7/9/2018

a visitor's guide to gettysburg, tip #2: what to do at night

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a visitor's guide to gettysburg, tip #2: what to do at night

What is there to do at night in Gettysburg? Drink. Ok, not just drink. There are also ghost tours. Gift shops are usually open too, though, surprisingly, some close at around 5 or 6 even during the summer. We're a small town and small town life doesn't always stay open until or past 9. Be aware of that when you come to Gettysburg. Now, don't get me wrong, Gettysburg doesn't close up at 5 and leave you with nothing to do (although you might hear some locals criticize it for doing just that). Like everything, there's a grain of truth to it and also a lot of exaggeration.

One thing I will point out to you as, simply, a heads-up rather than a criticism is that some gift shops, many, in fact, don't open until 10. Some open before. It struck me as odd the other day as I was walking out of a popular diner (who is welcome to sponsor us, as are all local businesses) on Steinwehr Ave at 9:15 ante meridian. I looked around me as I walked back to my car and noticed tourists ambling about, spying into shop windows to see a sign of life all to no avail. I scratched my head in bewilderment. Not that I am one to tell someone how he or she should run his or her business, but on Sundays, which is when this story occurs, people who have been nice enough to stay with us for the weekend want to get up and go. Breakfast, check out, leave by 10 or 11 and, SOMETIMES, they plan to grab a souvenir or gift on the way out of town, perhaps, after breakfast, mayhaps, berfore 10am. So, dear visitor, if that's how you roll, get your souvenirs and gifts Saturday night before 9.

This isn't a message to business owners to open at 9 like everywhere else in the country. It's a heads-up to the visitor to plan accordingly.

Ok, what can you do at night? There are, indeed, many watering holes in Gettysburg and they all offer a different vibe and, to an extent, prices. You want to feel like you've stepped back in time? Gettysburg has a few establishments that fit that bill. Perhaps something more elegant is your speed. Gettysburg's got 'em. Perhaps you're in your 20s and want to hang out at place with thumping "music" and people closer to your age. There happen to be a few places that are "on fleek" for you youngsters, too. Irish pubs your thing?-- I think you get my point: Gettysburg's got 'em.

Let's say you're not a drinker. Nothing wrong with that. It doesn't do it much for me anymore either. As far as what's come across my radar so far (and please correct me if I'm wrong by sending an email to matt@addressinggettysburg.com), you can eat ice cream, shop for souvenirs, take a ghost tour or just enjoy a stroll around a nice, historic town.

"Well, tell us, already! What are the names of these places, Matt?"

Soon enough. In the meantime, give yourself an adventure and discover what Gettysburg has to offer yourself by visiting and exploring.

Join our mailing list to learn where to eat, where to sleep and what to do when you visit; the progress on our production of Addressing Gettysburg Podcast and more.

Author

Matt Callery is the creator, host and producer of Addressing Gettysburg.

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7/2/2018

A Visitor's Guide To Gettysburg, Tip #1: How to Find the Visitor Center

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A Visitor's Guide To Gettysburg, Tip #1: How to find the visitor center

This may come off as a bit snarky. Believe me, it is not intended to be. It's intended to be helpful to many people who seem to have an issue finding the visitor center...while at the visitor center. I am still not being snarky.

The visitor center is an enormous building, but it's hidden. This, I do believe, is by design. Not to hide it from you, the visitor, but so that it blends in with the landscape and doesn't distract from the views on the battlefield. But I've encountered a surprising number of visitors who are so close, yet so far (as far as they know), to the visitor center they seek to find.

So let me walk you through this and, just one last time, I'm not being snarky here. I'm genuinely trying to help.

Let's assume that you have punched the address, 1195 Baltimore Pike, Gettysurg, Pa, into your GPS. Now let's assume that it has taken you to the Baltimore Pike entrance (there are two entrances as the VC is sandwiched between two roads, but this blogpost only deals with the Baltimore Pike entrance. Below is map of the location to aid you in visualizing what I am talking about as we move forward. Below that is a photo of the Baltimore Pike entrance, facing roughly South.)

Here is the sign at the Baltimore Pike Entrance taken from the perspective of looking (roughly) south from on the Baltimore Pike, or, in other words, the direction you are going when this sign appears on your right.

