Stories

Prince Estabrook

Prince Estabrook: A Wound and a Question

We know three things for certain about Prince Estabrook. He was enslaved. He was at Lexington. He was wounded. Everything else is inference, imagination, or silence. Why was he there? The historical...

Jonathan Harrington

Jonathan Harrington: The Distance Home

The distance from where Jonathan Harrington fell to his own doorstep was perhaps one hundred feet. It might as well have been a hundred miles. Shot through the body in the first British volley, Harri...

Captain John Parker

Captain Parker's Choice

The night had been long. John Parker, 45 years old and coughing from the consumption that would kill him before the year was out, had mustered his men at one in the morning after Revere's warning. The...

Why We Still Stand on This Ground

I've worked with Lexington's Revolutionary sites for over two decades. Every Patriots' Day, I watch thousands of people gather before dawn on the Green to witness the reenactment. Year after year, the...

Teaching Beyond the Textbook

My students walk past Lexington Green every day. For them, it's just a park—a nice one, sure, with monuments and cannons, but fundamentally the place they cut through on the way to get pizza. My job ...