Characters

Edward Braddock

1695-1755

During the French and Indian War, Braddock was the commander in chief of the British forces in America. In 1775, he led a force of 1200 men against fort Duquesne, which is now Pittsburgh, PA. and was occupied by French military forces at the time. About 11Km from the fort, Braddock was ambushed by French and Indians. his force was decimated, over 900 of his 1200 were killed. The few survivors were led to safety by George Washington, then a Colonel in Braddock’s army. General Braddock was himself wounded during the attack and died shortly thereafter.

Henry Ward Beecher

1813-1887

Born in Litchfield, Conn. on June 24, 1813. He attended Amherst College and at the Lane Theological Seminary. His most notable religious employment was in Brooklyn, New York Where he served as a pastor for the Plymouth Church of the Pilgrims. He held this position for the rest of his life and became one of the most famous pulpit orators and lecturers on American history of his time. He was sympathetic to abolitionist views. Beecher was also supportive of the woman suffrage movement. His writings include "A Tale of Village Life in New England"(1867) and "The Life of Jesus the Christ" (4 vol., 1871-91). He died in Brooklyn, on March 8, 1887.

James Anderson DePreist

1936-

Born in 1936, in Philadelphia. he received a degree at the University of Pennsylvania. He studied music at The Philadelphia Conservatory of Music. He later served in the U.S. state department as a specialist in American music and as a conductor in Bangkok, Thailand. In 1964 he made his debut as a conductor with the New York Philharmonic. He has gone on to conduct many symphony orchestras. His latest being with the Oregon Symphony in 1980.

James Maxwell Anderson

1888-1959

Playwright, born in Atlantic, Pennsylvania, USA. After taking an MA at Stanford, he served as an editor with the New Republic (1918-24) before achieving his first success, collaborating with Lawrence Stallings on a realistic war drama, What Price Glory? (1924). He thereafter alternated between romantic blank-verse such as Elizabeth the Queen (1930) and Winterset (1935) and more realistic dramas such as Key Largo (1939) and The Bad Seed (1954).

Jeffrey Amherst

1717-1797

Born in Riverhead, Kent. In 1731 he entered the British army as an Ensign. He served in the War of the Austrian Succession as well as the Seven Years' War. In September of 1758 Amherst became the commander in chief of the British forces in America. In 1760 he captured Montréal. He returned to England in 1763. From 1772 to 1782 he was the commander of the entire British army. Amherst, Massachusetts and Amherst College were named after him.

Joseph Black

1728-1799

Born in Bordeaux, France. He received his education at the Scotland universities Glasgow and Edinburgh. He later became a professor of chemistry at the University of Edinburgh. He is most known for his works concerning the chemical properties of carbon dioxide. In 1761 Black discovered latent heat. three years later he measured the latent heat of steam. His pupil at the time, James Watt, later put this to practical use making improvements to the steam engine. he also discovered that different substances have unique heat capacities.

Phineas Taylor Barnum

1810-1891

P.T. Barnum was born in Bethel, Connecticut. his career as a showman started when he purchased Joyce Heth, a slave who was supposedly 161 years old. Eventually, his show expanded to include the midget General Tom Thumb as well as the original Siamese twins, Chang and Eng. In 1871 he launched a mobile circus advertised as "The greatest show on earth". In 1881, his show merged with that of James Bailey and became internationally famous.

William Frederick Cody

1846-1917

Born in Scott county, Iowa. His father died when he was in his early teens. Cody briefly attended school in 1859. When the civil war began, he served as a guide and scout for the Union Army. In 1863 he joined the 7th Kansas Cavalry as an army scout. At the close of the war in 1865 he contracted with the Kansas Pacific Railroad to provide buffalo meat for the workers on the line. His claim of killing more than 4000 buffalo in less than 18 months earned him the nickname "Buffalo Bill". In 1872 the U.S. government awarded him a Congressional Medal of Honor, but revoked it 44 years later because he had not been in the military at the time.