Once you've made the turn the first thing you should see is a digital sign. Normally it shows the direction that cars should go to park vs. where buses and RVs should go to park.

This sign shows that RVs and buses must turn left at the upcoming intersection in order to park.

Today, this sign said cars should go to Lot 3. Cars are always welcomed in Lot 3 (which is immediately off of the Taneytown Road entrance, which we're not covering in this article) without being told to by the digital sign. But it was busy today and Lot 1 was full. So this is the way to let you know to not even bother with Lot 1.

Soon after seeing this sign, you will come to a four-way intersection (pictured below). If you are not a bus dropping off a large group of people at the visitor center, don't even acknowledge that it's possible to make a right turn. That's not for you.

If you're in an RV or a bus that wants to park and not drop people off, you must make a left. There, you will find the bus and RV lot as indicated in the sign two pictures above. There are even bathrooms there. Past the bathrooms is a little path that goes into the woods. That will take you and yours on a short walk up to the visitor center. The building in the RV/bus lot is not, in fact, the visitor center.

Let's take a second to read the sign at the intersection:

Note how cars and vans (SUVs too) go straight, while buses, RVs and Trailers park to the left. Hey, Tesla owners, if you go left you can even charge up. To the right, handicap and bus drop-off are allowed. By the way, that white sign in the background is pointing to our sponsor, GettysBike Tours' location which is in the Bus and RV lot.

Ok, great, let's get beyond the intersection.

Here's what it looks like after you've passed the intersection. Not the car ahead of us. That car is going around a bend that you will be going around soon.

Notice how the weeds, wildflowers and underbrush are growing wild. I also believe this is by design and has some environmental reasoning. Whatever the reasoning is, I kinda like it. It makes one feel detached from the chaos of modern life and makes it a little easier to transport ourselves back to 1863.

But that's not why I bring it up. I bring it up because, while it is nice on the one hand, I think it's the main reason why people have such a hard time finding the actual visitor center. Poor visibility, an unintended consequence of the design. Plus the font size on the signage is too small to be seen and processed while driving.

Anyway...

As you come around the bend, you will probably blow past a sign. This sign...

This is a sign that might be hard to read and process if driving over the speed limit. Don't drive over the speed limit.

Let's take a moment and analyze this sign here in this blogpost so you don't need to stop in the middle of the lane of traffic to read it.

See where the pick up truck is? Turn in there to find parking. That's lot 1. It's the closest to the Visitor Center.
Be aware that you probably won't see the Visitor Center immediately upon turning into the lot and you'll say, "Matt mislead us." No he didn't. Remember, the Visitor Center is hidden. Just press on and find a space. Keep your eyes open for the foot traffic as you get further into Lot 1. That is your next clue in this adventure. They will be walking in two directions: to the visitor center and away from the visitor center, most likely to their cars. Hopefully you'll be able to figure out which is which.
Lot 1 is also where you'll find handicap parking and bike racks.
You might discover that the lot is full. Don't fret. Continue back on the road until you find lot 3. There is more parking there. HOWEVER, you now have to hoof it to the VC.

Should you miss Lot 1 all together, there will be a very small window of opportunity for you to actually see the visitor center itself as you drive around the bend just outside of Lot 1. The picture below shows you what it might look like

Can ya see it? Here is a zoomed in shot of it.

Again, though this is done with some humor, I don't mean to come off as smarmy, nor do I intend to embarrass anyone, be it the visitor or the Visitor Center powers-that-be and staff. I love Gettysburg and love that people come to visit it still. I want to get more people visiting here. I just know from firsthand experience that may visitors have difficulty navigating their way to the Visitor Center itself while being right in front of it and I want to help our followers who haven't visited before, come armed with an idea of what to expect. Plus, I want them to be able to actually get to the Visitor Center so they can see the great exhibits and presentations it has to offer.

Also, the Foundation does a fantastic job at breathing new life into how we see our history through the Visitor Center, which is great because, as we believe here at Addressing Gettysburg, "History is how you see it." Have fun on your visit. Read a book or two!

Oh, one more thing. You may be asking yourself, "why hasn't he mentioned Lot 2?" Good question. The short answer is: because it's not for you. And that's the long answer too. Just move on with your life. :-)

Author

Matt Callery is host and producer of Addresing Gettysburg Podcast among other things. To be notified about the progress of production and the release of the podcast, join our mailing list here.

