The Fading of George Washington

                  Our first president, George Washington, was born 282 years ago on Feb. 22nd.  Fewer and fewer Americans know this because his national holiday, approved in 1879, is now the generic "Presidents Day."
                  To have George Washington, and other great presidents, lumped with not so greats JamesBuchanan (handed Lincolnthe war) and Woodrow Wilson (federal income tax, World War I) is absurd.
                 And yet America is content with this phony holiday, a day on which we contemplate --- what?
                 Groover Cleveland's love child?  Jimmy Carter's duel with an angry rabbit?  (Both true --- including the April 1979 rabbit rout.)
                 On "Presidents Day" we certainly do not consider the Gettysburg Address.  We don't give thought to Eisenhower's 1961 warning about loss of liberty through the "military industrial complex," which, as you read this, is producing drones that one day will fly over a neighborhood near you.  (Unarmed, hopefully.)
                On the official national holiday known as "Presidents Day," we do what good Americans do on a day off.  We sleep in.  Then shop for deals.  Maybe take lunch at Taco Bell.
                Anyway, George Washington is reduced to a sales pitchman.  Fine.  That suits our irreverence.  But it was not always this way.
                Within living memory nearly every American school room had a portrait of Washington.  Earlier generations of Americans did not want later ones to forget what he did.
                The late Ann Hawkes Hutton, the author and grande dame of North Radcliffe Street in Bristol Townships, dedicated her life to promoting the first president's birthday.
                In the 1930s, she rescued the spot where Waashington crossed the Delaware River in 1776 from disarray and obscurity.  In the 1950s, she oversaw the construction of the visitors center, now undergoing major renovations.
               She had the 1851 Emanuel Leutze painting removed from a nearby church and displayed in softly lit grandeur at the visitors center.
               Americans would forget Washington's miraculous military maneuvers and also his statesmanship.
               What made Washington great?  The list is long.  But the stunner came Dec. 23, 1783, when he cermoniously surrendered his sword to Congress.  He chose not to.  The world had never seen anything like it.
               Even today, we see public men reluctant to relinquish power, through cult of personality or the well financed "permanent campaign," designed to influence opinion and elections.
              Washington was no saint, though.  Judged by our superior views of race and justice, his stature is diminished by his ownership of slaves, whom he later freed.
              But if we had not had Washington controlling the Continental forces, and instead had his less talented rival, Gen. Horatio Gates, we would likely speak with British accents, and sing "God Save the Queen!"  instead of "My Country Tis of Thee."
             That is worth a national holiday named for the man responsible.