evacuation day

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Evacuation Day Rocks!

Seeing as how I now work for "we, the people" I get all sorts of holidays off.

And I am particularly excited to have Evacuation Day off. I don't know why it makes me so excited, but it totally does. Perhaps it's because I am a "herstory dorkus" as one person calls me. And because I guess I prefer "event" holidays like the Fourth of July, to "people" holidays like Columbus Day.

And so today when I called the bank to see if they were open (my Mom didn't believe me that they are), the nice customer service person told me I was the third caller that day asking.

So I told her about Evacuation Day - probably to her complete amusement. But at least now she knows!

I am going to celebrate this day, and be grateful that we celebrate Thanksgiving instead of Guy Fawkes Day, traded the Queen for the Fourth of July, and Dunkins instead of tea.

Oh yeah, and Happy St. Patricks Day!

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Evacuation Day celebration to rectify historical oversight

In 1927, during the 150th anniversary celebration of the American Revolution, 56 granite markers were set out in New York and Massachusetts to mark the trail over which wagon trains of the Continental Army carried cannons that had been captured at Fort Ticonderoga.
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Those cannons ultimately were emplaced on Dorchester Heights on the night of March 4, 1775, bringing British positions in Boston within artillery range and triggering their decision to evacuate the city. The event is celebrated as Evacuation Day on March 17. But one important site along the trail was not marked in 1927.

That historical oversight will be remedied next Saturday, when ground will be broken at Roxbury Street and Malcolm X Boulevard for the 57th marker.

The site, explained Michael P. Bare, chairman of the Evacuation Day Heritage Committee, is important because it lies at the foot of a hill below the Dillaway-Thomas House. That was the home and headquarters of General John Thomas, who commanded that the cannons be hauled up to Dorchester Heights, completing the trail begun at Ticonderoga by General Henry Knox.

Saturday's groundbreaking will mark what has become an annual celebration of the shared history of Roxbury and South Boston - the site of Dorchester Heights - in the events that drove the British out of Boston.

In addition to a granite marker similar to those erected in 1927, a National Park Service interpretive easel will be placed at the site.

The day's events will start off at Alford, a small town near the border with New York where groups from Boston will meet with groups from Fort Ticonderoga and New York. The Roxbury groundbreaking will take place at 3 p.m., with ceremonies at Dorchester Heights at 4 p.m. For more information, visit evacuationday.com.