"The American Revolution" is timely viewing with U.S. democracy under siege by Donald Trump and his authoritarian party [View all]

by Joel Connelly

Amidst a polyglot of ancestries, including two Generals Schwarzkopf, I learned as a kid that my mother’s forebears included one William Dawes.

My ears perked up when I heard his name mentioned in Ken Burns’ marvelous PBS series “The American Revolution,” airing now on stations like KCTS.

On the night of April 18th, 1775, Dawes rode out of British-occupied Boston to deliver a warning to local militias: “The Redcoats are coming.” He escaped from capture on the road between Lexington and Concord, while the Brits held onto fellow rider Paul Revere.

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In watching Burns’ documentary, however, I felt Dawes was delivering a message to me. Dawes, Revere, and fellow rider Samuel Prescott were pushing back against an occupying army from across the Atlantic Ocean. They had already helped dump a boatload of British East India Company tea into Boston Harbor.

Out of these early skirmishes came roots of a republic which, nearly two hundred and fifty years later, urgently require nourishing.

https://www.nwprogressive.org/weblog/2025/11/the-american-revolution-is-timely-viewing-with-u-s-democracy-under-siege-by-donald-trump-and-his-authoritarian-party.html

I highly recommend watching the series if you have already.