By James C. Fulmer | Past President, NMLRA
“When an old man dies, a library burns to the ground.”
— (Old African Proverb)
This July there will be many events that I will be attending. Here old men and women will gather and do what they liked to do for most of their lives. From rifle matches, rendezvous, Territorial matches, Dixon’s Gunmakers Fair, and family picnics. Dixon’s Gunmakers Fair, which will be the 37th annual event held in Kempton, PA, from July 26th through the 28th. I have attended every year of this event and have seen many muzzleloading gun builders, barrel makers, lock makers, bag, horn, knife, and many others come and go and many never will return. I was 27 years old on the 1st year of this event, but many of the people who started it and where those in muzzle loading where already in their 50s and 60s. Now 37 years latter many of those men and women are gone. It is true: when a person who is a library will close their doors forever no more information can be retrieved from those individuals. The sad part is a lot of the information only they possessed. So at the family picnics or when you have a question on how to or whys at a rifle match or rendezvous ask because the old people won’t always be around.
Members of 4th Indiana Light Artillery photographed near the Benjamin Harrison home in Indianapolis during the April NRA Convention, left to right, are Randy Jackson, Rick Herman, Buddy Townsend and Cindy Jackson.
This year I went to the 148th annual National Rifle Association Annual Meetings and exhibits in Indianapolis, IN. It was held April 26th thru to April 28th. I have attended the NRA event non-stop since 1998 when it was in Philadelphia, PA, and will continue to do so as long as I can make the trip. This year I was invited by Buddy Townsend of the 4th Indiana Light Artillery Civil War re-enacting group to see them demonstrate the 3-inch ordnance rifle. Their group would shoot blanks at the Benjamin Harrison house in downtown Indianapolis. They had been asked by the NRA’s Ring of Freedom Heritage Society to demonstrate the operating of the muzzle-loading cannon for their membership. They would tour Benjamin Harrison’s house and watch the ordnance rifle be fired and eventually had a luncheon on site.
Benjamin Harrison was the 23rd President of the United States and I was surprised how much I did not know about him or his wife Caroline Lavinia Scott Harrison. His house in Indianapolis is restored pretty close to original with most of its contents original and or from that time period. He was a grandson of President William Henry Harrison who was the 9th President of the United States in 1840 but died of pneumonia only one month after he took office.
Benjamin Harrison was born August 20, 1833 in North Bend, OH. His father John Harrison is the only person who could say so far in history he had a father who was President William Harrison and his son was President Benjamin Harrison. Benjamin would attend Miami University in Oxford, OH, and graduate in 1852. He would marry Caroline Lavinia Scott October 23, 1853, study law in Cincinnati and was admitted to the Ohio bar in early 1854. He would travel to Indianapolis and set up a law practice. Here he would become involved in politics and supported the first Republican presidential candidate John C Fremont in in 1856 and Abraham Lincoln in 1860.
Author posed next to a reproduction of a Civil War muzzle loading 3 inch ordnance rifle before the Benjamin Harrison home in Indianapolis, IN.
When the Civil War broke out Benjamin would enlist and help raise recruits through northern Indiana for the Union. He would lead the newly formed 70th Indiana Volunteer Infantry. The governor of Indiana would commission Benjamin Harrison as a colonel August 7, 1862. By the end of the war he would be nominated by President Lincoln to the position of brevet brigadier general of volunteers. His nomination was confirmed by the Senate and he would ride in the Grand Review in Washington, DC, before mustering out in 1865.
Benjamin Harrison was heavily involved in politics after the Civil War. He would become well known as a lawyer and a negotiator. When he was a delegate at the Republican National Convention in 1880 he helped James A Garfield win the Republican nomination for President and went on and helped him to become President. He would get elected as the US senator for Indiana for one term and be voted out in 1887. He would return to his law practice but would eventually get nominated and be elected the President. He was sworn into office March 4th 1889 as the president of the United States. He was to be the last Civil war general to serve as president.
A lot of stuff happened under his watch is the easiest way to describe the time period. On December 29th 1890 the US 7th Cavalry would clash with the Lakota Sioux, which is considered the last major American Indian Battle in the 1800s. Six new states where admitted to the Union. North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana, and Washington where all admitted during the month of November 1889. Idaho and Wyoming in July of 1890. More states where admitted to the Union during Harrison’s presidency than any other president after the forming of the original colonies. Harrison would have electricity installed in the White House for the first time by Edison General Electric Company. He would modernize the Navy by having battle ships with heavy armament and steel hulls. The United States would become a real Navel Power. He would appoint 4 Supreme Court justices. He attended a three day centennial celebration of George Washington’s inauguration in New York City on April 30th, 1889.
When re-election came around in 1892 the Democrats nominated Grover Cleveland who Benjamin Harrison had defeated four years earlier. Harrison would be defeated and has the distinction of being the only president whose predecessor and successor was the same man.
Roadside historical marker for Benjamin Harrison, 23rd President of the United States.
The First Lady Caroline Harrison is a story unto herself. She would be asked by the newly founded Daughters of the American Revolution to become their first President General in1890. In February of 1892 she would give the first recorded speech ever given by a First Lady at the first Congress of the DAR. She would work with other ladies to help raise funds for John Hopkins University Medical School on the condition they would admit women students. It was exciting times just like they are now.
If you think our time period is changing so fast you can’t keep up. Think about Benjamin Harrison: from muzzle loaders to Maxim recoil operated machine guns; from candles in his childhood to electricity in the White House. Plenty of intrigue and foreign politics back then as there is now. History repeats itself and it must be taught in schools or we will make the same mistakes as our forefathers. Enjoy the 4th of July this year by re-reading the Declaration of Independence; better yet read it to your grand kids.
