going to DVR it, so I can watch it before the daughter does...in case they decide to say that he was gay or something.
Ferry Farms?
The General was ALWAYS very interested in the ladies (although VERY proper), so there will be no gay angle (LOL!). What they will LIKELY do, however, is point out that the Ferry Farm had slaves.
The General WAS ambitious, but his ambition was not only a personal one; he was ambitious for this COUNTRY as well. They never emphasized this point. But, I am quibbling here--more important, they NEVER mentioned the OVERRIDING depth of character that this man had. He walked away from incredible power not once but TWICE: he goes home to the farm and Martha in 1783 after beating the greatest military power on Earth, refuses a kingship, and after 2 terms as POTUS, AGAIN walks away from power. If they talk about his ambition, then PLEASE talk about the power this man left behind for a more simple life.
They disingenuously positioned his wartime espionage as "deceit." What crap! He was fighting a war, for God's sake...would Nat Geo EVER have positioned Allied spying against Hitler as "deceitful?" I think not...how DARE they!
His entre into upper Virginia society did not just depend on his surveying skills: he was,at 16 years of age, arguably the best horseman in Virginia and that got him in the best graces of Lord Fairfax who loved the fox hunt. Young George always led the hunt and Fairfax was impressed. Further, his older half-brother Lawrence was married to a Fairfax and was the first resident of Mount Vernon...this put young George in proximity to the Fairfaxes.
Slavery: this was a decidedly one-sided portrayal. They gave NO CONTEXT to the fact that slavery was the NORM (in much of the north as well as the south). Slavery was still legal in NY State until 1821, and it was part of life in Virginia (VA had the most slaves). Washignton was eventually repulsed by it, but as a Virginian interested in politics, he had no choice but support it. He refused to break up families, and had the slaves under his ownership taught to read, even though that was not the custom. And, they do not mention that he used the law in Philadelphia to actually surreptitiously FREE certain slaves.
I know Tom Fleming (one of the historians who gave testimony on the show--we were both members of the NY Revolutionary War Roundtable when I lived a few blocks from him in NYC) and I am certain he did not approve of the slant they gave this. But, he had no power to change it...
That's all for now, folks...I'm just spitting mad...