Whiskey Rebellion remembered with Pennsylvania festival

WASHINGTON, Pennsylvania — Americans have usually been a rebellious great deal.

Just ask King George III — or George Washington.

The Father of Our Country confronted his individual revolt when his proper-hand gentleman Alexander Hamilton tried to put a burdensome tax on the whiskey remaining produced on the frontier, a rise up led by the distillers of western Pennsylvania.

That insurrection is nevertheless remembered and celebrated at the annual Whiskey Rebellion Festival (www.whiskeyrebellionfestival.com)  in Washington, Pennsylvania, the centre of the revolt and about a 2½-hour drive from Columbus.

The pageant, scheduled July 8-9, is sponsored by the Bradford House Historic Association, which also operates in Washington the Whiskey Revolt Instruction and Readers Center (www.whiskeyrebellioncenter.org) and the Bradford House Museum, a Nationwide Historic Landmark developed in 1788 by David Bradford, a leader of the revolt.

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The brouhaha arose in 1791, when then-Secretary of the Treasury Hamilton proposed the first federal tax, an excise on distilled goods, to assistance fork out the debt from the Revolution.

The frontier distillers of western Pennsylvania, where by most of the country’s whiskey was remaining manufactured, did not cotton to Hamilton’s tax. A lot of experienced fought from “taxation devoid of representation” in the Groundbreaking War and were being ready to combat once more.

Various area tax collectors were harassed, or even tarred and feathered.

Occasions came to a head in 1794, when a mob of hundreds of guys attacked and wrecked the mansion of a regional tax collector. President Washington sent a militia to confront the rebels. Inevitably, about 20 adult men have been arrested, but all had been afterwards acquitted or pardoned. The tax was repealed throughout the Jefferson administration.

Despite the fact that that fascinating unpleasantness is now whiskey less than the bridge, the record of the rebel takes centre stage — quite basically — at the pageant.

7 distinct historical reenactments and performances, concentrating on several areas of the riot — including a tar-and-feathering! — will be staged on Major Road.

Much more record will be on faucet at the people centre, the Bradford House Museum and the LeMoyne Household, one more historic household museum in Washington, which will also portray a frontier church services at 10 a.m. on July 10.