As a followup to this post, I randomly encountered a Google Ad from the Appomattox Court House tourist board:
Too perfect.
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The Edge of the American West 
12 comments
April 10, 2010 at 7:21 am
Margarita
Well, if you squint a little and cock your head to the right, and ligature the first two letters of script, it could be read as “Ahistoric” Appomattox. Kind of.
Oh, who cares? It feels so good!
April 10, 2010 at 7:37 am
kid bitzer
oh, i dont think that’s such a distortion of events. yes, it does lend a specious air of volition to what was wholly involuntary on one side. but is also in keeping with much of lincoln’s own rhetoric. just think how angry he was to have gettysburg described as the successful repulsion of a foreign invader from our national soil.
not that i’m anywhere near as generous as he was. i liked a suggestion at tnc’s site, of bumper-stickers saying “what part of appomattox do you not understand?”
April 10, 2010 at 8:05 am
Margarita
Lincoln’s rhetoric was that there was nothing to “reunite.” The Union was indissoluble. That was my take on the offending slogan anyway.
April 10, 2010 at 12:14 pm
silbey
oh, i dont think that’s such a distortion of events.
It’s NOT when the war ended, was my point. It’s NOT when “our nation” reunited, in too many ways to count.
April 10, 2010 at 3:23 pm
grackle
Doing a quick glance across the page, I misread “Historic” as Christ at; and what a nice combo of myths that would be.
April 10, 2010 at 3:48 pm
eric
I misread “Historic” as Christ at
This reminds me of my favorite Oxford joke; it helps if you know that Lincoln and Jesus colleges are right across the street from each other.
American family walks into the porter’s lodge at Jesus College and looks around.
Porter asks, “Can I help you?”
American dad says, “We’re looking for Lincoln. Is this Lincoln?”
Porter says, “No sir, this is Jesus.”
American dad looks in the guidebook, looks at the quad, says, “It looks like Lincoln.”
Porter says, “Well, you Americans always did have trouble telling them apart.”
April 10, 2010 at 3:51 pm
kid bitzer
silbey– yeah, fair enough.
April 10, 2010 at 10:13 pm
andrew
Maybe further research will determine that, while there was a five year rise in the level of violence at the beginning of the 1860s, a civil war never happened.
April 11, 2010 at 5:34 am
Erik Lund
Andrew: that depends. Is the Civil War a dubious narrative that allows us to stop thinking about subjects that make us uncomfortable? Maybe if you were to call it “the War of Northern Aggression.” Because I’m pretty sure _that_ never happened.
April 11, 2010 at 9:27 am
aimai
Well, it was “A” civil war, whoever you think started it. “The Civil War” is actually a fairly good descriptor. But after years of Southern whining I’m thinking of having a bumpersticker made up that says “More Wars of Northern Aggression, Please.”
aimai
April 11, 2010 at 9:35 am
THE CON
I thought you all would like this. CNN’s main article this morning “Were Confederate Soldiers Terrorists?”
http://www.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/04/11/martin.confederate.extremist/index.html?hpt=C1
April 11, 2010 at 11:33 am
TF Smith
I was in look-away land last week with the spouse, and as we went walking, we came across a lovely little city park – restored 19th Century homes, pond, ducks, statue of Dixecrat governor, etc.
Then we saw a large (8 foot +) statue of what could only be described as a seriously ticked-off angel: wings, sword (artfully situated to cover the nether regions), etc.
We were both curious, so we walked over to check the base – Daughters of the Confderarcy, whatever-chapter, to honor the Confederate dead, circa 1908.
The entertaining side note was that it was cast at the Union Bronze Company, Brooklyn, NY…
And then later the same week I found myself a few miles away from Stone Mountain, GA – where, according to the people I was working with, mostly AA, there is (today) a large population of AA, both native-born and 1st generation.
All of which is to say that the South makes Edgeland’s various human/ethnic/tribal weirdnesses look tame…
And yes, more than a few were – Quantrill comes to mind.