Rendevous (Sunday)

I heard my picture of Kaylee's 6th graduation did not post, so I'll try that again. I don't know how to enlarge it since it was sent from a smart phone, but I think it should show up this time.

 

Saturday night was a short night but we had plans today too, so we had to get on the move.  Joe M., Cathy, Joe and I skipped church and headed into town for breakfast and then off to the Spirit of Vincennes Rendevousb (37th Annual). As usual, we encountered more farm equipment taking up more than their half of the road.

The Rendevous is a weekend celebrating Vincennes' historical part in the Revolutionary War on the banks of the Wabash River, right next to the George Rogers Clark Memorial (the romantic site of Joe's and my engagement).
 

The Rendevous is quite an event for historic Vincennes, Indiana's oldest city.  We also have Grouseland here, the home of President William Henry Harrison, the first Indiana Territory Governor and 9th President of the United States.     Vincennes has not done a very good job of "exploiting" or advertising its place in history, but the Rendevous is pretty well done.  According to the literature:

       "At 10 a.m., Thurs., Feb. 25, 1779, British Lt. Gov. Henry Hamilton surrendered his garrison of 80 soldiers after a siege which lasted less than two days. The victor, Lt. Col. Clark, had led an army of 170 Americans and French-Canadians across the flooded area of present-day southern Illinois in a march to Vincennes.
The Spirit of Vincennes Rendezvous is designed to bring back to life the sights, sounds, and smells of late 18^th century and early 19^th century Vincennes"

We had never been to this, and we really enjoyed it.  We walked through the encampment where many of the participants camp for the weekend, then we made our way over to where they were shooting off a cannon, and watched the first of the Battles.

In addition to the participants of the battles, lots of people were dressed in period costumes, including kids, and we saw a few "Indians" in full paint.

We encountered some soldiers on the way to the first battle of the day, and we had been hearing the cannon shots already.

 We passed a lady cooking flapjacks over the fire, and a couple guys making breakfast frajitas (I asked how they were different from breakfast burritos, and they said they couldn't spell burritos).

We passed this green/red flag and thought maybe it was French or something, but we were told it was George Rogers Clark's flag.

We walked over to check out the cannon.  There were oxen over here, and we later saw kids riding in oxen-drawn carts.  

It had started to sprinkle as we prepared to watch the first battle.  Joe M. is taking a picture of me in my neon green raincoat (they dubbed me "Colonial Wilma" but he hasn't sent me the picture yet").  I called them "We of the Umbrella" (as in We the People).

And then the battle began.  There was a lot of smoke from the muzzle loaders and rifles, and casualties on both sides, but our side won.

Next we wandered through the aisles and checked out some of the booths.  All items for sale were "period items," but they were interesting.  I bought some scissors, and a coffee mug for my collection.

Another friend from my school days, Anne Robinson Saxe, hooked up with me for a while.  She and her husband were coming back from graduation activities in Georgia, on their way to their home in Madison, Indiana.  We had not seen each other probably since high school, so we enjoyed our time together.  This year's trip to Vincennes has really been a walk down memory lane for me because I have gotten to see so many people from my childhood.

We enjoyed some of the wide variety of food served (ham & beans, corn on the cob, pie from St. Peters Lutheran Church, strawberry shortcake, pork sandwich), then went back over for the second and final battle.  They had a cannon demonstration before the battle started.

The outcome of the second battle was the same as the first, although we were told that we (the Congressional Army) is not always the victor.  Again, there were lots of smoke, the enemies' cannon would not fire and they tried to negotiate a surrender, but that didn't work out.

There was a real cutie right down the bleachers from us -- we thought he would be a fine "Little Shooter."

We finally headed out but we had spent the bulk of the day here.  We had to stop at the grocery on the way home so Joe M. could get the ingredients for a rhubarb/strawberry pie he wanted to make, and Cathy picked up the makings of lunch meat sandwiches for dinner.  Fred and Judy came out and we did get in 3 hands of cards, but we were all pretty tired.  We are just having too much fun -- we need a day of rest.