A series of pictures and factoids for Create's NaJoPoMo Challenge.

This is more or less what Little Round Top looked like when I first saw it, about 1965. This is what it looked like on 3 July 1863. We missed the centenary by a couple of years. We missed the fighting, too, but I'm not complaining.

My dad thought we ought to stop by and pay our respects on our way to Washington, DC, during a family trip. We stood respectfully in silent meditation over the horrendous loss of life there. There were a few dozen other history tourists on the same spot.

The historical reverie was shattered by my baby sister, who was all of five. 'Daddy, where are the Yankees at?' she demanded. We beat a hasty retreat.

Gettysburg was the high water mark of the Confederacy. Lee went back south after that, where he belonged. Lincoln showed up and made a speech so famous that we had to learn it in school. I was always grateful to him for his pithiness.

Gettysburg is in a lovely part of the country. Way too pretty to be shooting at people in. Heck, if it looked like Camden, New Jersey, it would still be too nice to shoot people in.