American History with Lisa K! :D
Hi there everybody!! Today we are going to learn about
The AMERICAN REVOLUTION!
The AMERICAN REVOLUTION is one of my favorite topics to discuss, since it is the birth of a totally neato country (America). Now, some of you might be thinking, "Lisa K appreciates culture and foreign language, is not overweight, and she doesn't even watch football. She is unamerican!" This is false. In fact, not only am I more American than apple pie, I actually am an apple pie myself. Here is a diagram:
(Ramparts here are represented by a waffly looking thing because I don't know what real ramparts look like)
Now, onto the history lesson! 8D
As far as anyone knows, the first people to come to America were probably those casino-running people that some of us like to call "Indians" (or perhaps "Injuns") and others prefer "Native Americans" or "Indigenous Peoples" or some other thing. I am going to use "Indian" because it's still the one I hear the most often and it is the shortest to type.
Most maps are really damn misleading, because, they make it look like Alaska is the end of the world, but actually, if you kept going left at the end of Alaska, you would find some water, and then RUSSIA. wtf. Maybe mapmakers should have realized this before putting Russia wayyy over on the other side of the map! >:o
Anyways, so these people used to live in Russia (but they're not Russians like, like Russians you're thinking of Russians with the funny winter hats or whatever) and then, there was a lot of land where there's just an ocean now, so they walked across it, and they went to North America. Then since they were probably in Canada which is like, pretty cold lots of them went more south-ish to warm up.
MEANWHILE
So, like, since now we know what is to the left, to the right of America, after the ocean, there is Europe. Here is a map of the important countries in Europe.
At the time, England (then known as "Ye Olde Englande") was the most important country in the world, and the other country was France (then known as "France"). One day a bunch of these Europeans decided to see what was on the other side of the ocean. They seriously had like tons of time to just waste so they took boats and not a plane.
They have sad faces because being on the boat sucked because they did not have lots of food and their tea got cold.
The English arrive in the New World!!
Finally, when the English found America they were pretty hungry and stuff, and they didn't know how to talk to the Indians because like they didn't speak the same language so they just tried to use the Indians for stuff. They were totally mean to the Indians, what with the raping and also stealing all their stuff, but the Indians did not understand because their way of life was all peaceful and stuff. Also, many Indians died due to the diseases that had always been in Europe and the Europeans were used to it but these diseases had not existed in America. Especially dog-ridden diseases killed lots of Indians because they did not keep dogs as pets.
After awhile there were practically no Indians left whatsoever so more English people came over and made families and houses out of wood and stuff (French too).
But, the remaining English and French people that were still in England and France (this was a lot of them because so many people did not really wanna go to North America yet because it was just like a big forest) decided to have a war!!!
This war lasted for 7 years (which is like pretty long for a war!! Since WWII was like 4 years and that was like a big war with lots of countries, but this was just England and France remember). The French lost this war! And the English won... BUT AT WHAT COST?? :O
England became like super poor!! I guess maybe they shouldn't have spent all their money killing France. aw.
England was like "oh, we need money, and we can't get money in this country", because, England is really small, so it was kinda already like filled up with people and stuff. What could England do?
MEANWHILE!!!!!!!!!
The Americans had been kinda cut off from England for awhile (they didn't have any Internet access yet or anything so yeah) and they developed their own way of life! Which was different from the British way!
They like didn't even really feel all that "English" since this mysterious "England" place was far away and they had never been there.
Suddenly, the King of England had an idea!!!! He would take lots of money from his colonies (colonies are like when you own land but it's obviously nowhere near your original country so they sorta govern themselves but it's still part of the country. Kinda like Puerto Rico) MWAHAHA.
Stamps and Tea were two of the biggest issues!! Now, I know lots of people are like "Tea, so what, I never drink tea", and I used to think the same thing, but listen, I think tea was wicked important in those days. In a way, England is sorta like the RIAA here and tea is like mp3s. Like, once you're so used to something and all of a sudden it gets all expensivey due to some random thing you're all "WTF?". So they were all "WTF?" over tea and stamps.
