assembly and senate elections, largely due to the unparalleled politicking of Aaron Burr. ... http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/08/massachusetts_politics_and_the.html
9/1 History by the Hudson Waterfront conservancy chooses Weehawken for ... The Hudson Reporter - Hoboken,NJ,USA Not to be missed along the way were the famous dueling grounds where Vice President Aaron Burr shot Secretary of Treasury Alexander Hamilton on July 11,
Congratulations Lauren (not Laura) !
8/10
July 31, 2009
Copy faxed to 202-456-2461
Honorable Joseph R. Biden, Jr.
Vice President of the United States
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20501
Attn: Vice President’s Scheduler
Re: A respectful request:
Can you schedule a few minutes to meet with us on Friday, October 30, 2009, as our members tour the ceremonial rooms of the White House?
Dear Mr. Vice President:
Our national, non-profit, historical association is dedicated to studying and celebrating the life and times of the third Vice President of the United States, Colonel Aaron Burr, Jr.
We are very active and have a lot of fun studying relevant history, as shown by our website: www.aaronburrassociation.org.
One of our most memorable accomplishments was on July 11, 2004, when we, descendants of General Alexander Hamilton, and the Weehawken, NJ, Planning Commission, conducted for the public, in Weehawken, an authentic reenactment of the infamous (and tragic) pistol duel between Vice President Burr and Hamilton, exactly two hundred years after it occurred. Over 2,000 citizens were in attendance on the banks of the Hudson River for our costumed event.
At our 2007 Annual Meeting, in Richmond, Virginia, we marked the bicentennial of the “trial of the century,” at which our man was found not guilty of treason, by staging a play at the Old House Chamber, scene of the actual trial.
Each year we hold a five day meeting at a location in the eastern portion of our country which has some relevance to Col. Burr or his relatives. This year, we will be meeting in the Washington, DC area, October 26-31st. We have pending an application for a tour of the White House on Friday, October 30, 2009, which was processed in late April by Ms. Pheobe Bicknell, tour-planner for our member, U.S. Senator Richard M. Burr (R-NC). We expect between eighty to ninety members will be on this tour.
In the first half of October, the White House will inform Senator Burr’s office whether our tour request is granted and, if so, what our start time will be on October 30th.
Should your busy schedule permit, we would love to meet with, and hear from you, informally, for any period of time, while we are right there at the White House. Perhaps a media outlet, such as Politico, or The Hill, could cover our get-together.
Vice President Aaron Burr, in his role presiding over the Senate, distinguished himself by injecting fairness and due process into the impeachment trial of Supreme Court Justice Chase, thus incurring the wrath of President Thomas Jefferson, who was trying to purge the high court.
Attached is the Reservation Form showing the itinerary for our October meeting.
One of the “friends” of our association, Arthur Imperatore, of NJ, tells me that he is a friend of yours through the Senate Leadership Council, and has enjoyed golfing with you.
Continued good luck with your heavy, interesting responsibilities.
Sincerely,
__________________________________
Stuart Fisk Johnson, Esq,
Attorney At Law
The Daniel Webster Building
Suite 330
503 D Street N.W
Washington DC 20001-2728
(202) 393-5507
President General of the Aaron Burr Assoc.,
Williams College, 1965
University of Virginia School of Law, 1968.
7/11/09 205 years after the duel:
7/10 Great Antonio Burr Interview - The Epoch Times article
6/18 LAKE CITY — The love of dancing and performing began for Aaron Burr when he was only 2 years old, and this love has continued and developed strongly since then.
Burr, who has been dancing for 13 years, is sharing his tap-dancing craft with students at Dancin’ on Main in Lake City this summer.
The 16 year-old lives in North Myrtle Beach and attends North Myrtle Beach High School.
“His name will be national one day,” said Paige Strickland, owner and instructor at Dancin’ on Main.
Kaycee Weaver, a rising senior at Lake City High School and a student at Dancin’ on Main, worked with Burr exclusively this summer learning various dance routines.
Weaver, who has won awards in state competitions for her performances, has been dancing for 11 years.
“Kaycee is super talented,” Burr said, adding that Weaver learned her solo in two days. “There is a lot of talent in Lake City.”
Burr said when he graduates from high school, he wants to attend college and major in musical theater. He said he is interested in both dancing and acting.
According to his resume, he was a contestant/semifinalist for NBC’s “America’s Got Talent” in 2006 and was the winner of the Greatest Dancer in America Challenge in 2005 on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”
In 2007, he was the principal singer, dancer and soloist for Alabama Theatre’s Christmas Show.
Additionally, he has experience as model and appeared in Red Magazine in August 2005.
Burr has had extensive professional training in dance, acting, improvisation, voice and choreography.
Strickland said Dancin’ on Main will sponsor a Tap Intensive Camp from July 9 to 11 featuring Burr; Betty Frances Stone, tap instructor at Dancin’ on Main; and Brenda Crawford, owner of Crawford’s Dance Studio and multi-award-winning choreographer.
