George Washington Carver the Delaware Page From an American History Textbook

Have you ever thought how would it be if the history was written by different people and perspectives? Is it the history we learn that is real? We can never know this completely. This painting was painted by Robert Colescott in 1975 in a satirical way. It depicts George Washington's Crossing the Delaware, one of the founding fathers of the USA who was the Commander in Chief of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War. For the US Army, this triumph was a turning point during the Revolutionary War because it changed the course of the war in favor of the Continental Army. This inevitable attack was at night and Delaware was full of ice. But before this painting was painted, Emanuel Leutze painted this victory in 1851.

Emanuel Leutze painted this painting to inspire liberal reformers during the European Revolutions in 1848. The man standing in front is George Washington himself, and behind him stands James Monroe with the American Flag who is the fifth president of the USA. And the rest of the people on the ship have different ethnicities in the American Colonies. Although the painting doesn't reflect the triumph totally in a right way because it was at night, it is still capable of reflecting the gloriousness of the victory. As we see, some of the main characters are white as it should be including George Washington but in the 1975 version all of the characters are painted as black.

In the 1975 version, all of the characters are black and it does not depict the night as well. The name of the painting also says a lot about the intention of Robert Colescott, it was painted for an American History textbook. This painting shows how we interpret history changes according to the narratives. Since white Anglo-Saxon men are more powerful in the USA, many ethnicities, especially African Americans have been exposed to racism. In the American Revolutionary War, blacks also fought for the Independence of the country but they were never mentioned in history textbooks. So this painting is definitely a criticism of history's being biased. Who knows, maybe many things we know in history so far have not actually happened in the way they are narrated.