This is when the Boston Tea Party happeneneded!!
Basically, a bunch of guys in Boston were like "omg, this tea is so expensive" and they decided to dump it into Boston Harbor! They dressed up like Indians to disguise themselves, however, they obviously weren't real Indians because they were white, duh, so they got found out, but they were all "man that was so worth it" because they showed England that they were way wicked not paying for expensive tea!
Then, somehow anyways a war started, the place where it started was "Lexington and Concord", ok? That will like definitely be on a test somewhere in your life. Here we have the picture of Paul Revere (not William Tell!! I have no idea why people call this guy William Tell. William Tell was the guy that shot the apple off of someones head). Actually, Paul Revere was aided by 2 other guys. They put 2 lights in a tower to show that the English came by sea. I think that this is pretty obvious though because I mean they'd have to be at the sea at some point before being on the land :/
Then a war began!!!
As you can see, the Americans are not as well dressed and also they don't have good weapons (I forget what the really used so here they are just throwing rocks.)
The war was going really badly for Americans for a really long time!
Now, guys, I know what you're thinking "But America doesn't suck, how could they have been doing so bad" but you have to remember that at the time America was just a bunch of adventerous people living in the forest. Okay well, like, there were some cities but 90% of the population was just like people on farms in the middle of nowhere.
HOWEVER!!!!
The Battle of "Saratoga" (write that one down too) changed all of this :o:o:o
The Americans won this battle against the English somehow. This was very significant, because, I mean like America was seriously not going to win the war, until the SUPER EURO-FRIENDS came along!!!
The first country to want to help America was France.
If you remember the 7 Years War, France lost to England in this war (they lost to England in some other wars too) and were like, totally stoked now that America might win because they knew that this would seriously damage England to lose America (I mean think about what the world would be like now if UK and US were the same thing !!) so they were all, liek, out for revenge. Actually when I think about it France is kinda like a fair weather friend, which is why I added the sunshine to this picture to show the fair weather.
There were 2 other countries that helped out America during the Revolution!!
Here they are!!!! I really tried hard to draw a good matador :( Okay, anyways, but yeah, there was Spain and the Netherlands too. It should be noted that, in lieu of a picture of someone from Holland, I simply took an extremely accurate map of the country from Mario Party 7 and copy pasted it. Anyways, those other 2 countries kinda made a half assed effort because nobody was really serious about it, but France was like, totally devoted to getting revenge on England so they were really the important country to take note of.
Anyways, after that point, England was kinda screwed because like, England is more powerful than all of those other countries, but America + France (w/some Spain and Holland) was strong enough to be better than England, and eventually the English lost and America became its own little country. Except it was a really big country.
GO HOME ENGLAND! :V
Then, a lot of other stuff happened like, people discovered the rest of the country and it was really big and had lots of land so Americans made lots of stuff and became really rich and famous and now that's why people say "This is the best country in the world", even though maybe some other countries have the same standard of living, but they aren't America so I'm not really talking about them now. This is why when people say "Oh I hate America because of Bush" they are stupid, because they don't even realize lots of other neato stuff that happened here. This is also why if you live in Masssachusetts you had to go through more historical field trips than anyone else in the entire country :(
bonus section: THE AMERICAN FLAG
So, yeah, after the war ended they realized they needed a flag, since they did not have a flag, so they made the American flag. It was made by a girl.
Here is what the first American flag looked like:
The red and white stripes represented the red-and-white striped shirts our French brethren wore all the time, and the European Union flag in the corner represented the European Union.
Seriously guys.
As a side note, more stars were added later on, in 1849, to prevent counterfeiting of flags, which was a lucrative business venture at the time, then known as the "California Gold Rush".
*For those curious, the origin of this post was Stef always asking me to make historical moments more fun and interesting. The original I did was of WWII but that war is both too long and also a bit too "heavy" for the taste of what I was going for here. There is a lot of truth mixed in with lots of sneaky lies, and obvious lies, in this entry so if you're really curious to learn more about history (and I hope you are! I tried very hard to make it interesting!!) just ask me and I will clear things up for you ^^
The AMERICAN REVOLUTION!
