The Founding Fathers

>>1922894
>How much of this is American revisionism?

Contrary to what the children on /his/ often say, "revisionism" doesn't mean "lying," it just means reevaluating the narrative. But to answer your real question, yes, American culture mythologized its "founding fathers" into greater than human status, to try forge a common culture from scratch. They were just people.

>Were they really all good or were some of them corrupt?

I don't know about "corrupt," but obviously they all had flaws.

>Was George Washington really a good general?

He was a great leader but a mediocre general. His real achievement is uniting and maintaining a chaotic coalition of disparate forces.

>Was there a rivalry between them about who should run things?

Yes, there was all sorts of bickering and wildly different ideas about what sort of country it should be.

>What kind of men were they? Were they upper class?

Yes. The poorest among them were at least well off lawyers (e.g. Adams). Some were extremely wealthy businessmen (e.g. Hamilton). Most were born wealthy, and were basically aristocracy (e.g. Jefferson).

>How did the citizens view them at the time?

This I don't really know.

lets just say if the civil war never happened, the shit they came up with would've been perfect.

>>1922894
They were people. Incredible people certainly but still people. They had their flaws.

>How much is revisionism
Quite a bit. Americans have this kind of weird shinto thing going on with the founding fathers that probably would horrify them if they knew.

>Was Washington a good general
Solid leader, meh general.

>Was there a rivalry between them
Man you really should read some of the shit they talked to and about eachother. It's the stuff of legend. They agreed that they wanted independence but as per how that independence should be framed after, there were a lot of ideas and disagreements.

And the FF talked mad shit about eachother over it.
Personally I'd be interested to know how the US might've turned out had Washington been crowned a king and we'd been a constitutional monarchy.

>Were they upper class
Most of them were very well off. Some of them had to work for it, others were born into it.

>>1922894
what is the image for? what do the blue dots represent?

>>1922992

Not OP, but the blue dots look like present day population distribution. The red lines are pointing to those guys' birthplaces. No idea what point it's trying to make.

>>1922894

>How much of this is American revisionism?

like in every historical event there's a decent amount of revisionism

>Were they really all good or were some of them corrupt?

most of them were (wealthy) landowners who were tired of paying taxes to some king who's thousands of miles away, so their motives were understandable

>Was George Washington really a good general?

compared to other revolutionary generals, no.
But he was very good a logistics and keeping the moral of the men high

>Was there a rivalry between them about who should run things?

there's always rivalry between people, but they knew that they had to establish a common ground for themselves and the other revolutionaries

>What kind of men were they? Were they upper class?

yes, either academics or landowners


>How did the citizens view them at the time?

probably as the lesser evil

>>1922954
>Yes. The poorest among them were at least well off lawyers (e.g. Adams). Some were extremely wealthy businessmen (e.g. Hamilton). Most were born wealthy, and were basically aristocracy (e.g. Jefferson).

Adams wasn't really poor, he was just frugal. He died with a wealth surplus as large as Jefferson's debt. Hamilton was hardly a wealthy businessman , he stayed a lawyer his entire life and stopped holding offices partly because he couldn't afford it anymore. Jefferson, while born aristocracy, was not born wealthy. He married into that.

Otherwise a fair evaluation.

>>1922894
>How did the citizens view them at the time? I know a lot of citizens had read common sense by Thomas Paine.

This one hasn't been answered well yet so I'll give it a go. Come the revolution it was something like 1/3rd were loyalists, 1/3rd revolutionaries, and 1/3rd apathetic or undecided. As the war dragged on many loyalists left and the British gained no favor by lodging themselves in American houses and blockading the merchants so public opinion started to strongly favor the revolution by the end.

After that it really became a north/south divide (federalist vs. anti-federalis,) Hamilton and Washington being seen as monarchists while Jefferson and Madison were seen as anarchists.