ADVANCE ENVIRONMENTAL COLUMNIST

I grew up on a family farm alongside Potomac Creek in Virginia. Our farm’s rich soil holds millennia of Native American history. As a boy, I regularly found “arrowheads” along the muddy creek banks and adjacent fields (more on those quotation marks later). Without the internet for entertainment, some days I even had a rule that I couldn’t go home until I’d found at least one. Over time my eyes got better at finding them. Now, I have hundreds sleeping in softly-cushioned boxes.

The photograph above is a box from my collection. Sadly, some arrowheads are broken; time takes its toll, and the modern plow is both a crude archeological tool as well as a careless destroyer of antiquities. Here’s one up close:

I still find arrowheads today. Birders win by looking up, but my life-long habit of looking down brings its own rewards. Arrowheads are a tangible and addictive way to learn history. They also connect us to those who called this land home long before us. When I joined Facebook years ago and began posting picture of my finds, the “How do you find them?” question started rolling in.

So, here’s my starter guide. It includes common sense rules that will not only save you from wasting many hours, but could keep you from legal trouble.

Rule 1. Know the law, and be ethical.

I’m no lawyer, but use common sense.

You shouldn’t look for arrowheads on private property without explicit permission. Not only is that stealing, but here in Virginia you are putting yourself in danger from dogs and landowners. Both bite when angry. (We do have hidden meth labs, you know.) Even if you get permission, it’s nice to offer the landowner first choice of anything you find. They may even let you come back.

Also, should you find anything in an official park (local, state, federal), leave it where it is and tell the officials. That’s the law in most places. In my experience, they’ll often let you keep it. But you never know if you’ve found something of real archeological value, either in terms of the location or the artifact itself. So, do an internet search of the relevant laws of the place you’re in and follow them. It’s your responsibility.

In that vein, never dig for specimens. Yes, there are private businesses, called “pay digs,” that let you dig up artifacts for a fee. They seem to be concentrated in Texas. Some even use bulldozers. That’s unethical, in my view. Cashing in on Indigenous People’s history is tasteless, and digging harms the landscape. Leave no trace, as they say. Everything I’ve ever found has been exposed on the surface.

And NEVER, EVER go looking on a known archeological site. You are interfering with the work of the professionals who add to our knowledge of human history. If you come across something you suspect might be a Native American village site or campground, tell somebody. Email an archeologist at the local university, for example. Leave it to the experts.

That said, I do read local histories to learn where native villages once stood. That’s educational and provides useful information when considering Rule 3 below.

Rule 2. Know what you’re looking for.

This is a real challenge, especially at first. Some helpful facts: To begin with, calling them “arrowheads” is misleading.

In Virginia at least, actual bow-and-arrow technology dates back only to the latter parts of the Woodland period, which lasted from about 1200 BCE up to European contact 1600s CE. Yet, Indigenous peoples lived here for many millennia before that. Some scholars estimate up to 20,000 years before today. Even conservative estimates say 12,000 years, at a minimum.

This means that most of the stone artifacts I find aren’t actual arrowheads. They’re knives, grinders, drills, spearheads, ammo for atlatls (a thrower device common before archery), or something else. It’s more accurate to refer to them as “points.” But it’s easy and common to call them all “arrowheads,” so that’s what I’ll do here.

Take a good look at the examples in the picture I posted of the box from my personal collection. You’ll see arrowheads come in many shapes.

In part, this is because forms changed over time. Over centuries, elders passed, cultures shifted, and people learned to make things differently. This is also because these artifacts had different functions—as knives, scrapers, spears, etc. Each function necessitated a different form. And even the size of the animals the native peoples hunted changed over time. After the megafauna disappeared, for example, carrying around a mastodon-size spear probably looked silly, like bringing a howitzer to a rabbit hunt.

But many of the arrowheads in my collection have been altered, too. And that’s not just the fault of modern plows.

Take a look at the two artifacts below, which I found separately. Note the distinct curves along their top left edges. What’s going on here? The explanation is that their respective owners resharpened these blades to keep them useful.

Reader, check your pulse: If you don’t find that incredibly cool, go back to your previously scheduled, incurious life.

Indigenous people had to keep their tools in proper working condition, just like smart chefs and hunters do today. Their lives depended on it. It took effort to make a good blade out of hard rock—why toss it away when it goes dull? Reuse!

More evocatively...

The arrowheads you find will usually look different from each other, especially if they’re from different time periods. There’s no one shape or style to look for. And their condition will differ.

The material used may also vary, although there are consistencies within regions. This is because, barring trade, Native Americans usually relied on the rock types they could access most readily.

Out West, that might be glassy, black obsidian. Here on Potomac Creek, that usually means quartz or quartzite. This is fortunate, because white is easier to spot on the ground. But chert and other rock types are found here, too. Once you realize how hard these rocks are, you’ll appreciate the skill required to turn them into intricate tools with refined edges.

So, familiarize yourself with the common shapes and stones. I suggest looking at examples posted by social media groups that are interested in arrowheads from your area.

You’re looking for something that has an edge or point AND shows signs of human work.

The latter part is key: without it, chances are you’re holding a “geo-fact” made by Mother Nature, not an artifact made by people.

It’s maddening how often nature creates something resembling human-made work!

I guarantee that the first hundred objects you pick up will be geo-facts. Don’t get too frustrated. The patience of Job is a virtue here.

You’re also likely to come across an arrowhead that’s not just broken or altered, but lying on its side, or in a position where the original shape isn’t obvious. Some of my proudest moments are when I identify a partially buried artifact, with only a small bit poking out of the ground. Or even under water. Without a good sense of what I’m looking for, I would have missed it.

Finally, as you can see from my collection, most arrowheads are small, ranging from an inch or so to maybe three or four (unless you come across something unusual).

This is important knowledge, because it leads us to the Rule 3.

Rule 3: Know where to look.

Theoretically, you can find an arrowhead almost anywhere. Stuff travels. Items get lost or haphazardly moved around. I’ve found arrowheads in unexpected places, like cities. But you want to increase your chances, so follow these principles.

First, stones of similar size tend to associate with each other.

Why? Because natural forces like wind, gravity, and water like to group similarly-sized things together. This means that you are less likely to find a 2-inch arrowhead on a beach that holds only very fine sand (unless it plopped down from an overhanging cliff face). Ideally, you want a field, hillside, or beach littered with stones that are roughly the size of what you’re looking for.

Second, although arrowheads may be almost anywhere, fields and water are the best places to look. That’s where erosion works fast, especially after storms have passed. I love searching such places after a heavy rain. A freshly plowed field can be great —but make sure you have permission.

On that note, here’s another fun fact. Stones rise up in places where the ground freezes. That’s because each stone has a small pocket of air under it, where water collects. When the water turns to ice, it expands, lifting the stone up. Enough freeze cycles and eventually the stone pops up onto the surface. This phenomenon is known as “frost heave.”

It’s probably why New England farmers are so ornery; they have to keep clearing their fields of rocks each spring.

And that’s why I walk the same fields each year. New arrowheads keep popping up! What a generous world we live in.

Rule 4: Think like a native

This rule is a lot of fun.

Travel back in time for a minute. Imagine yourself an Indigenous person utterly dependent on your surroundings for everything you need to survive.

Where would you spend most of your time?

Almost always, the answer is near fresh water. You and the animals you hunt need it every day. So, you build your village, fish, hunt for game, and generally hang out there. Even when you run off into the woods to flirt with someone from another tribe, you leave your family and kids there. Access to water is key to your life.

That’s the best place to start looking for arrowheads. The fields I walked as a boy are in a broad valley with creeks and streams that lead to a river. No surprise I found so many.

Of course, topography changes over time; a river’s banks have almost certainly shifted—often dramatically—in the last thousand years or so.

But downhill is downhill. Lowlands fill with water that attracts game and hunters. Since humans arrived, Potomac Creek has likely always been someone’s home. (Except when it was under the sea—but that’s a boon for the fossil hunters.)

Even hilltops near water can be worth checking. In summer, native peoples usually camped by the river. But in winter, when the cold air settles low, they often built their villages up high where the warming sun hits first. So, look up there. And remember that whatever tools they used up high are now washing downhill into creek beds and gullies. Check there, too.

So while there are other places to look, start with water. And I don’t mean modern, human-built reservoirs or lakes, unless you can find the natural feeder creeks that flow into them. Maybe check a good topo map for clues. A kayak is a great way to gain access to otherwise hard-to-reach shorelines.

Here’s another very useful hint: If you’re patient and observant, you may come across evidence of tool-making.

For this, it really helps to know how stone implements like arrowheads are made. You start with a larger stone, which you then “knap” or chip away at to produce the finished product. This laborious process inevitably produces hundreds of flakes.

Come across these flakes and you’re in business.

In your investigations, you are far more likely to find a concentration of flakes (once you can identify them) than an arrowhead, because there are so many more flakes. And once you do, you can be sure you’re in the right place. Native Americans were making and using tools right here.

Now, your chances of finding something nice is pretty good. This reminds me of a happy story.

There’s a trail near my office that I sometimes visit for a quick break. Years ago, I noticed that the high ground at one bend in the trail, right next to a river, was littered with flakes eroding out from the soil. So, I kept my eyes open every time I walked there.

Sure enough, one fine day I discovered one of the prettiest arrowheads I’ve ever seen. It lay in the open, eroding out of a slope, right where hundreds of people walk and jog every day. Here it is:

Look at those serrated edges, cut into an object only one inch long. What extraordinary craftsmanship! That day, I felt as though I’d found the Ark of the Covenant.

Chris Egghart, an expert on Native American stone tools who writes books on the subject, looked at photos of my collection and identified this one as a LeCroy bifurcate, dating from the early to mid-Archaic period (about 6500 BCE. For perspective, the Great Pyramid in Egypt was built around 2600 BCE. What I’d found was about four millennia older.

Up yours, King Tut!

See how addictive this can be?

I sent pictures of that point and others to the local museum, noting where they were found and offering to donate them. The nice lady there said thanks, but that they already have more of such items than they know what to do with.

Rule 5: Have fun, grab a flippin’ stick, and give thanks.

Of course, there’s plenty more to say about finding arrowheads. But don’t forget it’s supposed to be fun. Take a kid along.

I get skunked most days, meaning I fail to find anything worth keeping. But it’s still a day spent outdoors in nature, exploring beautiful places. Birds sing, flowers bloom, and critters scurry about. And I can get so focused on what’s immediately in front of me that I’ve unwittingly come close to stepping on many a snake.

It’s also helpful to find a thin but sturdy flippin’ stick, about 45 inches long. If you’re anywhere near my age, you don’t want to bend down to check every promising stone. You need something to flip it over with. My favorite sticks are the de-barked ones left behind by beavers.

Finally, there’s an important ritual I always observe whenever I find something. I raise the artifact skyward and give thanks to the person who left it there.

Maybe they lost the arrowhead by accident. Maybe they killed someone with it. Maybe they were kind, and maybe they were some type of prehistoric jerk. Who knows? But almost certainly I’m the first person to touch it since they did, however many millennia ago. So, I feel somehow connected to that person, and grateful for their long ago presence.

I hope future peoples will grant me such benefit of a doubt.

Bonus finds

Logically, looking for arrowheads will lead you to find sundry other objects we humans have tossed aside. They can be interesting unto themselves. I found a bunch of V-shaped stones in a river and thought they might be weights for a fish net. Since then, I’ve concluded they’re some sort of alien spaceship.

Less mysteriously, that sort of crap appears at a rate of 50 to each arrowhead. A bit creepy, if you ask me. But one morning several years ago, I found—and nearly lost—something I truly value today.

Walking a river bank after a good rain, I spotted a very nice, complete arrowhead. I was happy as a plum. I gave appropriate thanks.

Then, I spotted this unusual object lying among the pebbles.

At first, I thought it was modern. It felt like rough masonry, with smooth grooves worn into each side. I figured it was a piece of a defunct bridge or dam, or maybe a collapsed upstream house. Definitely nineteenth or twentieth century. So, I tossed it back on the ground. Maybe you geologists would like to chime in?

Half an hour later, I returned to pick it up. I still didn’t know what it was, but I just couldn’t leave it behind. Something about the way it fit in my hand—I know that’s a maddening cliché among arrowhead hunters, but sometimes it’s valid.

The gods smiled on me.

Lying in bed late that night, I happened to be reading The Powhatan Indians of Virginia: Their Traditional Culture, by noted Virginia anthropologist Helen Rountree. Figure 14 on page 66 held a black and white photo of Native American artifacts housed in a local university collection.