For more information on the camp, call (843) 374-0498 or stop by the studio, at 145 East Main Street.
ON THE WEB For more information on Burr’s career and performances, visit http://www.aaron-burr.com. You can also watch some of Burr’s performances online at YouTube.
June 18
Bush also suggested that the tone of the political debate today can be traced to the founding fathers, when Vice President Aaron Burr shot and killed Alexander Hamilton.
"At least when my vice president shot somebody,'' Bush said, "it was an accident.''
June 3, 2009With No Challenger, Burr's In No Trouble By Kyle Trygstad By any number of metrics, North Carolina Sen. Richard Burr could be the most vulnerable Republican incumbent in the country. His once Republican-leaning state looks rather blue after the 2008 elections, and recent polls show Burr anything but safe.Still, Burr is likeable -- nothing like his distant relative, Vice President Aaron Burr -- and he lacks the kind of issues that doomed former senator Elizabeth Dole's re-election bid last year. Perhaps most important to the first-term senator's survival prospects, though, is that no top-tier Democrat has stepped forward to challenge him. Attorney General Roy Cooper, who won a third term in November with more votes than any other statewide candidate, had been the party favorite but announced three weeks ago he wouldn't run....
5 Suggestions on how to achieve a higher education
SHANNON MORGAN Editor-in-Chief
Issue date: 6/3/09
1. Go to that quiet sanctuary filled with the thoughts of millions of minds, the library. How many of you shudder when I say research? I went into convulsions the first time I was assigned a 12-page paper. I begrudgingly sifted through an ocean of books at Albertsons library, trying to determine if Aaron Burr truly had an incestuous relationship with his daughter Theodosia, as claimed by Alexander Hamilton's character in the historical novel "Burr" by Gore Vidal. To my surprise, I found researching to be as exhilarating as reading Vidal's novel. By the time I finished my paper I'd driven my friends crazy with angry rants about how Hamilton was a punk, and Burr was my new personal hero. On my quest to discover Burr, I encountered strange creatures called, librarians, who I thought of as the shush-police before I started college. I see them now as guardians of knowledge and invaluable resources to my education. Because of that paper, I fell in love with research and became the library's number one fan. Learn to love the library and I assure you, the library will love you back. 2. Get involved and build an Urban Tribe. .......
May 6, 2009
The reservation form for the Annual Meeting is now available from the index page.
Please complete the form and send to Stuart.
May 2, 2009 Filibuster article
.....The right to extended debate came about quite by accident. In 1789, the first U.S. Senate adopted rules allowing the body to "move the previous question," thereby ending debate and proceeding to a vote. In 1806, outgoing Vice President Aaron Burr argued that the previous question motion had been used so sparingly up to then that it should be eliminated. The Senate agreed, and so the potential for a filibuster came into being. Without a previous question motion, the Senate left itself with no way to limit debate short of gaining unanimous consent.....
Put Burr on the $10 bill
Notes from Underground
Issue date: 3/30/09 Section:
Want to see why the economy collapsed? Just look at the $10 bill. Alexander Hamilton deserves to be remembered as one of the great villains of American history. He was trying to undo the country's hard-won freedom before the Revolutionary War was even over. .....
Phase 2 of The Oaks History and Nature Trail is now open at Brookgreen Gardens
By WBTW STAFF REPORTS Published: March 12, 2009 The second phase of The Oaks History and Nature Trail at Brookgreen Gardens is now open. The trail lets people experience an area of historic significance and learn more about the culture and daily lives of the people who lived at The Oaks Plantation and in the Lowcountry during the rice-producing years. The one mile trail is open everyday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. The Oaks Plantation was owned by the Allston/Alston family from the 1730s through the early 1900s and was home to South Carolina Governor Joseph Alston and his wife Theodosia Burr Alston, the daughter of Aaron Burr, a former Vice-President of the United States. Brookgreen Gardens is open daily to the public.
Park used as backdrop for film projectWritten by Rachel KirkpatrickMonday, March 09, 2009Putnam Memorial State Park recently served as the backdrop for select scenes in a new documentary written and directed by Dana O’Keefe, son of Thomas and Christine O’Keefe of Redding.
A crew and cast of re-enactors recently filmed a skirmish in the park for the film, which Mr. O’Keefe calls a “re-imagining” of the rivalry between Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton. It is essentially a revisiting of the history of the Founding Fathers from the perspective of Aaron Burr, he said.
“This is all about exploring issues from the perspective of Aaron Burr, who was a very prominent figure during this period, but was, in a sense, robbed of his rightful place in that history, in large part due to the consequences of his historic rivalry with Alexander Hamilton,” Mr. O’Keefe said.
Mr. O’Keefe said he is fascinated by the story of Aaron Burr, an American politician and Revolutionary war hero.