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6/7/2018

Farms of the Southern field

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farms of the southern field

by Jacob Auer

Jacob Auer is the current owner of GettysBike Tours

Editor's Note: This article is used with permission of GettysBike Tours. You can find this article and others like it at www.gettysbike.com. Also, book a tour with them! Photos of the farms discussed here are after the article.

This will be a multiple part series discussing the farms and buildings on the Gettysburg Battlefield. To start off the series let’s talk about three farms on the southern side of the field, the Slyder, Snyder and Bushman farms.
Phillip Snyder Farm: The Phillip Snyder farm was built in 1831 and occupied by Phillip snyder and his family in 1863. The house is a 2 story log and frame house built on a granite foundation. In 1991-1992 the house was restored to its original 1890’s appearance. It stands unoccupied today.

On July 2nd 1863, Confederate troops of Hood’s Division marched through the property on their way to fighting at Devil’s Den, Little Round Top and The Wheatfield.
The Michael Bushman farm: A Reverend Michael Bushman and his wife Amelia lived in the Bushman farm both before and after 1863. The original portion of the house was built in 1808 and deeded by Sophia Hammer ot her daughter, Amelia. Amelia included her husband Michael Bushman in the will when they married. Michael Bushman was a nationally recognized minister in the German Baptist Brethren Church. The brick portion was added in 1860.

Amelia died in 1875, three years later Michael married Louisa Rupp. The will stated that the farm would go to Michael and Amelia’s children. As they never had any children the farm was sold to the Gettysburg Memorial Association in 1894 when Michael died in 1893 and transferred to the National Park Service in 1933.
Hood’s division went through the Bushman property on their way to attack Little Round Top and Devil’s Den. Hood may have been wounded in the Bushman orchard. It is likely the barn was used as a field hospital and 8 confederate soldiers were buried beside it. The house was renovated in 2017 and is available to be rented.
The Slyder Farm: John Slyder moved from Maryland in 1849 and bought 75 acre property. By the time of the battle the house included a two story house, blacksmith and carpenter shop and an orchard of peach and pear trees. As with the other two farms the Slyder farm saw Hood’s Confederates sweep through the property on their way to Devil’s Den and Little Round Top. The buildings became a Confederate field hospital.
Two months after the battle John Snyder sold the farm and moved to Ohio. The farm passed to the Snyder family who had it until the turn of the Century. The national Park now owns it.

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6/7/2018

Origins of the Rocks!

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AN OVERVIEW OF THE TECTONIC HISTORY OF GETTYSBURG PENNSYLVANIA

by Jacob Auer

Jacob Auer majored in Geology at Allegheny College and is the current owner of GettysBike Tours

Editor's Note: Diagrams and pictures can be found at the bottom of the blogpost.

Before we get into the origins of the rocks at Gettysburg let's define some vocabulary that will help with the understanding of the following concepts. The first concept is time. Our perspective of a long time ago is, generally, a few thousand years ago into BC. For this discussion we must go back even further, all the way to the Proterozoic Era. This period began 2.5 billion years ago and ended 540 million years ago. Geologic time usually means talking in the millions of years ago scale. Figure 2 shows the breakdown of geologic time and will be helpful to refer back to throughout this reading. Next we need to define an orogeny. A basic definition of this is a mountain building event caused by the collision of two or more continents.

The geologic history of the Gettysburg area begins in the Proterozoic Era, during the Grenville Orogeny. Nearly all of the crust at that time collided and formed a supercontinent this event is called the Grenville Orogeny. The core of the Appalachian Mountains is a result of the metamorphism, volcanism and sedimentation that occurred as a result of the Grenville Orogeny. The metamorphic rocks at the core of the mountain chain are over a billion years old and were deposited over 100 million years.

During the late Proterozoic (800-600 million years ago) crustal extension created fissures where large volumes of magma flowed. The volcanism lasted tens of millions of years and alternated between intrusive dikes and sills and flood basalts. The rocks produced by this volcanism covered the basement rocks formed during the Grenville Orogeny with metabasalts, greenstones and rhyolitic breccias. The mountain used by the Confederates to shield their advance and retreat is comprised in its core of these Rhyolitic breccias. As extensional tectonics continued the supercontinent broke up into a basin, forming the Iapetus Ocean. The basin was filled with deposits from alluvial fans and turbidity flows. Eventually these deposits formed many of the rock units that make up the present day Appalachians.

