Jessabean

“We have abundant reason to rejoice that, in this land, the light of truth and reason has triumphed over the power of bigotry and superstition,” President Washington wrote to one Baltimore church.26 “Religious controversies are always productive of more acrimony and irreconcilable hatreds than those which spring from any other cause.”
― Ron Chernow, Washington: A Life

“No detail was too trivial to escape his notice, and he often spouted the Scottish adage “Many mickles make a muckle”—that is, tiny things add up.”
― Ron Chernow, Washington: A Life

“Many southerners feared that the New Englanders were a rash, obstinate people, prone to extremism, and worried that an army led by a New England general might someday turn despotic and conquer the South. The appointment of George Washington would soothe such fears and form a perfect political compromise between North and South.”
― Ron Chernow, Washington: A Life

“As the family unfolded twenty blankets and a picnic barbecue on the riverbank—Washington brought forty-eight bottles of claret to spread good cheer—they watched a macabre sporting event. Two boats, each manned by five or six muscular slaves, raced out to an anchored boat and back, while spectators cheered and placed bets onshore. It was an exceedingly strange vignette: the man who would be fighting for American liberty exactly one year later was being entertained by teams of strong, athletic slaves.”
― Ron Chernow, Washington: A Life