An object at center-bottom was exactly what I’d picked up that morning and almost left behind for trash! The book called it “a stone crusher with indentations on both sides.” What I’d found was a stone miller.

What are the odds I’d learn the truth that very night? I was so relieved I hadn’t tossed it out. My wife, lying next to me, was measurably less excited.) And, as usual, I offered it to the local museum, which declined without looking at it.

One final discovery

I LOVE finding Indian pottery. Given its use in food making and storage, there’s something warm, familiar, and intimate about it.

Our local Native pottery was made by pinching clay; they didn’t have pottery wheels. The potter then usually pressed fabric or cords onto the vessel, creating distinctive patterns. Apart from decoration, I’m guessing the patterns probably made it a bit easier to grasp the finished pot, too.

The Native pot sherds I find are always very small (about the size of a microchip), scattered, and barely worth keeping even if you know what they are. I only recognized the tiny sherd pictured below because it showed the imprinted cloth pattern. I found it deep in the marshes of Potomac Creek behind our farm, washed up alone by a fast-flowing stream.

Look at the miniscule quartz minerals embedded within the clay. This is “temper” added for strength. Delicate, strong, and lovely.

My gratitude to whomever made it. You are long gone and unknown to me. But by your works, you’re still here, in the present. With me.

***

Ranjit Singh teaches in the Department of Political Science and International Affairs at the University of Mary Washington. He’s also an active environmentalist. His “No Lines in Nature” Substack, where this essay originally appeared, blends history, science, and philosophy to explore our relationship with the natural world world. You can find it HERE.

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How to Find an Arrowhead: A life-long habit of looking down brings its own rewards

By Ranjit Singh, Advance Environmental Columnist

I grew up on a family farm alongside Potomac Creek in Virginia. Our farm’s rich soil holds millennia of Native American history. As a boy, I regularly found “arrowheads” along the muddy creek banks and adjacent fields (more on those quotation marks later). Without the internet for entertainment, some days I even had a rule that I couldn’t go home until I’d found at least one. Over time my eyes got better at finding them. Now, I have hundreds sleeping in softly-cushioned boxes.

I still find arrowheads today. Birders win by looking up, but my life-long habit of looking down brings its own rewards. Arrowheads are a tangible and addictive way to learn history. They also connect us to those who called this land home long before us. When I joined Facebook years ago and began posting picture of my finds, the “How do you find them?” question started rolling in.

So, here’s my starter guide. It includes common sense rules that will not only save you from wasting many hours, but could keep you from legal trouble.

Read the full article

De‑Trumpification Commission: Sledgehammers, Golden Calves, and the Federal Debt

By Phil Huber, Advance Columnist

From Fredericksburg, Washington is just close enough to be dangerous. It’s about an hour away by car, roughly 52 miles, which makes the city ideal for day trips, congressional gawking, and, in some imagined, happier future, civic calisthenics on the National Mall. If the next administration is serious about national renewal, it should create a De‑Trumpification Commission and invite the public to help remove the monumental evidence of our recent bout of presidential self‑branding. This would not be vandalism. It would be debt reduction with historical interpretation and some exercise for the arms, chest, back, legs and core.

Read the full article

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More Than 770,000 Children Are No Longer Receiving SNAP Benefits After Changes to Federal Food Program

By Nicole Santa Cruz, ProPublica

As a House committee debated President Donald Trump’s signature domestic policy bill last year, Republican backers repeatedly emphasized that its changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as food stamps, wouldn’t affect vulnerable people.

But nearly a year after the measure was signed into law, the number of children receiving food assistance has plummeted by at least 776,000, according to a ProPublica analysis. At least 12 states break down program participation by age, and of the 1,670,011 people who are no longer receiving benefits in those states, 776,134, or 46 percent, were children.

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Just Another Manic Monday Headlines—and Other News from Around the State

VaNews/Virginia Public Access Project

Articles from newspapers throughout the Commonwealth and Washington D.C. Firewalls will block you from reading some, but you’ll at least have some idea about what’s going on from the headlines, which, let’s be honest, are all many of us have time to read anyway.

Read the full article

This article is published under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND. It can be distributed for noncommercial purposes and must include the following: “Published with permission by FXBG Advance.”

ADVANCE COLUMNIST

From Fredericksburg, Washington is just close enough to be dangerous. It’s about an hour away by car, roughly 52 miles, which makes the city ideal for day trips, congressional gawking, and, in some imagined, happier future, civic calisthenics on the National Mall. If the next administration is serious about national renewal, it should create a De‑Trumpification Commission and invite the public to help remove the monumental evidence of our recent bout of presidential self‑branding.

This would not be vandalism. It would be debt reduction with historical interpretation and some exercise for the arms, chest, back, legs and core.

American presidents are expected to wait until after death, or at least retirement, before they get airports, memorial halls, solemn marble tributes, and bronzes posed for eternity. The whole point is that history, not the honoree, gets the last word. Trump has never been one for waiting. During his presidency, his name has been attached or proposed for attachment to public buildings, federal programs, benefit cards, park passes, and even an airport, all while he remains alive and loudly available for dedication ceremonies. In most democracies that sort of thing is awkward. In autocracies, it is project management.

History offers a long and gaudy list of rulers who could not resist turning public space into a personal résumé. Pharaohs carved their names into stone and erected monumental images of themselves for the ages. Roman emperors raised triumphal arches, forums, and colossal statues so that no citizen might escape the proper feeling of insignificance. Stalin renamed a major city after himself. Juan and Eva Perón managed to get provinces and cities rebranded in their honor.

Trump, being an American original, has adapted the form to domestic tastes. He appears less capable in conquering Iran than in annexing the nearest available symbol. Why invade Russia when you can rename a performing arts center, sketch out a monumental arch, add a new East Wing, slap your face on federal cards, dream aloud about a military parade, and commission gleaming statues of yourself in enough gold finish to make the biblical calf look understated? The difference between a serious national monument and a Trump monument often comes down to whether the sculptor is told to capture nobility or merely the correct camera angle.

That is why the next administration should publish a De‑Trumpification Commission Executive Order on day one. It can be modeled, loosely and satirically, on earlier public bodies that oversaw changes to the Capitol and its statuary, including mid‑century efforts to quietly remove offensive monuments during renovation. Only this commission would have a more urgent task: identifying every plaque, façade, wing, arch, parade concept, commemorative card, oversized pedestal, and speculative gold‑toned statue to which Trump tried to attach his name, face, or aura, then returning those things to a healthier state of civic neutrality.

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Naturally, this should be done in a fiscally responsible manner. Americans are always told government should pay for itself, so let the Commission raise revenue the old‑fashioned way: raffles, concessions, sponsorships, premium demolition packages, and auction sales of retired vanity artifacts. For a modest fee, citizens could enter the weekly Sledgehammer‑o‑Rama and compete for the chance to remove a ceremonial gold panel from some decommissioned federal monument or retired presidential likeness. VIP packages could include goggles, a souvenir fragment of faux marble, and a T‑shirt reading, “I helped put the republic on a sensible pedestal again.”

For particularly challenging artifacts, the Commission will need special handling. Take the golden likeness in Mar‑a‑Lago, a private residence, golf course, and country club that already functions as a kind of living museum of Trumpian excess. The next administration could solve several problems at once by declaring Mar‑a‑Lago a national historic site and leasing it to the Smithsonian as a satellite museum of American hubris. The statue could be relocated indoors, gently de‑idolized, and sold off in ethically sourced fragments through the gift shop— “Genuine former golden calf, now supporting the federal budget one paperweight at a time.”

And where should all this money go? Straight to pay down the federal debt. Finally, a bipartisan fiscal plan. Every swing of the hammer becomes a tiny act of deficit reduction. Every dismantled arch, every retired statue, every truckload of ornamental excess hauled off for recycling becomes part of the most emotionally satisfying debt‑payment program in modern history. Washington has spent decades searching for painless ways to reduce the national debt. It turns out the answer may be therapeutic demolition.

Fredericksburg is close enough to Washington for a practical day trip, but far enough away to maintain the moral clarity that comes from seeing the capital as both seat of government and recurring source of absurdity. A 60‑minute ride to the District, a rented sledgehammer, a few healthy swings at a retired monument to presidential vanity, and home in time for dinner: that is regional living at its finest.

There should also be deep discounts for historians, architectural historians, preservation planners, archaeologists, museum curators, and cultural resource specialists. No one has suffered more professionally from the inflation of ego into the built environment. These are the people who would have to draft the future interpretive markers explaining why a sitting American president once felt called to populate the federal city with self‑referential naming schemes, ornamental annexes, and statuary with the theology of the golden calf. They have earned half‑price admission, expedited raffle entry, and perhaps a reserved lane near the especially tasteless monuments.

The larger lesson is serious. Healthy republics do not encourage living leaders to turn the public square into a vanity franchise. They reserve honor for service, perspective for history, and marble for the dead. When rulers begin naming, building, renaming, annexing, parading, and casting themselves in symbolic gold, it usually means they have confused stewardship with ownership. The proper democratic response is not reverence. It is renovation.

And so, Fredericksburg should prepare now. Stretch. Hydrate. Budget for gloves. Keep a Saturday open in the first spring of the next administration. The call may soon go out for volunteers to help restore the capital to a more traditional appearance, one missing a few giant monuments, one less gilded statue, and one lighter federal debt. With any luck, a few winners from the 540 area code will get the patriotic pleasure of toppling the first absurdity.

***

Huber is a retired U.S. Army Reserve colonel, retired consultant, and former Army civil service environmental specialist who spent his career contracting for and overseeing cultural resource and environmental policy work for the Department of the Army. He now lives in Fredericksburg, focusing on civic responsibility, public policy, and the challenging work of maintaining American democracy.

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ADVANCE ENVIRONMENTAL COLUMNIST

I grew up on a family farm alongside Potomac Creek in Virginia. Our farm’s rich soil holds millennia of Native American history. As a boy, I regularly found “arrowheads” along the muddy creek banks and adjacent fields (more on those quotation marks later). Without the internet for entertainment, some days I even had a rule that I couldn’t go home until I’d found at least one. Over time my eyes got better at finding them. Now, I have hundreds sleeping in softly-cushioned boxes.

The photograph above is a box from my collection. Sadly, some arrowheads are broken; time takes its toll, and the modern plow is both a crude archeological tool as well as a careless destroyer of antiquities. Here’s one up close:

I still find arrowheads today. Birders win by looking up, but my life-long habit of looking down brings its own rewards. Arrowheads are a tangible and addictive way to learn history. They also connect us to those who called this land home long before us. When I joined Facebook years ago and began posting picture of my finds, the “How do you find them?” question started rolling in.

So, here’s my starter guide. It includes common sense rules that will not only save you from wasting many hours, but could keep you from legal trouble.

Rule 1. Know the law, and be ethical.

I’m no lawyer, but use common sense.

You shouldn’t look for arrowheads on private property without explicit permission. Not only is that stealing, but here in Virginia you are putting yourself in danger from dogs and landowners. Both bite when angry. (We do have hidden meth labs, you know.) Even if you get permission, it’s nice to offer the landowner first choice of anything you find. They may even let you come back.

Also, should you find anything in an official park (local, state, federal), leave it where it is and tell the officials. That’s the law in most places. In my experience, they’ll often let you keep it. But you never know if you’ve found something of real archeological value, either in terms of the location or the artifact itself. So, do an internet search of the relevant laws of the place you’re in and follow them. It’s your responsibility.

In that vein, never dig for specimens. Yes, there are private businesses, called “pay digs,” that let you dig up artifacts for a fee. They seem to be concentrated in Texas. Some even use bulldozers. That’s unethical, in my view. Cashing in on Indigenous People’s history is tasteless, and digging harms the landscape. Leave no trace, as they say. Everything I’ve ever found has been exposed on the surface.

And NEVER, EVER go looking on a known archeological site. You are interfering with the work of the professionals who add to our knowledge of human history. If you come across something you suspect might be a Native American village site or campground, tell somebody. Email an archeologist at the local university, for example. Leave it to the experts.

That said, I do read local histories to learn where native villages once stood. That’s educational and provides useful information when considering Rule 3 below.

Rule 2. Know what you’re looking for.

This is a real challenge, especially at first. Some helpful facts: To begin with, calling them “arrowheads” is misleading.

In Virginia at least, actual bow-and-arrow technology dates back only to the latter parts of the Woodland period, which lasted from about 1200 BCE up to European contact 1600s CE. Yet, Indigenous peoples lived here for many millennia before that. Some scholars estimate up to 20,000 years before today. Even conservative estimates say 12,000 years, at a minimum.