“I wanted to try to re-imagine that period in a way that would feel dynamic to a contemporary audience,” he said. “People associate Aaron Burr with murdering Alexander Hamilton, but the truth is these men were not so different.”
The film takes on many unexamined assumptions about the Founding Fathers as well as the mythology surrounding the American Revolution. Not only is Mr. O’Keefe directing the film, but he wrote it as well. His collaborator, Alex Kliment, is portraying Aaron Burr in the film. Vikram Gandhi is the film’s cinematographer.
Mr. O’Keefe is senior executive in the sales, financing and management divisions of Cinetic Media, a company based out of New York City. His repertoire includes a short film entitled The New Yorkist, which he wrote and directed. It premiered at the 2008 Tribeca Film Festival and has been playing on the festival circuit throughout the year.
Mr. O’Keefe said he hopes to complete Aaron Burr, Part 2, over the course of the summer. He plans to submit the films to various festivals
2/1/09 Flight 1549 Passengers Were Helped by NY Waterway Ferries
A survivor recalls the incident in this email:
Inaugurations often interesting
....Thomas Jefferson was the first President to take office in Washington, D.C. It was in March, 1801, and he stayed in a boarding house. He woke up on Inauguration Day, ate breakfast and walked down Pennsylvania Avenue to the Capitol. Only two people gathered, so Chief Justice John Marshal administered the oath to Jefferson and Vice President Aaron Burr. ....
Farewell to Campaign Finance Reform--Good Riddance!
By Thomas Fleming
Mr. Fleming has written widely on American politics from the American Revolution to modern times. He is a past president of the Society of American Historians.
I am astonished that in the aftermath of the epochal presidential election of 2008, almost no one in the media has mentioned the second most important reason for calling the contest historic. Just behind the stunning and justly celebrated choice of our first African-American president is the total destruction of the worst hypocrisy concocted by American politicians in their storied struggles for power, campaign finance reform....
In the beginning there were no campaign finance laws. Money was not regarded as a menace in American politics. There were a lot of rich men around in 1790. The distribution of wealth was roughly what it is today. The top ten percent of the population controlled well over half the wealth and cash. That realistic—and rich—man, President George Washington, firmly backed Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton’s plan to create financial stability in the new republic by reassuring the wealthy. Hamilton went a step further and formed a political party, the Federalists, which claimed to represent the new nation’s best and brightest, as well as richest.
Thomas Jefferson organized a political party to oppose Hamilton’s tilt toward the rich. New York became a battleground state in the election of 1800, the first to take place after Washington’s death removed his tacit blessing of the Federalists from the political picture. Jefferson’s lieutenant in New York, Aaron Burr, who was running for vice president, politicized a lower middle class chowder and marching society known as The Society of St. Tammany. They helped swing New York behind Jefferson and Burr and as Tammany Hall dominated the politics of the Empire State for the next hundred and fifty years. Tammany welcomed otherwise despised Irish immigrants who brought with them from the Ould Country the fine art of paying people to vote, stuffing ballot boxes, and beating up would-be opposition voters....
Thursday, Jan. 22, 2009
Silent Cities tell tales of the past
By Dave Baity - For The Sun News
MURRELLS INLET -- Residents of the Silent Cities tucked away in the backwoods of Brookgreen Gardens are long dead. But their graves reveal much about how Georgetown County became one of the wealthiest areas in the United States, then faltered after the Civil War.A wrought iron gate opens into a walled garden shaded by live oaks on what once was The Oaks Plantation that contains the history of owners who were among the nation's wealthiest people. Marble slabs embellished with engraved texts describe a bit of the background of plantation owners, their spouses and descendants who were laid to rest in the sandy soil beneath above-ground grave boxes.
.......
Joseph Alston, governor of South Carolina from 1812-1814, and his son, Aaron Burr Alston, occupy the most prominent grave.
Aaron Alston was named after his maternal grandfather, Aaron Burr, who tied Thomas Jefferson with 73 electoral votes in the 1800 presidential election. The U.S. House of Representatives named Burr vice president after 36 ballots. After his term ended, he was acquitted of a charge of treason that involved the Louisiana Purchase and lived in self-imposed exile in France before returning to a law practice in New York.
Jacob Alston's wife, Theodosia Burr Alston, doesn't occupy the grave. She was lost at sea after the couple's 10-year-old son died of malaria in 1812.
Winkler said Theodosia Alston, Burr's only child, became depressed after her son's death and decided to visit her father in New York. She boarded a ship in Georgetown that apparently sank off the N.C. Outer Banks, Winkler said. Jacob Alston couldn't accompany his wife on the trip because the War of 1812 erupted just as he assumed the governorship. .....
Annual Meeting Information from Stuart on these 4 pages:
For reservations, call the National Marriott # at 800 321-2211
Room block code number for the ABA group is AARAARA
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