Dear Cousins, I hope you all saw our vivacious Portland Mayor Vera Katz marching in the Columbus Day Parade in NYC. If not, she and a thousand other Oregonians got on planes and flew to New York to proclaim that Oregon Loves NY. They went to plays, visited Ground Zero, stayed in the Waldorf Astoria, where I used to stay when I lived in Maryland and made many I Love NY weekend trips, usually about this time of year. Watching the parade, I was so proud of being an Oregonian, and of being an American. It was a true reflection of American community. Thanks for all your suggestions about coping with viruses and attachments. I will put in the subject line now if I am sending any attachments, and will tell you ahead of time. I have gotten two more messages, not with attachments as previously, but from people I don't know, and with garbled messages, which I suspect were also virus sent. Today it is raining in Portland, OR. Although we are known for that, this has been our dryest year in 130 years, when they started keeping track of rainfall. Our rivers look like stream and the falls of the Wilamette, where pioneers first settled, have vanished. It is my belief that most of the Backcountry settlers who originated along the Delaware River and the Chesapeake Bay in the 1600's ended up in some form or another here in Oregon. (Some made a wrong turn to California, too.) It was lovely to see other Oregonians remembering their community connection with the East Coast. Welcome to our newest subscriber, John O. who is fortunate enough to still live in that fertile "Cradle of American Civilization." John wrote me last night that he had taken communion at St. Stephens Church in Cecil County, Maryland, where our ancestors did the same, with the same communion service. I lived many years in Maryland, and I too, have walked among the graves there at St. Stephens, and felt that unique communion with the past. The first parish church was begun shortly before 1700, and finished in 1702. As I remember there were two subsequent ones, the current structure being erected in the mid 1800's. You can visit my short history of St. Stephens, and Cecil County, and some of its characters at the website. http://freepages.history.rootsweb.com/~amxroads/Homelands/cecil.html Then, as now, history is shaped by Religious issues. The settlement of America was undertaken first by commercial interests, and quickly became a means for ordinary persons to escape the ongoing religious/political beliefs and wars that characterized the Reformation throughout Europe and Great Britain. Although founded by the Calverts, who were Catholic, Maryland was to be a haven for anyone who professed Christian beliefs, but this attitude was overturned, and Maryland fell into the typical English mold. Like all Church of England parishes, St. Stephens Parish was both the church and state: The churches were concerned with both political and moral outlook of the parishioners. It was in Pennsylvania, chartered in 1681, under William Penn's Quaker faith that religious freedom bloomed, and Pennsylvania became a true haven for the politically and religiously persecuted. Maryland had been chartered almost 50 years before, in 1634. The Yale Law School Avalon Project put the Maryland and Pennsylvania charters online, along with those of the first and second Virginia Companies, and others. This is a great site. http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/states/statech.htm Before I moved to Portland several years ago from Eastern Oregon, I talked with an older lady, another Oregon pioneer descendant, who lived across the street from me. She related how her homesteading grandmother had missed her family in the East so badly. She would go outside when the moon was full and gazing down on everyone, East to West, North to South, and remember that they were all connected by things greater than themselves. And so are we still. Love, Your Cousin, Carolyn Carolyn McDaniel cmacdee@teleport.com ========================================= --- Visit American Crossroads --- http://freepages.history.rootsweb.com/~amxroads