This means that most of the stone artifacts I find aren’t actual arrowheads. They’re knives, grinders, drills, spearheads, ammo for atlatls (a thrower device common before archery), or something else. It’s more accurate to refer to them as “points.” But it’s easy and common to call them all “arrowheads,” so that’s what I’ll do here.

Take a good look at the examples in the picture I posted of the box from my personal collection. You’ll see arrowheads come in many shapes.

In part, this is because forms changed over time. Over centuries, elders passed, cultures shifted, and people learned to make things differently. This is also because these artifacts had different functions—as knives, scrapers, spears, etc. Each function necessitated a different form. And even the size of the animals the native peoples hunted changed over time. After the megafauna disappeared, for example, carrying around a mastodon-size spear probably looked silly, like bringing a howitzer to a rabbit hunt.

But many of the arrowheads in my collection have been altered, too. And that’s not just the fault of modern plows.

Take a look at the two artifacts below, which I found separately. Note the distinct curves along their top left edges. What’s going on here? The explanation is that their respective owners resharpened these blades to keep them useful.

Reader, check your pulse: If you don’t find that incredibly cool, go back to your previously scheduled, incurious life.

Indigenous people had to keep their tools in proper working condition, just like smart chefs and hunters do today. Their lives depended on it. It took effort to make a good blade out of hard rock—why toss it away when it goes dull? Reuse!

More evocatively...

The arrowheads you find will usually look different from each other, especially if they’re from different time periods. There’s no one shape or style to look for. And their condition will differ.

The material used may also vary, although there are consistencies within regions. This is because, barring trade, Native Americans usually relied on the rock types they could access most readily.

Out West, that might be glassy, black obsidian. Here on Potomac Creek, that usually means quartz or quartzite. This is fortunate, because white is easier to spot on the ground. But chert and other rock types are found here, too. Once you realize how hard these rocks are, you’ll appreciate the skill required to turn them into intricate tools with refined edges.

So, familiarize yourself with the common shapes and stones. I suggest looking at examples posted by social media groups that are interested in arrowheads from your area.

You’re looking for something that has an edge or point AND shows signs of human work.

The latter part is key: without it, chances are you’re holding a “geo-fact” made by Mother Nature, not an artifact made by people.

It’s maddening how often nature creates something resembling human-made work!

I guarantee that the first hundred objects you pick up will be geo-facts. Don’t get too frustrated. The patience of Job is a virtue here.

You’re also likely to come across an arrowhead that’s not just broken or altered, but lying on its side, or in a position where the original shape isn’t obvious. Some of my proudest moments are when I identify a partially buried artifact, with only a small bit poking out of the ground. Or even under water. Without a good sense of what I’m looking for, I would have missed it.

Finally, as you can see from my collection, most arrowheads are small, ranging from an inch or so to maybe three or four (unless you come across something unusual).

This is important knowledge, because it leads us to the Rule 3.

Rule 3: Know where to look.

Theoretically, you can find an arrowhead almost anywhere. Stuff travels. Items get lost or haphazardly moved around. I’ve found arrowheads in unexpected places, like cities. But you want to increase your chances, so follow these principles.

First, stones of similar size tend to associate with each other.

Why? Because natural forces like wind, gravity, and water like to group similarly-sized things together. This means that you are less likely to find a 2-inch arrowhead on a beach that holds only very fine sand (unless it plopped down from an overhanging cliff face). Ideally, you want a field, hillside, or beach littered with stones that are roughly the size of what you’re looking for.

Second, although arrowheads may be almost anywhere, fields and water are the best places to look. That’s where erosion works fast, especially after storms have passed. I love searching such places after a heavy rain. A freshly plowed field can be great —but make sure you have permission.

On that note, here’s another fun fact. Stones rise up in places where the ground freezes. That’s because each stone has a small pocket of air under it, where water collects. When the water turns to ice, it expands, lifting the stone up. Enough freeze cycles and eventually the stone pops up onto the surface. This phenomenon is known as “frost heave.”

It’s probably why New England farmers are so ornery; they have to keep clearing their fields of rocks each spring.

And that’s why I walk the same fields each year. New arrowheads keep popping up! What a generous world we live in.

Rule 4: Think like a native

This rule is a lot of fun.

Travel back in time for a minute. Imagine yourself an Indigenous person utterly dependent on your surroundings for everything you need to survive.

Where would you spend most of your time?

Almost always, the answer is near fresh water. You and the animals you hunt need it every day. So, you build your village, fish, hunt for game, and generally hang out there. Even when you run off into the woods to flirt with someone from another tribe, you leave your family and kids there. Access to water is key to your life.

That’s the best place to start looking for arrowheads. The fields I walked as a boy are in a broad valley with creeks and streams that lead to a river. No surprise I found so many.

Of course, topography changes over time; a river’s banks have almost certainly shifted—often dramatically—in the last thousand years or so.

But downhill is downhill. Lowlands fill with water that attracts game and hunters. Since humans arrived, Potomac Creek has likely always been someone’s home. (Except when it was under the sea—but that’s a boon for the fossil hunters.)

Even hilltops near water can be worth checking. In summer, native peoples usually camped by the river. But in winter, when the cold air settles low, they often built their villages up high where the warming sun hits first. So, look up there. And remember that whatever tools they used up high are now washing downhill into creek beds and gullies. Check there, too.

So while there are other places to look, start with water. And I don’t mean modern, human-built reservoirs or lakes, unless you can find the natural feeder creeks that flow into them. Maybe check a good topo map for clues. A kayak is a great way to gain access to otherwise hard-to-reach shorelines.

Here’s another very useful hint: If you’re patient and observant, you may come across evidence of tool-making.

For this, it really helps to know how stone implements like arrowheads are made. You start with a larger stone, which you then “knap” or chip away at to produce the finished product. This laborious process inevitably produces hundreds of flakes.

Come across these flakes and you’re in business.

In your investigations, you are far more likely to find a concentration of flakes (once you can identify them) than an arrowhead, because there are so many more flakes. And once you do, you can be sure you’re in the right place. Native Americans were making and using tools right here.

Now, your chances of finding something nice is pretty good. This reminds me of a happy story.

There’s a trail near my office that I sometimes visit for a quick break. Years ago, I noticed that the high ground at one bend in the trail, right next to a river, was littered with flakes eroding out from the soil. So, I kept my eyes open every time I walked there.

Sure enough, one fine day I discovered one of the prettiest arrowheads I’ve ever seen. It lay in the open, eroding out of a slope, right where hundreds of people walk and jog every day. Here it is:

Look at those serrated edges, cut into an object only one inch long. What extraordinary craftsmanship! That day, I felt as though I’d found the Ark of the Covenant.

Chris Egghart, an expert on Native American stone tools who writes books on the subject, looked at photos of my collection and identified this one as a LeCroy bifurcate, dating from the early to mid-Archaic period (about 6500 BCE. For perspective, the Great Pyramid in Egypt was built around 2600 BCE. What I’d found was about four millennia older.

Up yours, King Tut!

See how addictive this can be?

I sent pictures of that point and others to the local museum, noting where they were found and offering to donate them. The nice lady there said thanks, but that they already have more of such items than they know what to do with.

Rule 5: Have fun, grab a flippin’ stick, and give thanks.

Of course, there’s plenty more to say about finding arrowheads. But don’t forget it’s supposed to be fun. Take a kid along.

I get skunked most days, meaning I fail to find anything worth keeping. But it’s still a day spent outdoors in nature, exploring beautiful places. Birds sing, flowers bloom, and critters scurry about. And I can get so focused on what’s immediately in front of me that I’ve unwittingly come close to stepping on many a snake.

It’s also helpful to find a thin but sturdy flippin’ stick, about 45 inches long. If you’re anywhere near my age, you don’t want to bend down to check every promising stone. You need something to flip it over with. My favorite sticks are the de-barked ones left behind by beavers.

Finally, there’s an important ritual I always observe whenever I find something. I raise the artifact skyward and give thanks to the person who left it there.

Maybe they lost the arrowhead by accident. Maybe they killed someone with it. Maybe they were kind, and maybe they were some type of prehistoric jerk. Who knows? But almost certainly I’m the first person to touch it since they did, however many millennia ago. So, I feel somehow connected to that person, and grateful for their long ago presence.

I hope future peoples will grant me such benefit of a doubt.

Bonus finds

Logically, looking for arrowheads will lead you to find sundry other objects we humans have tossed aside. They can be interesting unto themselves. I found a bunch of V-shaped stones in a river and thought they might be weights for a fish net. Since then, I’ve concluded they’re some sort of alien spaceship.

Less mysteriously, that sort of crap appears at a rate of 50 to each arrowhead. A bit creepy, if you ask me. But one morning several years ago, I found—and nearly lost—something I truly value today.

Walking a river bank after a good rain, I spotted a very nice, complete arrowhead. I was happy as a plum. I gave appropriate thanks.

Then, I spotted this unusual object lying among the pebbles.

At first, I thought it was modern. It felt like rough masonry, with smooth grooves worn into each side. I figured it was a piece of a defunct bridge or dam, or maybe a collapsed upstream house. Definitely nineteenth or twentieth century. So, I tossed it back on the ground. Maybe you geologists would like to chime in?

Half an hour later, I returned to pick it up. I still didn’t know what it was, but I just couldn’t leave it behind. Something about the way it fit in my hand—I know that’s a maddening cliché among arrowhead hunters, but sometimes it’s valid.

The gods smiled on me.

Lying in bed late that night, I happened to be reading The Powhatan Indians of Virginia: Their Traditional Culture, by noted Virginia anthropologist Helen Rountree. Figure 14 on page 66 held a black and white photo of Native American artifacts housed in a local university collection.

An object at center-bottom was exactly what I’d picked up that morning and almost left behind for trash! The book called it “a stone crusher with indentations on both sides.” What I’d found was a stone miller.

What are the odds I’d learn the truth that very night? I was so relieved I hadn’t tossed it out. My wife, lying next to me, was measurably less excited.) And, as usual, I offered it to the local museum, which declined without looking at it.

One final discovery

I LOVE finding Indian pottery. Given its use in food making and storage, there’s something warm, familiar, and intimate about it.

Our local Native pottery was made by pinching clay; they didn’t have pottery wheels. The potter then usually pressed fabric or cords onto the vessel, creating distinctive patterns. Apart from decoration, I’m guessing the patterns probably made it a bit easier to grasp the finished pot, too.

The Native pot sherds I find are always very small (about the size of a microchip), scattered, and barely worth keeping even if you know what they are. I only recognized the tiny sherd pictured below because it showed the imprinted cloth pattern. I found it deep in the marshes of Potomac Creek behind our farm, washed up alone by a fast-flowing stream.

Look at the miniscule quartz minerals embedded within the clay. This is “temper” added for strength. Delicate, strong, and lovely.

My gratitude to whomever made it. You are long gone and unknown to me. But by your works, you’re still here, in the present. With me.

***

Ranjit Singh teaches in the Department of Political Science and International Affairs at the University of Mary Washington. He’s also an active environmentalist. His “No Lines in Nature” Substack, where this essay originally appeared, blends history, science, and philosophy to explore our relationship with the natural world world. You can find it HERE.

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As a House committee debated President Donald Trump’s signature domestic policy bill last year, Republican backers repeatedly emphasized that its changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as food stamps, wouldn’t affect vulnerable people.

SNAP reforms would “restore integrity” to the program and ensure it works for the “most vulnerable among us, including children,” said Rep. Glenn “GT” Thompson, a Pennsylvania Republican and chair of the House Agriculture Committee.

Passing the bill would be a “historic accomplishment” that will ensure “those in need can continue to receive the assistance they need,” said Rep. John Rose, a Republican from Tennessee.

And Rep. Dusty Johnson, a South Dakota Republican, said the bill would focus resources on the “neediest” Americans. “If you are a pregnant woman, your benefits are unaffected. If you have young children at home, your benefits are unaffected by this bill. If you are disabled, your benefits are unaffected by this bill.”

But nearly a year after the measure was signed into law, the number of children receiving food assistance has plummeted by at least 776,000, according to a ProPublica analysis. At least 12 states break down program participation by age, and of the 1,670,011 people who are no longer receiving benefits in those states, 776,134, or 46 percent, were children.

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Another analysis reached the same conclusion: Just last month, the nonpartisan Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found there were 700,000 fewer children receiving food assistance.

Arizona has seen the nation’s largest percentage decline in SNAP participants; 205,223 children are no longer receiving the benefit since July 2025, a 55 percent drop. Louisiana had the second largest percent decline among children, 22 percent.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which oversees SNAP, hasn’t detailed the impact on children aided by the program, but initial figures show that compared to February 2025, 4.3 million fewer people received SNAP nationwide in February 2026, leaving 37.8 million participants.

