Countdown is on to 250

 

Independence Day has come and gone and now the one-year countdown is on to America’s 250th birthday.

Whether you call it the semiquincentennial, bisesquicentennial, sestercentennial or the quarter millennium, July 4, 2026, will be the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Trust me, it will be a big deal. I was just shy of my 10th birthday when we celebrated the bicentennial in 1976. I remember there being a lot of special celebrations and events taking place.

We are already well into the 250th year since the start of the American Revolution. A lot of people mistakenly think the war began with the signing of the Declaration in 1776, but we were a year into the war by then. The anniversaries of the midnight rides of Paul Revere, William Dawes and Samuel Prescott (April 18, 1775), the battles of Lexington and Concord (April 19, 1775), the start of the Siege of Boston (April 19, 1775) and the Battle of Bunker Hill (June 17, 1775) have already taken place. June 14 was the 250th birthday of the U.S. Army, making it older than the country itself!

Growing up in Colorado, we had the dual celebration of the state’s centennial celebration in 1976. Colorado is nicknamed the Centennial State because it was admitted to the Union on Aug. 1, 1876. All the fervor, however, centered around the bicentennial celebration.

That year at Niwot Elementary School we spent a lot of time studying the Revolutionary War. I remember reading the book “Spies on the Devil’s Belt” by Betsy Haynes and dreaming of being a kid spying on the British for the Continental Army. A lot of our comic books back then had colorful advertisements for plastic toy Revolutionary War soldiers. I really wanted some but don’t recall if I ever got them.

On July 4 of that year I baked a birthday cake for America. We put 200 candles on it. My dad lit it with a blowtorch, and we very quickly sang Happy Birthday to America and then blew out what little remained of the candles. The cake itself wound up under a sheet of wax.

Another cool thing was collecting bicentennial quarters. It was exciting to find one at first, but then it became old hat. Now, 50 years later, they are much harder to come by and when I find one, I get that rush of childhood excitement again. From what I understand, special semiquincentennial coins are to be minted next year. It will also be the last year for pennies, so coin collecting could become interesting.

I vaguely recall one of the things we did in school was to attempt to trace our ancestry to see if we had any Revolutionary War era ancestors. I didn’t get much farther than my grandparents before losing the line. Back then we didn’t have the benefit of the internet. I really didn’t know or care how far back I could trace my ancestry. Now it’s almost an obsession.

Thanks to various sites on the internet, I can trace many relatives on my father’s side back to colonial days in America. I know the first Southern arrived here in 1620 on a ship named George. I don’t know if I’m directly related or not. I do know that I have about three or four relatives who were in the Revolutionary War. I qualified to join the Sons of the American Revolution through my fifth-great-grandfather, William Hopkins. He was a private in the Orange County, New York, regiment under Goose VanSchaick.

Ironically, his father, Francis Whaley Hopkins, was known as The Tory Bandit. His occupation is listed as horse thief, counterfeiter, and counter-revolutionary organizer. He was hung for stealing a horse in 1779.

Interestingly enough, William Hopkins’ son, Henry Harrison Hopkins, a War of 1812 veteran, died in March of 1844 “in a camp on Cut Hand Creek in Red River Texas.” His will was probated in the Republic of Texas, qualifying me for membership in the Sons of the Republic of Texas.

Getting back to the 250th anniversary, I can only hope that schools make as big a deal about it as mine did for the bicentennial. It’s a great opportunity to get kids excited about American history. In the grand scheme of things, America has a short history, but it’s ours and I’m proud of it. Now that I know my family played a part, I plan to do more research into our role in history as we make the year-long countdown to 250.