The day before Easter my dad found a paragliding site that he wanted to go to. It was a two hour drive to Pennsylvania. After a half day playing at a near by park, we decided to go to Gettysburg, since we probably wouldn't be coming back for awhile.
Since we didn't have very long, we decided to only do the visitors center (including the cyclorama, museum, theatre, and of course the gift shop.
When we entered the building, we saw a ticket desk and headed over. The prices weren't too expensive, but definitely not cheap.
The first stop was the famous Civil War Cyclorama. It is a massive painting that encircles the entire room!
It depicts a huge scene from the Battle of Gettysburg.
We spent a while walking around the painting (literally) and then moved on to the museum.
The museum was made up of several rooms each filled to the brim with artifacts, quotes, speeches, and facts from the Civil War. The picture above shows a list of slave prices.
The southern Declaration of Independence. Before I came here, I never really thought about the fact that the south had a Declaration of Independence but it makes sense now that I do.
Actual canon balls found in a farm near the battle field. Imagine having these balls of metal flying through your barn wall!
There were a few rooms dedicated to each of the main battles of the war.
They even had a computer that played some different bugle commands and explained what each of them meant.
In between most of the rooms. there were movie stations explaining strategies used, the formations of each army, and skirmishes during each day.
An actual canon from the battle.
I mentioned earlier that there were many quotes given by soldiers who fought in each battle. Here is one of them
The two armies didn't only have cannons. they also brought artillery units to bombard enemy infantry.
It is depressing how many people died in this bloody war.
Even when most of the people who fought were Americans
Those numbers were the last exhibit in the museum.
But we weren't finished with Gettysburg yet...
The Gift Shop
The most feared room in any museum.
When we finally did escape, we headed outside to an observation tower that could overlook the whole battle field.
Thousands of people died right here.
Over all Gettysburg was a cool place to visit that wasn't too far away from DC. I am so incredibly thankful for all of those people who fought and died to protect their beliefs and who made The United States of America what it is today.
Comments
Post a Comment