Although children weren’t the intended targets of the legislation’s changes, they’re increasingly “collateral damage,” said Katie Bergh, a senior policy analyst at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

If states are trying to comply with the law’s changes to SNAP, they’re likely not focusing on making the program accessible, Bergh said. Other experts said that people may be pushed off the program because of increased paperwork requirements to remain eligible.

States are required to impose work requirements for most adult recipients, while preparing for two major cost shifts. In October, states will begin covering 75 percent of the program’s administrative costs. States have been paying 50 percent of those costs.

In addition, states will have to pay a larger share of SNAP benefits starting in October 2027, based on their error rate. Error rates reflect overpayments or underpayments of SNAP benefits. While sometimes characterized as fraud, such errors are usually the fault of the state agency or the SNAP recipient, according to USDA, which describes them as “largely unintentional.”

If a state agency is facing staffing shortages and struggling to comply with new regulations, it will be harder for low-income families to access the benefits, Bergh said. “Families are falling through the cracks.”

In Massachusetts, for example, the share of SNAP applicants who called an assistance line and couldn’t reach a worker rose from 61 percent in November to nearly 81 percent in March, according to the Department of Transitional Assistance, which administers SNAP in the state. The state agency did not respond to a request for comment.

A USDA spokesperson did not address ProPublica’s questions about the number of children who have lost access to SNAP. “There is no shortage of resources for the most vulnerable among us, including children,” the spokesperson said.

The three members of the House Agriculture Committee who defended last year’s bill before its passage — Rose, Thompson and Johnson — did not respond to ProPublica’s questions about their statements now that many children no longer receive SNAP benefits.

Rep. Jim McGovern, a Massachusetts Democrat, asked Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins about her recent comments that it was “good news” that millions of people no longer receive SNAP. If more than 700,000 children have been dropped in the 12 states that report those figures, “that number’s going to be into the millions” when other states are included, he said.

Rollins responded, “The 700,000 number of children is not correct,” contending that most people who were kicked off SNAP were “fraudulent.”

“That is not a nonpartisan group that gave you that number,” she said. (ProPublica independently verified the figures reported by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.)

McGovern said he has talked to people who have lost food assistance. “These are people who actually need and rely on this food assistance to provide basic nutrition for their families,” he said.

Pressure to lower error rates “creates a temptation for the states to bump off working families,” said Parke Wilde, a food economist at Tufts University. Working families may have more volatile incomes, making it harder for state agencies to assess benefits accurately.

“When they say we want to preserve SNAP for those with the greatest need, they’re sort of acknowledging that they want the scale of the SNAP program to be smaller,” he said.

Mariana Chilton, an expert in child hunger at University of Massachusetts, Amherst, said a smaller program won’t save money in the long run. Research shows that children who receive SNAP benefits are healthier, have better academic outcomes, use hospitals less often and have better mental health as teenagers.

She called the situation a “public health crisis” in the making. “When children are not healthy, this affects children today and it affects them throughout their lifetimes,” she said, likening hunger during early childhood to a brain injury.

As Arizona’s SNAP participation drops, nonprofits are feeling the effects. St. Mary’s Food Bank, the largest in the state, has seen a 15% increase in need this year, which translates into 300,000 more visits from people in search of food, said Milt Liu, the chief executive officer.

“It’s important for everyone to realize that policies have implications for people on the edge, and we’re seeing that in our line every day,” he said.

On a recent morning, Ana Alvarez waited in a line of vehicles at a St. Mary’s food bank in Phoenix. Alvarez, a single mother of five who works at a restaurant, started coming to St. Mary’s after she lost her SNAP benefits in September.

She reapplied for SNAP with the Arizona Department of Economic Security in December, but the application is still pending. The department did not respond to questions about its backlog.

She clips coupons and has cut out trips to the zoo and restaurants with her children. The slow season at the restaurant where she works is about to hit. And as summer temperatures rise, Alvarez wonders how she will afford her electric bill, her rent and her car payment.

At least once a week she contacts the agency about her application. The last time she called, a worker told her what others have in the past: She will have to keep waiting.

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Articles from newspapers throughout the Commonwealth and Washington D.C. Firewalls will block you from reading some, but you’ll at least have some idea about what’s going on from the headlines, which, let’s be honest, are all many of us have time to read anyway. CLICK HERE.

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Roadkill: The Long, Slow, Torturous Death of a Fredericksburg Street Name

By Steve Watkins, Advance Editor

It took five years of meetings, studies, research, polling, foot-dragging, and hand-wringing, but Fredericksburg City Council finally got rid of an “r.”

You might have missed it. I know I did. The deed was finally done a year ago, quietly, in the dead of night. Well, quietly, anyway: an unceremonious change of intersection signs and home addresses on a short L-shaped street with 23 properties, 12 of them “renter-occupied,” just off Lafayette Boulevard.

And just like that, “Forrest Avenue”—named in honor of the Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest, first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan—became “Forest Avenue,” named in honor of any large area covered chiefly with trees and undergrowth.

Read the full article

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Semi-Pro-Tips on Writing College Recommendations

By Drew Gallagher, Advance Columnist

Not long ago, a kid from our neighborhood asked me to write him a letter of recommendation. He was hoping to land a football scholarship at an obscure Division I college out west that competes in something called the Big Sky Conference—which I’m pretty sure they would prefer I not refer to by their first two initials, even then no one has every heard of them.

Based on the sway that athletics holds over institutes of higher education, my character reference could have been written in crayon, just so long as long as I didn’t bring up pending murder charges, or the time I found the young man sleeping under our front hedgerow with a half-empty case of Busch Light Apple.

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A Little Light Reading (and Plenty of Heavy if That’s Your Thing)

WASHINGTON INDEPENDENT REVIEW of BOOKS

From Marcie Geffner’s WIRB review of All Us Saints:

Katherine Packert Burke’s contemporary gothic novel, All Us Saints, portrays the tormented lives of four adult siblings almost two decades after three teenaged girls were killed inside their home. With a large cast of dramatis personae and a minimalistic plot, the author relies on a theatrical, locked-room structure, creepy images, and themes related to gender, sexuality, and violence to hold the story together.

On the evening of May 31, 2011, Calla St. Cloud, a creatively blocked New York playwright, her younger brother, James, a video-store clerk, and James’ girlfriend, Heather, arrive at the St. Cloud home in a small town in Virginia. The place is owned by Calla and James’ elder sister, Edna, a local photographer whose career has stalled. The other occupants are Edna’s husband, Roger, author of Doll Parts: Isolation, Transvestism, and the St. Cloud Family Murders, a true-crime book about the tragedy, and their daughter, Wren.

Shut inside the house, the family extinguishes lit candles one by one while Roger reads a script that reenacts the horrific events that occurred on the same night 19 years earlier.

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Virginia Budget Leaders Reach ‘Agreement in Principle’ for Deal

VaNews/Virginia Public Access Project

Articles from newspapers throughout the Commonwealth and Washington D.C. Firewalls will block you from reading some, but you’ll at least have some idea about what’s going on from the headlines, which, let’s be honest, are all many of us have time to read anyway

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This article is published under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND. It can be distributed for noncommercial purposes and must include the following: “Published with permission by FXBG Advance.”

ADVANCE COLUMNIST

Not long ago, a kid from our neighborhood asked me to write him a letter of recommendation. He was hoping to land a football scholarship at an obscure Division I college out west that competes in something called the Big Sky Conference—which I’m pretty sure they would prefer I not refer to by their first two initials, even then no one has every heard of them.

Based on the sway that athletics holds over institutes of higher education, my character reference could have been written in crayon, just so long as long as I didn’t bring up pending murder charges, or the time I found the young man sleeping under our front hedgerow with a half-empty case of Busch Light Apple.

I somehow managed to complete the task, though not to specifications (More about that in a minute). I wanted to add, “No Artificial Intelligence was used in the writing of this letter,” but I refrained because that seemed like exactly something AI would say. Also, though I don’t generally use AI for anything, I confess I was tempted when confronted with the recommended word counts, which were a thousand for “How do you know the individual, and in what capacity?” and an astonishing 10,000 for the recommendation itself.

One thousand is a lot of words, especially when all you planned to write was “Nice kid. Lives down the block. Parents owe me money.” But it pales in comparison to the 10,000 those Utahns said they wanted. I once wrote an as-yet-unpublished novel that came in at 70,000, a project to which I devoted a lot of time and energy because I naively thought it might make me some money. I wasn’t at all interested in devoting the same time and energy to a character reference for a stud athlete who as it turned out had already reported to campus for summer workouts with the football team!

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The daunting word count did make me wonder how someone might go about filling up 10,000 words in a character reference, and also if anyone had ever written one of these things and run out of words, which I fully intended to do. Fortunately, the Big Sky school had an 800-number set up to answer just those sorts of questions.

When I called, though, I was greeted by an automated voice and told that I’d caught them at a busy time and could I please hold. I never thought that 3:05 p.m. on a Thursday would prove to be a busy time, but then I remembered they were in the Mountain time zone and it was 1:05 there so they must be just getting back from lunch. I can only assume that reading 10,000-word character reference essays builds up quite an appetite, not to mention long periods of self-reflection about the usefulness—or uselessness—of that liberal arts degree about which their fathers had warned them.

After I sat on hold for 10 minutes, I was told that I wouldn’t be able to connect with a live person—then or ever—and I should leave a message. As one who has Verizon for my internet, cable, and telephone land line (which hasn’t worked in five years), I didn’t leave a message because I was sure someone would simply hit DELETE before listening to it, and mark every deletion with hash marks on a big whiteboard so they’d have something to celebrate at day’s end while hating their anti-liberal-arts fathers even more.

Still curious about these word counts, I went to the admissions office of my alma mater, Mary Washington College (now the University of), hoping they would respond even though I may not have made a donation in the 2025-2026 calendar year. (I did, however, make a donation to the new journalism scholarship at UMW named for my new boss, Steve Watkins. Steve hates my parenthetical asides, but I figure if I use one to remind him that I donated to the prestigious award named in his honor he would have to let this one fly.)

My point of contact at UMW was Melissa Yakabouski, dean of Admission, and she couldn’t have been more helpful.

“UMW doesn’t necessarily have a limit,” she told me. “We’re happy to have a letter of reference, but 10,000 words seems excessive. We put 500-word limits on applicants’ personal statements/essays.”

So there you have it. Not only does Mary Washington have something my young friend’s Utah school doesn’t—an NCAA men’s national basketball championship—but they also have a responsive Admissions department and humane word limits.

“Get Dirty!” as they’re fond of saying these days at UMW. “Go Wash!”

Sadly, UMW doesn’t have a football team or NIL money, so I understand why my young friend chose to bring his talents elsewhere. Fortunately, the fact that I fell about 9,500 words short in my character reference letter didn’t hurt his chances for admission.

As I’m writing this, he’s pushing a 45-pound weight up and down a football field eight times without stopping or standing. His new team opens their season on Sept. 5 against Idaho State, and the way I see it, if he gets on the field and they win, it’s all thanks to me.

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ADVANCE EDITOR

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It took five years of meetings, studies, research, polling, foot-dragging, and hand-wringing, but Fredericksburg City Council finally got rid of an “r.”

You might have missed it. I know I did. The deed was finally done a year ago, quietly, in the dead of night. Well, quietly, anyway: an unceremonious change of intersection signs and home addresses on a short L-shaped street with 23 properties, 12 of them “renter-occupied,” just off Lafayette Boulevard.

And just like that, “Forrest Avenue”—named in honor of the Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest, first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan—became “Forest Avenue,” named in honor of any large area covered chiefly with trees and undergrowth.

(Well, not exactly just like that. In 2015, the city’s Memorials Committee included the following item in their minutes: “Question About Renaming a City Street. Michael [Spencer] has received an inquiry from Neil Walsh about renaming Forrest Avenue which is currently named for Nathan Bedford Forrest, a Confederate General and later, a KKK member. Nancy [Moore] suggested that Michael could unofficially recommend that Mr. Walsh get a petition signed by everyone on the street to start the process.”)

Nothing came from that initiative, or from a petition with a hundred signatures that my pal Steve Rabson and I sent around several years ago also calling for the name change—delivered, with impassioned speeches, to city council, three of whose members privately assured me later that they’d right get on it, as soon as the next election was over. They didn’t.

