Walking Washington's Cambridge

The Washington Elm is gone—it fell in 1923, weakened by age and storms. But I stand where it stood and tell visitors: here, on July 3, 1775, a Virginia planter became the commander of an American army. The elm's absence actually helps make my point. History doesn't preserve itself. We have to choose what to remember. Cambridge chose to remember Washington's arrival, marking the spot even after the tree died. Every marker, every preserved building, represents a decision that this mattered enough to keep.