Through the Cambrian a marine environment deposited coarse grained sand which became sandstone that through metamorphism formed the Antietam Sandstone. This is representative of a nearshore environment. Since the sandstone is more resistant to weathering it is what caps many of the ridges in the area (figure 3).

To simplify the geology of Gettysburg I am going to ignore the Taconic (440-420 million years ago) and Acadian Orogenies (360 million years ago). A more detailed write up of these will be published on our blog but for the purposes of this pamphlet are not necessary. It is important to know that during these orogenies, particularly the Acadian Orogeny, the Iapetus Ocean was closed as the North American plate collided with the African Plate. The Alleghenian Orogeny (325-265 million years ago) formed the supercontinent Pangea. This was the last major orogeny of the Appalachians.

After this orogeny the mountain elevations are estimated to have been 6100 m (20,000 ft) comparable to the modern day Himalayas. Erosion over the millions of years since has lowered the elevations to 730 m (2,400 ft).

During the late Triassic (230-200 million years ago) Pangea began to split apart into roughly what the continents are today. This break up created the Atlantic Ocean by way of multiple half graben and block-fault basins (Figure 1). Old thrust faults formed during the Paleozoic reactivated but instead became normal faults.

This break up created a basin at the foot of the Appalachians called the Gettysburg-Newark Lowland section (also called the Birdsboro basin). This basin contains two deep basins on either end (Gettysburg and Newark basin) connected by smaller “narrow neck” sub-basins. The Gettysburg basin contains strata dipping 25-30 degrees and is 18 miles wide.

The Gettysburg Basin collected sediments from marine environments which formed the New Oxford Formation, the playal lacustrine sediments of the Gettysburg Formation and the fluvial sandstone of the Heidlersburg Member. The Heidlersburg Member is a group of rock formations that can be grouped together due to similarities in overall environment. In the New Oxford formation vertisols and calcrete with alternating lake deposits suggest a semiarid to more humid climatic fluctuations. As the basin expanded and deepened sediments from the surrounding area filled the basin and formed new rocks layers. Some of these sediments include the red shales and sandstones of the Gettysburg Shale of the Heidlersburg member.

Volcanism formed the igneous dikes and sills of the region which make up the core structures of most of the ridges on the battlefield. The Largest of these intrusions is the Gettysburg sill at 500 m (1,640 ft) thick. The heat from these intrusions caused localized metamorphism creating aphanitic hornfels. The mama filled faults, cracks and bedding planes. More on this in a bit!

So what are bedding planes?

Bedding planes are the surfaces that differentiate sedimentary rock layers. If you drove here on Rt 30 from Pittsburgh you passed many great examples of this. The road cuts through the mountains exposing layers or 'sheets' of rock usually at angles and sometimes folded, although the angling and folding occurred after deposition. The distinct layers are separated by bedding planes. Figure 4 is showing the bedding planes at the railroad cut in Gettysburg. This is not a great example but should give you the idea! Note: It is illegal to go down on the tracks without permission as it is CSX property. If you want to see these rocks in person have a look from the road or by one of the monuments!

These are called red beds and would have overlain much of the battlefield before they were eroded! These sedimentary rocks that are 240 million years or even older!

To recap, dikes and sills are intruded magma which when cooled become Igneous rock. The rock that this is intruded in can be nearly any type but in the case of Gettysburg it is Sedimentary, mostly sandstone and siltstones. The type of igneous rock the magma becomes depends on how it cools and its composition. The slower it cools the larger the crystals, the faster it cools the smaller the
crystals. This is why obsidian, which cools fast, looks like glass. The rocks here cooled faster forming crystal grains that you can see!

Rock Type:
The name of the type of igneous rock formed here at Gettysburg is Diabase (Between Gabbro and Basalt). In particular the formations are called the York Haven Diabase and the Rossville Diabase (figure 3) and has been dated to approximately 201 million years old (although the York Haven is slightly older). This means they formed during the Early Jurassic. The surrounding sedimentary rock is from the Upper Triassic. The York Haven Diabase forms the Sills and the Rossville Diabase forms the dikes.

The dikes are relatively fine grained while the sills are coarse grained and contain more feldspars. The dikes cooled faster than the sills. This could have occurred for a variety of reasons including depth, amount of material, and water content to name a few!