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The wheels of justice turn slowly, but grind exceedingly fine. That may or may not be true, but here’s what the Memorials Committee wrote in their Feb. 20, 2025 minutes about the then-pending street-name metamorphosis—ten years after Neil Walsh’s inquiry:

“Forrest Avenue Name Change—Ms. Moore reported that after two years the City will change the name of (Nathan Bedford) Forrest Avenue. It will be changed to Forest Avenue effective March 31. Mr. Spencer asked if there was a way to create a framework for the other names the commission had discussed. Ms. Moore explained that there was a process, but she did not think they [sic] City was planning to move forward with others.”

Ms. Moore was Nancy Moore, longtime news editor of the Free Lance-Star, now retired. Mr. Spencer was Michael Spencer, Historic Preservation professor at the University of Mary Washington.

The “other names the commission had discussed”—actually beginning in 2020, five years earlier—were 43 more Fredericksburg streets named for Confederate officers, for individuals “whose legacy includes the ownership of people,” or for men “engaged in the transatlantic slave trade.”

That was according to a November 2024 memorandum from the city manager, who also wrote, “Staff met with members of the Memorials Advisory Commission, Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park staff, and other local historians to identify street names that contradict the City’s goals to celebrate Fredericksburg’s diverse history and create an equitable and welcoming community.”

So, one down, 43 to go?

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Here’s what I wrote about Fredericksburg’s Confederate Street Names for Pie & Chai Magazine back in 2022:

A short while ago I brought up the issue of Confederate street names with my neighbors in the Idlewild subdivision in Fredericksburg. The Virginia General Assembly had finally come to its senses in 2021 and voted to put the kibosh on “Jefferson Davis Highway,” as the transcontinental route had been officially named since 1922 at the request of the Daughters of the Confederacy–not a terrorist organization, but not a very culturally sensitive one, either, then or now.

The original Jefferson Davis Highway—a southern counterpoint to the northern transcontinental Lincoln Highway—started in Arlington at the 14^th Street Bridge and extended south to Georgia, mostly on U.S. Route 1, and then west from there until it reached San Diego. The Daughters lobbied hard for it to run up the length of the West Coast as well, from San Diego to the Canadian border, but that didn’t happen.

The General Assembly killed the moniker after someone got around to pointing out how sketchy it was to have a prominent highway, or any highway for that matter, named for a white-supremacist slave owner from Mississippi who was also the long-dead president of the long-dead (though as-yet-unburied) secessionist Confederate States of America.

Route 1 is now “Emancipation Highway” through Fredericksburg, “Richmond Highway” in northern Virginia, and “Patriot Highway” in Spotsylvania, where they wouldn’t be caught dead using a word like “emancipation” for fear someone might think they were endorsing Critical Race Theory.

It was in the aftermath of the Route 1 name changes that I suggested to my Idlewild neighbors that perhaps it was time for us to reconsider our subdivision street names as well, many of which were named (presumably by the developers, Ryan and Ryland) for Confederate generals, including Posey, Perry, Pickett, Hampton, Wright, Hoke, Walker, and Wilcox.

A number of other streets in the city of Fredericksburg also have Confederate names: Forrest, Mahone, Hays, Longstreet, Albert Rennolds, Cadmus (Wilcox’s first name), and Jubal Early among them. Forrest, for god’s sake—named for Nathan Bedford Forrest, first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan! There’s also a whole neighborhood named Confederate Ridge. And don’t even get me started on the celebrated oceanographer and white supremacist Matthew Fontaine Maury, who after the Civil War went to Mexico to try his hand at setting up a Confederacy 2.0.

Curiously, no city streets, as far as I know, with one possible exception, were named for Union officers, including in Idlewild, once a 222-acre working plantation whose original owners, the Downmans, lived in a Gothic Revival mansion they had designed and built by an architect whose name, I kid you not, was Mr. Tongue.

Robert E. Lee used the Downman House, as it was then known, as a temporary headquarters during the Civil War. So did two different Union generals, Patrick and Howe, as the fighting went back and forth. Howe didn’t earn so much as a mention when the developers came in 150 years later, scraped off all the topsoil, and laid the streets for the Idlewild subdivision, though there is a tiny two-block Patrick Street in the development’s Phase Two.

The seven slaves owned by the Downman family were counted in the 1860 census as required by law under the 3/5 Compromise—they ranged in age from 11 to 43—but not their names. The mansion burned to a shell years ago, but the pet cemetery is still there. The Downmans really loved their dogs. Nobody knows what became of the seven people they enslaved. Needless to say, no streets in Idlewild were named for the slaves, though I’m certain that the developers, assiduous historians that they must have been, would have found a way to recognize the people enslaved by the Downmans if only that darn 1860 census had been any help. (I should note that there are streets in the Estates of Idlewild named for the Downmans and their neighbors, the Landrams, slave owners all.)

In the overture to my Idlewild neighbors via our members-only Facebook page, I included a quote from Georgia’s Alexander Stephens, the then-newly-elected vice president of the Confederacy who in 1861 assured a crowd of rabid Southerners that the Confederate government rested on the “great truth” that “the negro is not equal to the white man; that … subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition.” Stephens also bragged to his fellow secessionists that the Confederate government was “the first, in the history of the world, based on this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth.”

Most of my neighbors—two thirds of those who responded—Liked or Loved the post and/or wrote in support of changing the Confederate street names. Why on Earth, they said, would we want to continue honoring those who fought to defend slavery and white supremacy?

Those who disagreed—eight of the 26 respondents—lamented the cost and inconvenience, argued that there were more important issues we needed to address, and/or informed me that I was a woke liberal troublemaker and ought to find better things to do with my time than stir things up around here, and if I didn’t like the street names I could always just leave, and they’d be happy to help me pack and load up the car. I was even accused by one—accurately, as it turned out—of owning a goddamn Subaru.

But even among those eight, as much as they wanted things left the way they were, no one made any sort of positive case for honoring the Confederate generals.

A member of City Council caught wind of the exchange—I wrote something about it for the local newspaper–and told me he would have the Confederate street name issue be added to the Council agenda as New Business, though to my way of thinking it was already Very Old Business. But nothing came of it. Just before the next Council meeting, he got cold feet and said he thought it best for someone else to take the lead. So far, no one has.

There’s an old saying about trees, that the best time to plant them was twenty years ago, and the second best time is now. The same can be said for 86ing these Confederate street names, all of which could be changed if we were so inclined to recognize the contributions of civic leaders, medical heroes, Civil Rights pioneers, nonprofit workers, educators, visionaries, artists. Or, what the heck—Dogs! Cat! Trees! We could avoid altogether the risky practice of naming things after people, though I for one would still love to see a Danny McBride Boulevard somewhere in the city.

This wouldn’t be the first time Fredericksburg has changed street names in response to changing values and priorities. In an April 30, 2015 article in the Free Lance-Star, then-City Planner Erik Nelson noted that in 1933 the city restored the Colonial-period names “that had been suppressed in the heady days following American Independence.” And again, in 1969, according to Erik, the city changed and/or added a number of new street names, in further keeping with the city’s history.

The Southern Poverty Law Center says there are 2,300 roads, schools, and monuments linked to the Confederacy in 23 states, fewer than 400 of which have so far been removed or renamed. But it’s starting to happen more and more. Fairfax City just voted to change 14 streets with Confederate names, and Loudoun County says it may follow suit.

Clearly there is precedent for reconsidering who we honor in Fredericksburg and other cities of the South–and how we choose to honor them. Just recently the University of Mary Washington changed the name of Trinkle Hall, which was originally named for a former Virginia governor, an outspoken segregationist and eugenicist who promoted and signed into law the Racial Integrity Act of 1924, the Forced Sterilization Act of 1924, and the Racial Segregation Act of 1926. That building is now named for the Civil Rights pioneer James Farmer, who led the Freedom Rides and taught the history of the Civil Rights Movement for a number of years at the school.

As a retired professor emeritus at UMW—hell, as a human being—I’m proud of the college for taking this action, and for making it clear to students that history isn’t fixed or static, but rather always demanding of our continuing research and reevaluation. One of my books—published in a series of historical novels for young readers I wrote for Scholastic—is titled “Fallen in Fredericksburg,” and tells the story of the first Battle of Fredericksburg through the eyes of an intrepid band of young people trying to solve a lingering mystery from the war.

We need to continue teaching the history of the Civil War, of course–and we need to continue digging deep into that history to ensure a full and honest accounting of race and racism in America and in Virginia and in Fredericksburg. But that doesn’t mean we should hold onto these Confederate street names (and monuments, like those idiots in Mathews County who want to deed the land under their Confederate memorial to the Sons of the Confederacy for, you know, safekeeping). It may be inconvenient, as some of my neighbors complained, and there are certainly other important issues we need to address, as they also argued—rather petulantly, I have to say—but it’s past time we stopped honoring those who so violently dishonored our country.

***

Steve Watkins is editor of The Advance. You can contact him at 540-842-2066 or swatkins000@gmail.com.

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Articles from newspapers throughout the Commonwealth and Washington D.C. Firewalls will block you from reading some, but you’ll at least have some idea about what’s going on from the headlines, which, let’s be honest, are all many of us have time to read anyway. CLICK HERE.

Another H.L. Mencken/Fred-Area Journalism Award, With a Few Caveats

By Steve Watkins, Advance Editor

This week’s Fred/Mencken goes to John Sims, that guy you see around town all the time in his white t-shirt, black gym shorts, and slides—never without his camera and drone, and surely a police scanner in his car, or bike, or personal jet-pack, whatever he uses for chasing cop cars and ambulances.

John is the local one-man journalism operation known as Hyperbole, which has to be the most wrong-headed name ever for a newspaper (or news-Facebook page, or news-Instagram site, or news-anything). Content may be sketchy at times, and John’s writing could use some work, but he deserves full credit for practicing what we in the business call—or used to call, anyway, as much as I detest unnecessary acronyms—“GOYA, KOD.”

That is, “Get Off Your Ass, Knock on Doors.”

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Radiology Group Sues Mary Washington Healthcare for $2.65 Million+

By Steve Watkins, Advance Editor

Plaintiffs Allege MWHC Engaged in ‘Blatant Attempt to Destroy Radiologists’ Business,’ Warn Ongoing Conflict Could Cause ‘Elimination of Mammography Services within a 50-Mile Radius of Fredericksburg.’

Hospital Officials Dismiss ‘financially motivated lawsuit that has nothing to do with patient care.’

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A Columnist’s Introduction, Years Ago, To the Now-New Editor of The Advance

By Drew Gallagher, Advance Columnist

I sheepishly made my way to an empty desk, but it was evident that the moment would require me to speak. I kneeled, bowed my head in reverence, and uttered: “I’m sorry, Learned Sir. I have a problem with military time.”

Dr. Watkins looked at me with the same disdain that I had once seen in the eyes of the father of a born-again Christian girl who wanted to go to a high school dance with me and my theological skepticism. The words Steve spoke in that moment will haunt me until my dying day:

“No,” he said. “You have a problem with me.”

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Falling Through the Cracks and into the Void: Tens of Thousands of Virginians Could Lose Medicaid Coverage Starting this Year

By Hailey Zeller, Advance Correspondent

The largest projected source of Medicaid coverage loss is the new federal work and community engagement reporting requirement, which researchers estimate could affect more than 187,000 Virginia Medicaid expansion enrollees. Researchers also estimate that between 73,000 and 110,000 Virginians could lose coverage because of the new six-month eligibility checks, often due to paperwork problems rather than because they no longer qualify.

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This article is published under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND. It can be distributed for noncommercial purposes and must include the following: “Published with permission by FXBG Advance.”

ADVANCE FOOD COLUMNIST

If you want a good French fry there’s only one thing to do, and that’s drive yourself to Rehoboth Beach, Delaware and queue up at the Boardwalk Thrasher’s.

I suppose you can go to any of the Thrasher’s locations—two more in Rehoboth, three in Ocean City, Md. But for me, the Boardwalk has always been the place.

They make one thing there, and one thing only: the best French fry I have ever eaten.

Thrasher’s crows that they only use three ingredients to create their inimitable fries: potatoes, peanut oil, and salt. And they are inimitable. I know, because I’ve been trying to imit them for years.

Thrasher’s serves their hot fries by the bucket. And they are not cheap. Last time I checked, a large fry at Thrasher’s was $16. But you’ll be ok with it, because Thrasher’s fries are not a side dish, they are the main course. On a Saturday in July, you’re going to wait in a line that could easily be 20 people deep, and when you get to the front, you’ll spring for the large because you know you’re going to have to share these fries with your kids and the dozens of seagulls loitering around waiting to collect any that fall on the ground.

Protect yourself: Bold birds will sometimes snatch fries right out of your hand.

