Fort Pitt

From 1759 to 1761, on the crook of land where the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers come together and the Ohio river begins, Fort Pitt was constructed. This was during the French and Indian War and the site, because of the rivers there, was strategically very important. This fort replaced a fort the French had destroyed the previous year. During the American Revolutionary War, this was the American headquarters for the western theater of the war. Interestingly, Fort Detroit was the British counter to this fort.

This was our destination on day one. We had started driving at that time of the day when the sun is not yet up, so no one really cares what time it is. We had started the routine of pee and fleas, which make all drive times warp to this new thing called Corps time. Our car was quiet, with the brakes in rhythmic breathing of the sleeping kids only broken by the next instructions being given over the CB. It was good.

Our final leg of the journey was not quite as smooth. As we got into Pittsburgh and the instructions of where to go got stacked up and the caravan got stretched up by traffic lights, we missed our turn. A turn that meant rather then making it to the target parking lot we crossed a bridge and then immediately into the Fort Pitt tunnel. This means we could only hear the people who had gotten lost in the same way we did. This is not ideal. No reason to panic, so what is half the bass drummers were in our car. Shelly pulled up the address on the iPhone and we got turned around, us and our mini caravan of fellow lost folks. Back through the tunnel, back across the bridge and an exit which didn't mention the fort which was supposed to be there. We slowed and there he was. Steve, the husband of the President and a veteran parent, had walked to the difficult corner and was pointing the direction we needed to go. Exactly what we needed, we made it back in plenty of time.

The kids dressed in the back room of the museum. This would be there first performance of what was being called the Liberty Tour. While they finished getting their things and started warming up, the parents and the instructors went out to the park we would be playing in. It was a vast green that had a wall marking the foundation where that portion of the fort was no longer there. It was, as we would learn, the portion of the fort where musical instructions would be given to the troops.

It was then, from the shade of the bridge, which allowed us to be close to the exit from the museum and the green they would play on, but not roast in the heat, we heard the first drum beats. We looked over to a small copse of trees and through the crowd which had gathered we could see the distinctive uniforms of George Washington's Lifeguard, the uniforms adopted by the Plymouth Fife and drum corps. The crowd shifted toward them. We told people this was just the warm up, that they would be playing on the green they were leaving, but those beats were like a siren's call. Soon, the fife and drums and guardsmen each had little crowds of people. News stations showed up and cameras were positioned, bikers and walkers stopped and listened.

Then they gathered. They heard the commands we could not, they lined up and marched. A ship of red, white and blue which dragged behind it a wake of people. Looked for Savannah and Sienna, my reasons for being there and joined the wake allowing myself to be carried to the edge of the green.

There was probably 200 to 250 people, dozens of cameras and thick solemn attention. I swelled with pride at not just my kids but the whole corps, with the parents and support. I looked at the people who watched them and wondered if they felt the history come alive as they played the songs which had been played, in uniforms which had been worn on the spot those they were emulating had once stood. This was why we were here. Tour had begun.