The diabase contains minerals of calcium plagioclase, clinopyroxene with quartz, magnetite, biotite and olivine. If you don't know what most of those minerals are that's ok! Google is your friend, there isn't enough room to get into those details here! That being said the plagioclase and pyroxene are visible as black and grey crystals.

Do not break open the rocks as this illegal but if you find one that has broken naturally and recently, these grains will be more obvious! Figure 6 shows Bowen's Reaction Series. To make it simple it shows which minerals form at which temperatures. If you have more questions about this ask Jake! Bowen’s Reaction Series shows the crystallization of silica minerals in a magma through the temperature range. Essentially if a magma cools and maintains a high temperature it may form olivine. If that same magma is allowed to cool further it can ‘react’ with the surrounding magma and form pyroxene. This process continues down. Remember it's the cooling of magma with the parent material that forms the minerals so when you look at the diagram start at the top!

Where are they?
The diabase rocks described here can be found at Devil's Den (figure 5), Little Round Top, Big Round Top and spread throughout the battlefield! Devil's Den is perhaps the best example and most spectacular to look at. Little Round Top and, in the fall and winter, Big Round Top will give you a great view of the entire area from their peaks.

Diabase is more weather resistant than the surrounding sedimentary rocks and so has remained after the sedimentary rocks were reduced back to sediment and transported away. This is why Little Round Top and Big Round Top stand as tall as they do. At their core is more diabase acting as a support system for the sediment, in their case it is a sill. Seminary Ridge is formed from a diabase dike. The individual boulders are remnants of a huge diabase sheet that was intruded into the rock formations called the Gettysburg Sheet.

After the igneous intrusions (200 million years ago) the area under went isostatic uplift. This forced the crust upwards exposing it to more erosion. Since the igneous rocks are harder they were left behind as the sediments were eroded by streams. These harder rocks form the core of hills in the area including Seminary Ridge, Culp’s Hill and Little Round Top. The sediment eroded from this area found its way to the cost and formed what is now the coastal plane.

I hope you enjoyed this information, if you would like more info about the geology or what we offer visit gettysbike.com!

Sources:
National Park Service US Department of the Interior, 2009, Gettysburg National Military Park & Eisenhower National Historic Site Geologic Resource Inventory Report. https://irma.nps.gov/DataStore/DownloadFile/426477 Accessed April 24, 2018
USGS, 2017, What is Geologic Time?: https://geomaps.wr.usgs.gov/parks/gtime/index.html
Buiter, S., Pfiffner, O., Beaumount, C. 2009, Inversion of extensional sedimentary basins: A numerical evaluation of the localisation of shortening: Earth and Planetary Science Letters.
Geology In, 2014, How Does Bowen’s Reaction Series Relate to the Classification of Igneous Rocks? http://www.geologyin.com/2014/09/how-does-bowens-reaction-series-relate.html

Figure 1

Figure 2

Figure 3

Figure 4

Figure 5. Diabase boulders at Devil's Den.

Figure 6: Bowen's Reaction Series showing progression of mineral formation at different temperatures and the general rock type.

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5/29/2018

wHY gETTYSBURG?

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WHY GETTYSBURG?

by peter bonfanti

Peter Bonfanti is a restauranteur in New Jersey and co-founder of GettysBike Tours and cohost of Addressing Gettysburg Podcast

  When Matt and I decided to stop our wildly popular podcast Checked Out in Jersey,  and subsequently decided to focus on a podcast about all things Gettysburg, the number one question I was asked was "Why Gettysburg?" This question was usually followed with an eye roll, or just a general look of boredom and confusion.

This was also the same question and look that was thrown at me when 13 years ago, I decided to leave a lucrative career, and pack all my belongings and move to Gettysburg to create Gettysbike Tours with Matt.

Until recently, I honestly had not really given it much real deep thought. For some reason in felt right, similar to when I met my wife (while living in Gettysburg, but she lived in Jersey, but I digress). There was no lightning strike, or divine intervention - it just felt right.

Still the question remains... why?