You get a bucket loaded with fries, and a cardboard tray to dump the salted fries on, and then you sprinkle the fries with vinegar and try to make it back to your family under the beach umbrella before you eat them all yourself.

Thrashers fries are hot and delicately crisp on the outside, and soft and creamy on the inside. The flavor is nutty and rich from the peanut oil. After you add vinegar, the fries get soggy just for a moment—and then somehow CRISP BACK UP in the cardboard tray!

It’s that combination of glassy crispness and creamy inside that I’ve been chasing for so long in my own kitchen. It’s hard to describe. The fries aren’t crunchy; you’ll hear no influencer-ready crackle when you bite into one. But the crispness is both delicate and persistent. A towering achievement.

So simple: Just slice up some taters, fry them in peanut oil, and salt ‘em up. You might think that they’ve just given you their recipe right then and there, those dopes. You want to run home and make your own version for just a dollar or two’s worth of potatoes and oil. But that simplicity is misleading. Because within the simple framework of potatoes, peanut oil, and salt lie dozens of permutations.

Do they rinse their fries or not? Do they soak them? If they soak them, for how long? Do they use fresh or salted water? Do they air-dry them? Spin dry them? Blot them with paper towels? Or do the potatoes go in the oil wet? Does Thrasher’s chill or freeze their taters before frying? Do they fry them once, twice, three times? How long do the fries rest between frys? What temperature is the first fry versus the second fry?

One good thing about this rabbit hole I’m about to take you down is, it smells like fries in there.

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My family has been going to Rehoboth Beach for six decades now, and Thrashers has been a part of every visit. The Boardwalk location, which I’ve always preferred, sits between two Rehoboth institutions: Funland and Gus and Gus. Funland is a lively, kid-friendly amusement park with rides and games. Gus and Gus is a busy restaurant with a few tables, though they do most of their trade over the take-out counter facing the boardwalk. They sell excellent fried chicken, solid burgers, and thick-cut, hand-made fries. Yes—Gus and Gus, right next to Thrasher’s, also has boardwalk fries.

I’ll hit them up for a Philly cheesesteak and a drink, and then go wait in the Thrasher’s line for the fries. And I’m not the only one. The owners at Gus and Gus watch people do this every day, and you can tell it drives them nuts. They put up a big sign announcing they have boardwalk fries ,too! If you ask them about it, Gus and Gus will respond, with some irritation, “They’re the same fries!” If you listen close, you can hear a sublimated “goddamn” between “same” and “fries.”

The thing is though? They’re NOT the same. Even after decades next door to Thrasher’s, Gus and Gus haven’t cracked the code. Their fries are good. They’re fine. Really.

Just not as good as Thrasher’s.

There is one tiny complication, though, which is that Thrasher’s founder, J.T. Thrasher, was not a fan of ketchup. J.T. was of a mind that ketchup obscured the flavor of his one-of-a-kind fries, so he chose not to offer it, and Thrasher’s never has.

Now, you may want ketchup with your fries, and who is Thrasher’s to gainsay you? In 2018, the owners of Thrasher’s addressed the ketchup controversy, which had flared up yet again, when they issued an unequivocal public affirmation of their commitment to not offer ketchup with their fries, then or in the future.

The result was that some people who ordered Thrasher’s fries started drifting over to Gus and Gus and asking for ketchup—until Gus and Gus put up a hand-written cardboard sign that said “KETCHUP IS FOR GUS AND GUS CUSTOMERS ONLY.”

Over time, the cardboard sign got increasingly grease-splattered and faded, so a few years ago they replaced it with a very visible permanent sign. Sorry bro. You don’t buy our fries, you don’t get our sweet, sweet ‘chup.

Enter Funland. They saw their chance for a major cash grab, and installed a ketchup vending machine on the boardwalk just feet away from the Thrasher’s counter. Now while you wait in line for hot fries, you can arm your kid with some quarters, and send her over to Funland to twist the handle on the machine and nab a few squeeze packets of Heinz.

Suck on THAT, French fry snobs.

***

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I’ve been working on my fry recipe for years. And though I make a very good French fry, possibly even an excellent French fry, I’ve not achieved that combination of glassy crispness and creamy interior I’ve long been after. If Thrasher’s are a 10/10, my very best fry is probably about a 7/10.

When you spend years trying to copy a perfect food, you’ll start out with elaborate procedures and lots of tools and specialty ingredients, thinking that it must take a complicated, multi-step process to achieve something so good.

In the end, though, you’ll find that many of the world’s greatest foods are a master class in simplicity. Just a few key ingredients combined in the perfect way, by craftsmen who are deeply in love with the food they make hundreds of times a day, every day, for years.

I’m still on my fry journey, and if I stumble onto something new, I’ll update my method. But for now, I’ve stripped away all the froofraw, and after years of trial and error, come up with this:

Kirk’s French Fries

Get started at least three hours before serving.

Ingredients:

· Good, firm russet potatoes

· Vegetable oil

· Salt

· Malt vinegar

Fill a deep kettle about 1/3 of the way up with oil (see TIPS below).

Peel and slice your potatoes into fries about ½ inch thick. Rinse the cut fries in a big bowl of cold water to remove excess starch. Spread the uncooked fries on a cookie sheet lined with paper towels, and blot them as dry as you can, on all sides, also with paper towels.

Heat oil to 350°.

Add potatoes to the hot oil, working in batches if necessary. Maintain the temperature of the oil at 350°. Stir the potatoes to keep them from sticking together. When the fries start to blister and take on a little color, take them out, and let them drain on another cookie sheet lined with paper towels. Turn off the heat. Try to spread the fries out so they cool and drain evenly.

Now walk away. Let the fries sit on the counter for a few hours, or in the fridge, uncovered.

When you’re almost ready to serve your fries, bring the oil up to 375°. Add the cooled fries back in, being careful not to overcrowd. After a few minutes, they’ll pick up even more color. You’ll be able to feel that they are crisp when you stir them around with your metal tool.

Take them out of the oil and put them back on the cookie sheet lined with fresh paper towels. Let them rest 5-10 minutes. Keep the oil hot.

Just before serving, drop the fries one last time in the 375° oil for just a minute or two. Give them a few stirs. Remove them to a metal strainer. Toss them with salt

Serve immediately, offering vinegar to whoever wants it. Or ketchup, I guess. To each their own.

TIPS

· Figure one large, or two normal-sized russets per person.

· I square up my potatoes before cutting them into fries.

· Dry potatoes make crisp fries.

· Peanut oil is expensive, but it’s better. Use it if you can. I avoid canola oil, which can develop a fishy smell/taste when heated to frying temperatures.

· You need a thermometer. Without one, you will have a hard time making good fries.

· It’s important not to overcrowd the kettle. If you do, the fries will steam and not fry, and they’ll turn out limp and greasy.

· Use only metal or wooden tools. A stainless steel spider is perfect for the job

· If you don’t have malt vinegar, use apple cider vinegar

***

The other day, when I set a bowl of hot, fresh fries in front of my daughter, she told me that while training to be an EMT she had witnessed some complicated medical procedures successfully performed in a moving ambulance, and she was both startled and amazed that a person could be so skilled. She said she had the same feeling about my fries.

They may not be Thrasher’s, but they work for me.

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Get on the Team U.S.A. Hype Train, Join Hands

By Drew Gallagher, Advance Columnist

There is a train pulling into Fredericksburg on Friday at 3 p.m. The train is filling up fast, but you still have a chance to board before this hype train speeds out of control when the U.S. Men’s National soccer team beats Australia in World Cup play. All you need to board is some red, white, and blue attire and, if pressed about your new-found fandom, just respond that you think Christian Pulisic is a generational talent.

The way Pulisic looked in America’s resounding 4-1 victory over Paraguay, he and his mates may prove unstoppable on soccer’s grandest stage. Of course, if they lose to the Socceroos today then you can use that jersey you just bought to cushion your landing as you and your fellow lemmings leap from the train.

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Alexander Hamilton’s Letters to John Laurens: A Pride Month Special

By Michael Aubrecht, Advance Contributor

Perhaps no other American icon has had more speculation raised (and ignored) about to his sexual preference than Alexander Hamilton. This controversial Founding Father left behind an abundance of questions after dying a premature death following an ill-fated duel with political rival Aaron Burr. His is a story that begs reexamination. Of course, all historical analysis is subject to speculation, but what we’ve come to learn about the life and writings of Alexander Hamilton has revealed an interesting argument for his being gay.

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The Quiet Lawsuits Keeping Our Democracy Alive

By Phil Huber, Advance Columnist

Advance Columnist Donnie Johnston is right: taking Donald Trump’s name off the Kennedy Center is one small step back toward democracy. It matters that a federal judge effectively said, “No, you can’t put your name on a national institution simply because you want to.”

But that ruling is part of a much larger story. Across the country—and here in Virginia—democracy is being defended in a way most people never see: through lawsuits.

Not rallies. Not social media posts. Lawsuits.

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I Read the News Today. Oh, Boy!

VaNews/Virginia Public Access Project

Articles from newspapers throughout the Commonwealth and Washington D.C. Firewalls will block you from reading some, but you’ll at least have some idea about what’s going on from the headlines, which, let’s be honest, are all many of us have time to read anyway.

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This article is published under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND. It can be distributed for noncommercial purposes and must include the following: “Published with permission by FXBG Advance.”

ADVANCE CONTRIBUTOR

Perhaps no other American icon has had more speculation raised (and ignored) about his sexual preference than Alexander Hamilton. This controversial Founding Father left behind an abundance of questions after dying a premature death following an ill-fated duel with political rival Aaron Burr. His is a story that begs reexamination. Of course, all historical analysis is subject to speculation, but what we’ve come to learn about the life and writings of Alexander Hamilton has revealed an interesting argument for his being gay.

Hamilton was a complex man of many talents. Soldier, economist, political philosopher, constitutional lawyer, secretary of the Treasury, leader of the Federalist Party, and founder of the U.S. Mint were just a few of the titles he held. Hamilton’s climb toward political popularity was forged during his exquisite service during the American Revolutionary War. Initially acting as an artillery officer, he later became the senior aide-de-camp to General George Washington. Hamilton again served his commander-and-chief in 1794 during the Whiskey Rebellion tax-revolt, acting as the president’s closest military confidant. Three years later, he was unanimously named as Washington’s successor as commander of a new American army, mobilizing in preparation for a potential war with France. Fortunately, the need for such a force was negated thanks to the stubborn diplomacy of President John Adams.

It was while serving on Washington’s staff that Hamilton met John Laurens, the man about whom his relationship has become the subject of much fascination. Laurens was a successful soldier and statesman from South Carolina who gained approval by the Continental Congress in 1779 to recruit a regiment of 3,000 enslaved men by promising them freedom in return for fighting.

Despite being married to a woman named Martha Manning, Laurens arrived in the colonies as a bachelor after leaving her behind in London. He joined the Continental Army, and following the Battle of Brandywine was made an aide-de-camp to Washington with the rank of lieutenant colonel. He also served with the Prussian-born Baron von Steuben—also said to be gay—doing reconnaissance at the outset of the Battle of Monmouth.

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While on campaign, Laurens became close friends with his fellow aides the Marquis de Lafayette and Alexander Hamilton. His connection with Hamilton would eventually lead to speculation that the two were in a closeted gay—or at the very least an intimate homosocial--relationship. Adding to the complexity of their bond was Hamilton’s reputation as an adulterer. In 1791 he admitted participating in a scandalous affair with the wife of James Reynolds, a notorious swindler who later tried to blackmail Hamilton. In an effort to limit the political fallout, Hamilton published a full confession, shocking both his family and supporters by not merely admitting his guilt, but also by inexplicably writing about the affair in a surprising level of detail. The public’s reaction damaged Hamilton’s standing for the rest of his life. That event, however, took place years after the untimely death of John Laurens in 1782.

According to historian Jonathan Katz, who specializes in human sexuality, the primary source about the Hamilton-Laurens relationship is a series of intimate letters that Hamilton wrote shortly after Laurens left Washington’s staff to return to his home state of South Carolina. Laurens’ goal was to persuade the state’s legislature to recruit African Americans, who were flocking to fight the Continentals as British Loyalists.

Hamilton’s first letter to Laurens was penned in April of 1779:

Cold in my professions—warm in my friendships— I wish, my Dear Laurens, it were in my power, by actions rather than words, to convince you that I love you. I shall only tell you that ‘till you bade us Adieu, I hardly knew the value you had taught my heart to set upon you. Indeed, my friend, it was not well done. You know the opinion I entertain of mankind, and how much it is my desire to preserve myself free from particular attachments, and to keep my happiness independent of the caprice of others. You should not have taken advantage of my sensibility, to steal into my affections without my consent. But as you have done it, and as we are generally indulgent to those we love, I shall not scruple to pardon the fraud you have committed, on one condition; that for my sake, if not for your own, you will always continue to merit the partiality, which you have so artfully instilled into me….