The AMERICAN REVOLUTION is one of my favorite topics to discuss, since it is the birth of a totally neato country (America). Now, some of you might be thinking, "Lisa K appreciates culture and foreign language, is not overweight, and she doesn't even watch football. She is unamerican!" This is false. In fact, not only am I more American than apple pie, I actually am an apple pie myself. Here is a diagram:
(Ramparts here are represented by a waffly looking thing because I don't know what real ramparts look like)
Now, onto the history lesson! 8D
As far as anyone knows, the first people to come to America were probably those casino-running people that some of us like to call "Indians" (or perhaps "Injuns") and others prefer "Native Americans" or "Indigenous Peoples" or some other thing. I am going to use "Indian" because it's still the one I hear the most often and it is the shortest to type.
Most maps are really damn misleading, because, they make it look like Alaska is the end of the world, but actually, if you kept going left at the end of Alaska, you would find some water, and then RUSSIA. wtf. Maybe mapmakers should have realized this before putting Russia wayyy over on the other side of the map! >:o
Anyways, so these people used to live in Russia (but they're not Russians like, like Russians you're thinking of Russians with the funny winter hats or whatever) and then, there was a lot of land where there's just an ocean now, so they walked across it, and they went to North America. Then since they were probably in Canada which is like, pretty cold lots of them went more south-ish to warm up.
MEANWHILE
So, like, since now we know what is to the left, to the right of America, after the ocean, there is Europe. Here is a map of the important countries in Europe.
At the time, England (then known as "Ye Olde Englande") was the most important country in the world, and the other country was France (then known as "France"). One day a bunch of these Europeans decided to see what was on the other side of the ocean. They seriously had like tons of time to just waste so they took boats and not a plane.
They have sad faces because being on the boat sucked because they did not have lots of food and their tea got cold.
The English arrive in the New World!!
Finally, when the English found America they were pretty hungry and stuff, and they didn't know how to talk to the Indians because like they didn't speak the same language so they just tried to use the Indians for stuff. They were totally mean to the Indians, what with the raping and also stealing all their stuff, but the Indians did not understand because their way of life was all peaceful and stuff. Also, many Indians died due to the diseases that had always been in Europe and the Europeans were used to it but these diseases had not existed in America. Especially dog-ridden diseases killed lots of Indians because they did not keep dogs as pets.
After awhile there were practically no Indians left whatsoever so more English people came over and made families and houses out of wood and stuff (French too).
But, the remaining English and French people that were still in England and France (this was a lot of them because so many people did not really wanna go to North America yet because it was just like a big forest) decided to have a war!!!
This war lasted for 7 years (which is like pretty long for a war!! Since WWII was like 4 years and that was like a big war with lots of countries, but this was just England and France remember). The French lost this war! And the English won... BUT AT WHAT COST?? :O
England became like super poor!! I guess maybe they shouldn't have spent all their money killing France. aw.
England was like "oh, we need money, and we can't get money in this country", because, England is really small, so it was kinda already like filled up with people and stuff. What could England do?
MEANWHILE!!!!!!!!!
The Americans had been kinda cut off from England for awhile (they didn't have any Internet access yet or anything so yeah) and they developed their own way of life! Which was different from the British way!
They like didn't even really feel all that "English" since this mysterious "England" place was far away and they had never been there.
Suddenly, the King of England had an idea!!!! He would take lots of money from his colonies (colonies are like when you own land but it's obviously nowhere near your original country so they sorta govern themselves but it's still part of the country. Kinda like Puerto Rico) MWAHAHA.
Stamps and Tea were two of the biggest issues!! Now, I know lots of people are like "Tea, so what, I never drink tea", and I used to think the same thing, but listen, I think tea was wicked important in those days. In a way, England is sorta like the RIAA here and tea is like mp3s. Like, once you're so used to something and all of a sudden it gets all expensivey due to some random thing you're all "WTF?". So they were all "WTF?" over tea and stamps.
This is when the Boston Tea Party happeneneded!!