I have always been interested in history, and when in school I was a master at memorizing the where when and who of U.S. History. While it was enough to keep my attention, and I aced the tests, I never learned the real stories of our shared history. After starting Gettysbike Tours, I was fortunate enough to go on tours of the battlefield on a regular basis, and a few times I week I would hear Licensed Battlefield Guides tell the real stories of the people of Gettysburg. Suddenly, history was no longer dates and names but real people living real lives. The drama of Gettysburg (and history at large) is far superior to anything the greatest dramatists in Hollywood or Broadway could ever conjure up for the simple fact that it is all real.

For me, that's "why Gettysburg".

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5/26/2018

May 26th, 2018

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The March To Gettysburg

by Matt Callery

In 2005, Addressing Gettysburg host, Matt Callery, moved to Gettysburg to open a business. That business became GettysBike Tours. In 2010, he sold the business to one of the guides who worked for him and moved back to his home state of New Jersey. Now, he's returning to make Addressing Gettysburg a reality. Among other things

Matt in 2006 on top of the Pennsylvania Monument

The March To Gettysburg

I've always enjoyed forms of mass communication and entertainment. TV, radio, films, music and, in the recent decade and a half or so, podcasts. But what is a podcast exactly?

The simplest answer I give people who ask this question is that they're mostly akin to talk radio shows except that you can listen to them on demand rather than on a schedule. Sadly, this seem to boggle the minds of older people that I talk to causing them to miss out on material they might enjoy. And why wouldn't it boggle their minds? They're used to the actual world, not the virtual world. So, the next question inevitably becomes "How do you listen to one?" And this is when their eyes glaze over. If this is a concern to you, don't worry. We'll cover how to listen to podcasts as we get closer to the debut of the Addressing Gettysburg. Now back to the story.

In 2004, on a family trip to Gettysburg, I foolishly endeavored to take those willing on a walking tour of the battlefield...battle-day by battle-day...in one afternoon...again, on foot. We were dropped off at the Buford Statue across from the McPherson Barn. It was when we entered the shade of McMillan Woods when I had a mutiny on my hands. Yes, it was everyone else in the group complaining about the oppressive heat and the fact that they've already drank our supply of water, but it was also my own body rebelling against me. I knew we would not make it to the Round Tops, up to The Angle and then to the pool at the Gettysburg Motor Lodge where we were staying. Well, "we" be damned, I knew I wouldn't. So, we walked to the Virginia Memorial, cut across the field of Pickett's Charge and then crawled to the pool, barely alive. We didn't even take off our shoes. Ok. I exaggerated that last part. We took off our shoes... but we left our socks on.

I was a bit bummed because I firmly believed then, as I know to be true today, that the drama of the battle can't be conveyed thoroughly enoiugh without feeling the ground beneath your feet. Not merely on a stop when you get out of the car or bus, but from walking the grounds that the battle took place on. Still, a comprehensive walking tour was not the way to do it. Impossible! Gettysburg National Military Park is just too large.

As we were making the turn east to cross Pickett's Charge on our "strategic redeployment", a little birdy whispered in my ear. Well, not quite a birdy. It was my friend, Pat.

"Man, we shoulda brought our bikes," Pat said, wiping his brow.

Hmm, I thought.

Later that night, my brother-in-law said, "You know what you should do, Matt? Get a bunch of scooters and rent those out. People would love that."

Scooters? Definitely more attractive to an increasingly less physically-active populace, but too expensive and the insurance would be killer. Bikes? Bikes would be easier to get my hands on and the insurance will probably be cheaper too.

So, for the next 11 months I developed GettysBike Tours every night after work. My days of bar-hopping with friends were gone...well...on hold... and on July 1, 2005, GettysBike Tours was officially open for business and I was in New Jersey at a wedding.

Fast forward to 2018. I've been back in my home state of New Jersey since 2011. While working as a photographer and video producer, as well as a podcast host and producer -- three things that I love -- something all the while was tugging at me and it wasn't in Jersey. Every visit I made to Gettysburg felt like a return home which was abruptly ended upon the realization that I couldn't retire to the house I lived in between 2005 and 2010 and that my stay was short lived. Crossing the Delaware River back into New Jersey literally brought on anxiety. In spite of my being born here and growing up here, it never felt like home. I guess it's true what they say about home being where the heart is.