And Now my Dear as we are upon the subject of wife, I empower and command you to get me one in Carolina. Such a wife as I want will, I know, be difficult to be found, but if you succeed, it will be the stronger proof of your zeal and dexterity….

If you should not readily meet with a lady that you think answers my description you can only advertise in the public papers and doubtless you will hear of many… who will be glad to become candidates for such a prize as I am. To excite their emulation, it will be necessary for you to give an account of the lover—his size, make, quality of mind and body, achievements, expectations, fortune, &c. In drawing my picture, you will no doubt be civil to your friend; mind you do justice to the length of my nose and don’t forget, that I [Several words here have been mutilated in the manuscript. Some scholars theorize that Hamilton was referring to his “manhood”].

After reviewing what I have written, I am ready to ask myself what could have put it into my head to hazard this Jeu de follie. Do I want a wife? No—I have plagues enough without desiring to add to the number that greatest of all; and if I were silly enough to do it, I should take care how I employ a proxy. Did I mean to show my wit? If I did, I am sure I have missed my aim. Did I only intend to [frisk]? In this I have succeeded, but I have done more. I have gratified my feelings, by lengthening out the only kind of intercourse now in my power with my friend. Adieu

Yours. A Hamilton

On September 11, 1779, Hamilton wrote a second letter in which he referred to himself as a jealous lover:

I acknowledge but one letter from you, since you left us, of the 14th of July which just arrived in time to appease a violent conflict between my friendship and my pride. I have written you five or six letters since you left Philadelphia and I should have written you more had you made proper return. But like a jealous lover, when I thought you slighted my caresses, my affection was alarmed and my vanity piqued. I had almost resolved to lavish no more of them upon you and to reject you as an inconstant and an ungrateful [—]. But you have now disarmed my resentment and by a single mark of attention made up the quarrel. You must at least allow me a large stock of good nature….

Have you not heard that I am on the point of becoming a benedict? I confess my sins. I am guilty. Next fall completes my doom. I give up my liberty to Miss Schuyler. She is a good hearted girl who I am sure will never play the termagant; though not a genius she has good sense enough to be agreeable, and though not a beauty, she has fine black eyes – is rather handsome and has every other requisite of the exterior to make a lover happy. And believe me, I am lover in earnest, though I do not speak of the perfections of my Mistress in the enthusiasm of Chivalry.

Is it true that you are confined to Pennsylvania? Cannot you pay us a visit? If you can, hasten to give us a pleasure which we shall relish with the sensibility of the sincerest friendship.

Adieu God bless you…. A Hamilton

The lads all sympathize with you and send you the assurances of their love.

One year later, on September 16, 1780, Hamilton penned a third letters to Laurens that appears to put his affections for the recipient to be above those for his current female mistress:

That you can speak only of your private affairs shall be no excuse for your not writing frequently. Remember that you write to your friends, and that friends have the same interests, pains, pleasures, sympathies; and that all men love egotism.

In spite of Schylers black eyes, I have still a part for the public and another for you; so your impatience to have me married is misplaced; a strange cure by the way, as if after matrimony I was to be less devoted that I am now. Let me tell you, that I intend to restore the empire of Hymen and that Cupid is to be his prime Minister. I wish you were at liberty to transgress the bounds of Pennsylvania. I would invite you after the fall to Albany to be witness to the final consummation. My Mistress is a good girl, and already loves you because I have told her you are a clever fellow and my friend; but mind, she loves you a l’americaine not a la françoise.

Adieu, be happy, and let friendship between us be more than a name. A Hamilton

The General & all the lads send you their love.

There are no other suggestive Hamilton-Laurens letters. Two years later. Laurens was killed during a skirmish, prompting a distraught and grieving Hamilton to state, “I feel the deepest affliction at the news we have just received of the loss of our dear and inestimable friend Laurens. His career of virtue is at an end…. I feel the loss of a friend I truly and most tenderly loved, and one of a very small number.”

In an essay titled “The Hamilton-Laurens Relationship,” historian Bob Arneback wrote that the “extant letters” were expressions of Hamilton’s “homoerotic bravado with Laurens.” They may not be definitive, Arneback concluded, “But it is quite enough to allow us to label Hamilton as a man with a wide appetite for pleasures that comfortably included homosexuality.”

Whatever the nature of Hamilton’s relationship with Laurens, there is distinct proof that he enjoyed the company of women. In addition to his affair with Maria Reynolds, Hamilton later married Elizabeth Schuyler, mentioned in one of the letters to Laurens, and fathered eight children with her. Schuyler survived Hamilton by 50 years, until 1854, and spent much of her life working to help widows and orphans. After Hamilton’s death, she co-founded New York’s first private orphanage, the New York Orphan Asylum Society.

Most historians who ascribe to the Gay-Hamilton Theory, believe that Elizabeth was unaware of her husband attraction to men.

Alexander Hamilton joined John Laurens in the great beyond on July 12, 1804. Both a celebrated war hero and detested politician, he left behind a legacy that continues to divide critics today. From his dissenting posture as an ardent Federalist to his disruptions as a member of John Adams’ cabinet, Hamilton didn’t enjoy the same blanket-adoration as his contemporaries—until he was “rehabilitated” by Lin-Manual Miranda’s Tony-, Grammy-, and Pulitzer-award-winning musical.

John Laurens is with him there, too.

***

Michael Aubrecht is the author of Thomas Jefferson and the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom: Faith & Liberty in Fredericksburg and The Letters of Robert Morris: Founding Father and Revolutionary Financier. You can learn more at Michael’s blog.

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ADVANCE COLUMNIST

Advance Columnist Donnie Johnston is right: taking Donald Trump’s name off the Kennedy Center is one small step back toward democracy. It matters that a federal judge effectively said, “No, you can’t put your name on a national institution simply because you want to.”

But that ruling is part of a much larger story.

Across the country—and here in Virginia—democracy is being defended in a way most people never see: through lawsuits.

Not rallies. Not social media posts. Lawsuits.

We often talk about “checks and balances,” “separation of powers,” and the “rule of law” as if they’re abstract civics lessons. Today, they look much more concrete. They look like lawyers filing emergency motions before questionable policies take effect. They look like judges willing to tell presidents, governors, and agencies, “No.” They look like unions, civil-rights groups, state attorneys general, and ordinary citizens refusing to let power go unchecked.

If our democratic system is still functioning, it is not because institutions automatically correct themselves. It is because people keep taking governments to court—and winning.

Over the past several years, hundreds of lawsuits have challenged actions affecting elections, civil service protections, voting rights, transparency, and executive authority. Together, they reveal an important pattern: when government officials push beyond legal limits, someone sues. Often, the courts intervene.

The Kennedy Center case is a good example. The ruling did more than preserve a name on a building. It reinforced a basic principle: Public institutions do not belong to politicians. They belong to the public, and the law still matters.

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So, who is holding the line?

First, there are the democracy lawyers.

Organizations such as Protect Democracy and Democracy Forward were built for moments like this. Their mission is simple: identify abuses of power and challenge them before they become normalized. They contest unlawful executive actions, demand government records, and force agencies to follow procedures established by Congress. Their work is rarely glamorous, but it is essential.

Second, there are civil-rights and civil-liberties organizations.

Groups such as the ACLU, Common Cause, and the Brennan Center for Justice have spent years defending voting rights, free speech, and equal treatment under the law. When policies threaten access to the ballot box or target political dissent, these organizations are often in court immediately. They represent voters, activists, and communities whose rights might otherwise be ignored.

Third, there are unions and public servants.

Public-sector unions protect the career employees who keep government functioning. When efforts are made to replace professional expertise with political loyalty, unions often become a crucial line of defense. Merit-based public service is one of the quiet pillars of democracy. Without it, government risks becoming a patronage system rather than a public institution.

Fourth, there are state and local officials.

State attorneys general, election administrators, and local governments frequently challenge federal actions they believe exceed legal authority or threaten their residents’ rights. They often serve as an important counterweight when federal power expands beyond established limits.

What have these lawsuits achieved?

Quite a lot.

They have forced the release of records governments preferred to keep hidden. They have blocked or delayed policies that courts found unlawful. They have protected voting rights, defended civil-service protections, and required agencies to follow established procedures. In some cases, they have stopped questionable policies entirely.

This is what defending democracy often looks like—not dramatic showdowns, but a steady stream of injunctions, rulings, and legal challenges. Slow. Technical. Sometimes boring. Yet indispensable.

Donnie argues that citizens must do more than complain. They must recruit strong candidates, engage politically, and prepare for future elections. He is right.

But we should also recognize the people already doing the work.

For those of us in the Fredericksburg, Stafford, and Spotsylvania region, the question is simple: What can we do?

One answer is to support the organizations defending democratic institutions. Groups such as Protect Democracy, Democracy Forward, Common Cause, the Brennan Center, the ACLU, and government-watchdog organizations depend on citizens who donate, volunteer, and amplify their work. Litigation is expensive. Good lawyers, expert witnesses, and appeals all require resources.

If we want courts to continue hearing strong cases, someone has to help build them.

Still, there is a limit to what lawsuits can accomplish.

Courts can buy time. They can expose abuses, slow them down, or stop them. They cannot replace civic engagement. They cannot choose leaders. They cannot make citizens participate.

A democracy in which millions of eligible voters stay home creates opportunities for those willing to exploit public disengagement. Healthy democratic institutions ultimately depend on citizens who pay attention and show up.

The Kennedy Center ruling was one small step. The hundreds of lawsuits filed across the country are many more. Together, they remind us that democracy is not self-executing. It survives because people defend it.

We can support the organizations doing the legal work. We can hold elected officials accountable. And above all, we can treat voting as both a right and a responsibility.

The courts may provide breathing room. What we do with that space—here in the Fredericksburg area and across the nation—will determine whether these small victories become the foundation for a stronger democracy or merely pauses in a longer decline.

Readers who want to follow these cases for themselves can consult the Just Security Litigation Tracker, Court Watch by Democracy Docket, and the Protect Democracy Litigation Tracker, all of which provide regularly updated information on major lawsuits involving elections, executive power, civil rights, and democratic institutions.

***

Phil Huber is a retired Army Reserve colonel, a federal civil servant, and a retired consultant who writes on civic education. He lives in Fredericksburg.

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Articles from newspapers throughout the Commonwealth and Washington D.C. Firewalls will block you from reading some, but you’ll at least have some idea about what’s going on from the headlines, which, let’s be honest, are all many of us have time to read anyway. CLICK HERE.

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ADVANCE COLUMNIST

There is a train pulling into Fredericksburg on Friday at 3 p.m. The train is filling up fast, but you still have a chance to board before this hype train speeds out of control when the U.S. Men’s National soccer team beats Australia in World Cup play. All you need to board is some red, white, and blue attire and, if pressed about your new-found fandom, just respond that you think Christian Pulisic is a generational talent.

(A small shop next to Rita’s at 11105 Leavells Road in Spotsylvania is selling U.S. jerseys for the low, low price of $36. They also have other jerseys on sale for some of the other big countries, and there is a current promotion that if you buy a Spain jersey and wear it out of the store you get a free ice cream at Rita’s which you can enjoy while other people make fun of the fact that you root for a team that just played to a 0-0 tie with Cabo Verde which I’m told is a real country.)

The way Pulisic looked in America’s resounding 4-1 victory over Paraguay, he and his mates may prove unstoppable on soccer’s grandest stage. Of course, if they lose to the Socceroos today then you can use that jersey you just bought to cushion your landing as you and your fellow lemmings leap from the train.

Today’s game is such a big deal that The Advance is bumping up its I On Sports feature by a day so it can include the U.S. Men’s game as well as all the other sports to view this weekend.

The first question on everyone’s mind heading into the 3 p.m. kickoff on Fox is how is Pulisic’s left calf? According to manager Mauricio Pochettino, Captain America will be fine for today’s match. Reporters noted that Pulisic trained apart from his teammates on Monday but was killing it in a game of hopscotch. The pregame broadcast begins at 1 p.m. today. One of the two hours will be devoted to McDonald’s commercials starring Posh Spice’s husband in a drive-thru, while the other hour will focus on the anatomy of the human calf.

