Historical Places

We've been steeping ourselves in the history of the places we've been seeing. I was anxious to see St Augustine, Florida, because when you live in a place as old as Boston, knowing there are places in the US that are WAY older is pretty intriguing. St Augustine has been here since 1565, or 1513 if you count Ponce de Leon. It has been here as a possession of the Spanish (more than once), the French, the British, the Patriots (not-yet-the-USA),  the U.S., the Confederacy, the U.S.A.  I knew from reading the amazing book The Warmth of Many Suns by Isabelle Wilkerson that this also the site of the oldest town of free Blacks and former slaves, and had a rich African-American life before slavery came around.  So I've been anxious to see it.

All this really old stuff is here, but it mostly obscured by a kind of Disneyland-ish Oldest City amusement park. Well, that isn't fair to Disneyland, which, whatever kind of money-making enterprise it is, isn't cheesy. This is cheesy in that weird kind of Ye Olde Something  kind of way, but with the addition of lights and billboards. It has interpreters, like in Williamsburg or Plimouth, but it ends up more like a kind of like Las Vegas crossed with a history theme park. We did manage to see a wonderful exhibition about 450 years of African American history here in the Visitor Center. St Augustine played a pivotal role in the Civil Rights movement, and there were terrific artifacts in that exhibit, so it is worth trying to separate made-to-look-old from really old, and interesting from shlock.

All of this made me feel so grateful for New England, and especially for Boston. It is really good when a place is old without a big flashing sign proclaiming "Really Olde!!!" Boston might be stuffy in its way, but all that preservationist stuff means it is pretty dignified. When you go to see the Old North Bridge, guess what? It is old. It is a bridge. Maybe that one is because of the wonders of the National Park Service, now that I think of it. Here in St Augustine, the fort, Castillo de San Marcos, is a National Monument, and it wonderful. Whereas the "Fountain of Youth" is billed as a National Archeological Park, whatever that is, and has billboards every few yards and is cheesy beyond belief. It will come as no surprise to anyone that I think that sometimes government does things better than the free market does; but in this case, let's say three cheers for government enterprise, and another three for dignity, respect, and good taste.