Basically, a bunch of guys in Boston were like "omg, this tea is so expensive" and they decided to dump it into Boston Harbor! They dressed up like Indians to disguise themselves, however, they obviously weren't real Indians because they were white, duh, so they got found out, but they were all "man that was so worth it" because they showed England that they were way wicked not paying for expensive tea!
Then, somehow anyways a war started, the place where it started was "Lexington and Concord", ok? That will like definitely be on a test somewhere in your life. Here we have the picture of Paul Revere (not William Tell!! I have no idea why people call this guy William Tell. William Tell was the guy that shot the apple off of someones head). Actually, Paul Revere was aided by 2 other guys. They put 2 lights in a tower to show that the English came by sea. I think that this is pretty obvious though because I mean they'd have to be at the sea at some point before being on the land :/
Then a war began!!!
As you can see, the Americans are not as well dressed and also they don't have good weapons (I forget what the really used so here they are just throwing rocks.)
The war was going really badly for Americans for a really long time!
Now, guys, I know what you're thinking "But America doesn't suck, how could they have been doing so bad" but you have to remember that at the time America was just a bunch of adventerous people living in the forest. Okay well, like, there were some cities but 90% of the population was just like people on farms in the middle of nowhere.
HOWEVER!!!!
The Battle of "Saratoga" (write that one down too) changed all of this :o:o:o
The Americans won this battle against the English somehow. This was very significant, because, I mean like America was seriously not going to win the war, until the SUPER EURO-FRIENDS came along!!!
The first country to want to help America was France.
If you remember the 7 Years War, France lost to England in this war (they lost to England in some other wars too) and were like, totally stoked now that America might win because they knew that this would seriously damage England to lose America (I mean think about what the world would be like now if UK and US were the same thing !!) so they were all, liek, out for revenge. Actually when I think about it France is kinda like a fair weather friend, which is why I added the sunshine to this picture to show the fair weather.
There were 2 other countries that helped out America during the Revolution!!
Here they are!!!! I really tried hard to draw a good matador :( Okay, anyways, but yeah, there was Spain and the Netherlands too. It should be noted that, in lieu of a picture of someone from Holland, I simply took an extremely accurate map of the country from Mario Party 7 and copy pasted it. Anyways, those other 2 countries kinda made a half assed effort because nobody was really serious about it, but France was like, totally devoted to getting revenge on England so they were really the important country to take note of.
Anyways, after that point, England was kinda screwed because like, England is more powerful than all of those other countries, but America + France (w/some Spain and Holland) was strong enough to be better than England, and eventually the English lost and America became its own little country. Except it was a really big country.
GO HOME ENGLAND! :V
Then, a lot of other stuff happened like, people discovered the rest of the country and it was really big and had lots of land so Americans made lots of stuff and became really rich and famous and now that's why people say "This is the best country in the world", even though maybe some other countries have the same standard of living, but they aren't America so I'm not really talking about them now. This is why when people say "Oh I hate America because of Bush" they are stupid, because they don't even realize lots of other neato stuff that happened here. This is also why if you live in Masssachusetts you had to go through more historical field trips than anyone else in the entire country :(
bonus section: THE AMERICAN FLAG
So, yeah, after the war ended they realized they needed a flag, since they did not have a flag, so they made the American flag. It was made by a girl.
Here is what the first American flag looked like:
The red and white stripes represented the red-and-white striped shirts our French brethren wore all the time, and the European Union flag in the corner represented the European Union.
Seriously guys.
As a side note, more stars were added later on, in 1849, to prevent counterfeiting of flags, which was a lucrative business venture at the time, then known as the "California Gold Rush".
*For those curious, the origin of this post was Stef always asking me to make historical moments more fun and interesting. The original I did was of WWII but that war is both too long and also a bit too "heavy" for the taste of what I was going for here. There is a lot of truth mixed in with lots of sneaky lies, and obvious lies, in this entry so if you're really curious to learn more about history (and I hope you are! I tried very hard to make it interesting!!) just ask me and I will clear things up for you ^^