If Pulisic is unable to play it will either be a crushing blow to the United States or else it won’t matter at all because all forward Folarin Balogun does is score goals. Balogun had a “brace” against Paraguay which means he scored twice, but since soccer likes to alienate the casual fan beyond the annoying offside rule, they have to refer to simple things by terms that originated in Anglo-French because those two countries have always gotten along so well on the soccer pitch.

Today is Juneteenth, and many offices will be closed to mark the holiday, so you might want to get to your watering hole of choice early to make certain you have prime viewing for the American match. Plenty of locals will be trooping over to Fred Nats stadium and plunking down $8 for parking plus $5 for Standing Room Only to watch the U.S.-Australia match on the big screen in centerfield. Meanwhile, the local American Outlaws fan club will be settling in at Legends Grille in Spotsylvania, and Park Lane Tavern behind the Spotsylvania Towne Center will have specials during the match. Check out the Fredericksburg Free Press for a more comprehensive list of watch parties in the area. Or just turn on the TV and park yourself on the couch. What better way to acknowledge the importance of Juneteenth than celebrating the likes of Weston McKennie, Tyler Adams, and Chris Richards? Raise a glass, and read on for more.

Friday, June 19

Greatest Soccer Team in the History of the World vs. Australia in Group D of World Cup 3 p.m. today on Fox

If the United States can beat the Socceroos, they move to the top of Group D and then play the Scoobydoos next Thursday. Australia improbably beat Turkiye in their opener, so they’re tied with the U.S. on points but trail by one in goal differential. Should you bump into an Aussie supporter drinking Fosters while watching the match, simply say in your best Crocodile Dundee voice: “That’s not a beer. THIS is a beer!” And pull out a Pabst Blue Ribbon—America’s best since 1893.

World Cup Soccer Matches that Do Not Involve the Greatest Soccer Team in the History of the World, today on Fox and FS1 6 p.m., 8:30 p.m., and 11 p.m.

Of course, these games matter, especially the night cap of Paraguay versus Turkiye because it has implications for the United States and Group D, but you need to stay focused today on one match and one match only. USA! USA! USA!

Second Round of PGA U.S. Open Today 3 p.m. on NBCSN

If you want to make friends and influence people today, wear a golf visor with sunglasses on the back of your head and walk into your nearest pub and ask them if they can change the soccer match over to the golf because this is the day that golfers you’ve never heard of might miss the cut at Shinnecock Hills. Little Known Fact: Shinnecock Hills is a golf club in New York and was not named for a stripper who once performed at Al’s Diamond Cabaret in Taylor Swift’s hometown.

Local Prognosticator Bryce Sheetz went to graduate school with the specific intention of studying golf trends so he could provide them to an online substack and pay off his student loans. Bryce predicts that Xander Schauffele—opening odds of 18.5-1—will raise the trophy on Sunday for his first U.S. Open victory. Take it to the bank.

***

Saturday, June 20

Men’s College Baseball World Series 7 p.m. on ESPN-

The teams are to be determined based on games that played this week, but you can safely assume that UNC will be making this best-of-three championship since they’re led by a second baseman named Gallaher. Who they play is immaterial because none of the remaining teams have a player named Gallaher. The only thing this kid is missing is a second “G” in his last name, which, sadly, means he can’t break it into three separate words: GAL-LAG-HER.

Third Round of PGA U.S. Open 10 a.m. on USA and then noon on NBC

You know that shit‘s about to get real when golf is on two separate broadcasts on the same day. Another opportunity to make friends and influence people. Wander into any pub or sports bar at 1 p.m. and say: “Hup Holland hup, can you please change the channel to golf?” The Dutch fans will appreciate your effort to assimilate while they beat the crap out of you.

WNBA Caitlin Clark vs. Atlanta 1 p.m. on ABC

Sure, Caitlin Clark is not the name of the Indiana Fever, but she is what you’re here for. There’s a reason her autographed 1-of-1 rookie card sold for $660,000.00 at auction, even though teammate Kelsey Mitchell is tied with Clark in scoring average this season. You can pick up Mitchell’s signed 1-of-1 rookie card for less than $1,000 or your best offer on eBay.

Major League Baseball 10:10 p.m. Major League Baseball Network

Orioles at Dodgers. Some regions of the country will get the Red Sox at the Mariners. Be glad you do not live in those regions. Shohei Ohtani is not scheduled to pitch. but he is scheduled to hit nukes off Baltimore starter Trevor Rogers and then be available as a substitute for the Japanese Men’s Soccer team in their midnight kickoff against Tunisia.

***

Sunday, June 21 (Happy Father’s Day and First Day of Summer)

Final Round of PGA US Open 10 a.m. on USA and then noon on NBC

Shit’s still getting real as golf has to be broadcast on two networks again. Don’t let the noon time fool you. Dear old Dad can play 18 holes and still get home in time to fall asleep watching the end of Scottie Scheffler’s pursuit of the career grand slam.

World Cup Group Stage Noon on Fox

Spain vs. Saudi Arabia. As noted above, there is a match that kicks off at midnight and four more matches today which means five matches in total but the one that should be riveting is this one involving Spain. Spain is called La Roja which translates to “The Red One That Was Completely Humiliated by Cabo Verde in Their Opening Match.” Spain was the betting favorite at the start of this World Cup, but the 0-0 tie that was authored by a 40-year old goalkeeper in their first match was one of the biggest upsets in the history of the world, and that includes Henry V’s win over the French on St. Crispin’s Day at Agincourt.

Game 2 of Men’s College Baseball World Series 1:30 p.m. on ABC and ESPNU

A U.S. Open champion will be crowned today and, presumably, UNC as the winner of the College World Series since their second baseman is named Gallaher who showed off the speed all too familiar with the last name by legging out a key triple earlier in Omaha. The record book of Irish sprinters is nearly as long as the book of Irish cuisine that my homeland has gifted to the world. Try eating mutton without a few Guinness under your belt.

Major League Baseball 7:20 p.m. on NBC

Mets at Phillies. My mother was a Mets fan. My father was a Phillies fan. Nothing ever strained their marriage more than a three-game regular season series between their teams. They didn’t watch the games together. I just wish they were still around to to at least do it in separate rooms.

Happy Father’s Day to those who are still here and to those who are gone and helped show us that the world of sport can be a much-needed distraction from the demands of the world.

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Cage Matches and Christianity Don’t Go Together

By Rev. Richard Cizik, Executive Director, Evangelicals for Democracy

“There’s only one person more incredible than the Incredible Hulk, and that’s my Lord and savior Jesus Christ.”

These are the words of Josh Hokit, the former NFL player and heavyweight mixed martial artist who was one of the fighters participating in the UFC Freedom 250 tournament that took place on the south lawn of the White House on June June 14—Donald Trump’s 80th birthday.

Dubbed “the next chapter of America’s fighting history” and timed as the official start of the 250th anniversary celebration of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, this bloody series of seven cage matches had nothing to do with Christianity or being a Christian in modern-day America.

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On the Virtue of Work That Dirties Your Hands

By Shaun Kenney, Advance Columnist

This year will mark the 100th anniversary of Colonial Williamsburg, a place that first began as more of a museum than living history, but eventually gave visitors an idealized glimpse of what it was like to live in 18th century Virginia—to read their newspapers, hear the sound of hammer and tong next to the heat of a coal furnace, feel the linens and cottons of the day, catch the scent of lavender and rose water in the shops, watch furniture makers and bookbinders and silversmiths move with the surety of craftsmen and craftswomen.

Industrialization came late to America, but it never quite arrived in Williamsburg in the way that it touched other places such as Richmond, Fredericksburg, and Norfolk. Fears then—as now—revolved around the changing nature of work, education, commerce, markets, culture, and trade with the arrival of the railroads, coal, machines, ports, tobacco, wheat, and the replacement of manual labor (enslaved and free) with mechanical labor and the mechanics whose duty it was to oil, repair, and eventually program their every need.

James Fox is by no means an American household name, but in a marvelous book titled Craftsman: In Search of Lost Arts and Disappearing Trades we get a glimpse of things lost back in merry old England. Matthew Crawford’s magisterial text Shop Class as Soulcraft sounded the alarm as far back as 2010 about the distinction between mechanic and technician. Alexander Lagland’s book Craft explores similar themes, and who could possibly neglect the Foxfire series written by Georgia high school students in the 1970s and right up to the present day.

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The Postman Doesn’t Always Ring Twice

By Theodore G. Blackwell, Guest Column

The U.S. Postal Service has issued a proposal in which they will refuse to transmit mail-in or absentee ballots unless certain requirements are met, such as a state-specified list of voters compiled and maintained by the Department of Homeland Security, all in the name of “election integrity.”

Considering the fact that in 2022, the year of Virginia’s last midterm election, there was only one instance of voter fraud conviction, I fail to see how our election integrity was at risk to begin with.

Since Virginia has not complied with the requirement, and was sued by the Justice Department, all I can wonder now is will my mail-in ballot be picked up? What do I do if the USPS refuses to carry it? Approximately 8 percent of all votes cast in Virginia were by mail in the last midterm. What will happen to our votes this time?

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What’s Going On

VaNews/Virginia Public Access Project

Mother, mother, there’s too many of you crying. Brother, brother, brother, there’s far too many of you dying. You know we’ve got to find a way to bring some lovin’ here today, yeah. Or, if you want to look at it another way: Articles from newspapers throughout the Commonwealth and Washington D.C. Firewalls will block you from reading some, but you’ll at least have some idea about what’s going on from the headlines, which, let’s be honest, are all many of us have time to read anyway.

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This article is published under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND. It can be distributed for noncommercial purposes and must include the following: “Published with permission by FXBG Advance.”

GUEST COLUMN

“There’s only one person more incredible than the Incredible Hulk, and that’s my Lord and savior Jesus Christ.”

These were the words of Josh Hokit, the former NFL player and heavyweight mixed martial artist who was one of the fighters participating in the UFC Freedom 250 tournament that took place on the south lawn of the White House on June June 14—Donald Trump’s 80th birthday.

Dubbed “the next chapter of America’s fighting history” and timed as the official start of the 250th anniversary celebration of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, this bloody series of seven cage matches had nothing to do with Christianity or being a Christian in modern-day America.

In fact, only 16 percent of Americans were in favor of the mixed martial arts event, according to a nationwide Reuters/Ipsos poll, while 46 percent opposed the spectacle for such reasons as the gratuitous violence and the $60 million price tag to stage the event.

Clearly, many Americans felt queasy about MMA fighters punching, kicking, elbowing, kneeing, striking and butting their opponents violently under a 92-foot tall, 600-ton steel “claw” on the White House lawn. They were equally troubled by the event being turned into an infomercial for Crypto.com, Ram trucks, specialty drinks, beer, sports merchandise and more.

And then, there was the fact that attending UFC 250 was by invitation only, with ultra-premium VIP sponsorship packages reported to cost up to $1.5 million. Of course, regular UFC fans who came to Washington were able to watch the fights via jumbotrons on the Ellipse, or they could livestream the fights on Paramount+ (if they had a subscription).

Yet it is the immorality of this spectacle at a time when so many people are struggling to make ends meet that makes the UFC Freedom 250 tournament so troubling.

Simply put, the president of the United States wanted a big birthday party, and the rich and powerful ponied up millions to attend a modern-day gladiator event at the White House, which is still “the people’s house.”

Interestingly, history shows that in ancient Rome, the emperors walked from their palaces to watch gladiator fights in a large Colosseum—rarely did they host fights in their back yards—as a way to distract the masses from their difficult lives. And gladiator fights were often held to honor the emperor’s birthday.

Moreover, these ancient fights were frequently put on at the expense of local elites, which makes the connection to the UFC Freedom 250 tournament so creepy.

Fortunately, the Roman Empire ended with the sack of Rome in 410 CE, and the death of the last recognized Western Emperor, Julius Nepos, in 480 CE. And on the 250th anniversary of the founding of this nation, we are not governed by a king or an emperor.

Yet, the words of Mr. Hokit praising Jesus Christ at the end of his winning match should remind people of faith that while sports and athletics are cultural ideals, Jesus preached non-violence and noted that the pursuit of wealth can choke out spiritual growth and make people indifferent to the suffering of others. As stated in the Gospel of Matthew (6:24), you cannot serve both God and money.

Also, Mr. Hokit and his fellow MMA fighters should stand as a warning that while militant masculinity has a place in some types of sports, it does not in the public square. Scholars warn of Christian nationalism where a warrior-like Jesus condones violence and war to defend the faith and our nation.

This cannot be America in our 251st year.

***

Rev. Richard Cizik is executive director of Evangelicals for Democracy, which brings together people of faith—Republicans, Democrats and Independents of all walks of life—who believe that as Americans, we are stronger and more resilient together than when we are divided.

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