The Battle of Gettysburg has always been an obsession of mine. I feel like my life's quest has not so much been about learning everything there is to know about the battle (which IS a big part of it) but moreso to figure out the WHY of it all. Why does this battle capture the imaginations of millions like me? Why don't other battles hve the same effect? Why do people who visit Gettysburg once immediately fall in love with it? And why do many people find themselves compelled to move there some time after visiting?

There's a magic to Gettysburg that I've yet to hear a person give a good explanation for. And that's the point. Why do you love your spouse or children? You just do. No explanation is required and, even if one was required, you would just stutter and stammer as you search your soul for the right words only to find those words don't exist yet.

Through a series of events that started in July of 2017, I found myself on what I now recognize to be the road back to Gettysburg, or my "March to Gettysburg". While searching for work and other things to keep me here in New Jersey, all things "Gettysburg" were screaming at me from the wings. It took my best friend and cohost on Addressing Gettysburg, Peter Bonfanti, to call it to my attention and even formulate a plan of action to achieve my goals.

So what are those goals? Well, first, I'm lucky enough to have been brought on as an employee of the business I founded in 2005. So, my first goal is to help Jake, the current owner, bring the business to the next level. Meanwhile, I'll be studying my butt off to take the guide exam. Doing the multimedia productions under the umbrella of Addressing Gettysburg will certainly help in that effort. Through Addressing Gettysburg, my goal is to change the perspective of the person who always says, with the wave of a hand, "Pfft! History/the Civil War/that George Washington stuff is boring" by showing him/her that those stoic-looking people in photographs look that way for a reason and not to be fooled by them. They were just as human as we are. They just hid it better. It's also for the beneift of the history nerd. Let's be honest, most nerds are not entertaining. We at Addressing Gettysburg embody that rare blend of entertaining and nerdy and hope that the supernerd might find a funny bone as he or she engages with our material.

What's my plan? That's TOP SECRET.

That's why we really appreciate your support of Addressing Gettysburg through donations, shopping through our Amazon links and Sutler's Store. The revenue from those sources helps defray the cost of production and allows me more time to study for the exam. So, thanks, again.

Also, if you find yourself in Gettysburg, stop by GettysBike Tours and say hi. Even if you don't ride bikes. I'd love to meet you.

New Pages Added to Website

Take a few minutes and peruse the new pages on our website. We've added our maps page, Battles of the Gettysurg Campaign page (that's right, it wasn't just the Battle of Gettysburg) and our videos page. More pages are under construction at this time including Notable Commanders, Hidden Gems of the Battlefield and more!

Recording sessions for the Addressing Gettysburg Podcast will begin in early June after Matt has moved to town. Sponsor, GettysBike tours has been gracious enough to allow us to conduct the sessions after hours at their location. A special thanks to Jake for that!

Copyright © 2018 ADDRESSING GETTYSBURG, All rights reserved.
"The March to Gettysburg"
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matt@addressinggettysburg.com
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a visitor's guide to gettysburg, tip #2: what to do at night

a visitor's guide to gettysburg, tip #2: what to do at night

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A Visitor's Guide To Gettysburg, Tip #1: How to Find the Visitor Center

A Visitor's Guide To Gettysburg, Tip #1: How to find the visitor center

Author

Farms of the Southern field

farms of the southern field

by Jacob Auer

Origins of the Rocks!

AN OVERVIEW OF THE TECTONIC HISTORY OF GETTYSBURG PENNSYLVANIA

by Jacob Auer

wHY gETTYSBURG?

WHY GETTYSBURG?

by peter bonfanti

May 26th, 2018

The March To Gettysburg

The March To Gettysburg

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a visitor's guide to gettysburg, tip #2: what to do at night

a visitor's guide to gettysburg, tip #2: what to do at night

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A Visitor's Guide To Gettysburg, Tip #1: How to Find the Visitor Center

A Visitor's Guide To Gettysburg, Tip #1: How to find the visitor center

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Farms of the Southern field

farms of the southern field​

by Jacob Auer

Origins of the Rocks!

AN OVERVIEW OF THE TECTONIC HISTORY OF GETTYSBURG PENNSYLVANIA

by Jacob Auer

wHY gETTYSBURG?

WHY GETTYSBURG?

by peter bonfanti

May 26th, 2018

The March To Gettysburg

The March To Gettysburg

New Pages Added to Website

Archives

Author

Categories

Subscribe to the Show

Join Our Mailing List

Contact Us!

farms of the southern field