I Spy With My Little Eye

Fletcher's school had a History Fair this year.  They alternate between History and Science Fairs for the 1st through 8th graders.  This was our first year to participate.  The first graders are studying the American Revolution so each child chose a person from the Revolution and found out facts about him or her and made a visual (with parental help).  Since there could be no duplicates, we decided to do one of the lesser know people.  Benjamin Tallmadge was George Washington's first central intelligence officer.  He organized a spy ring that ultimately helped win the war.  The techniques he used were fascinating - ciphers, code books, invisible ink, and dead drops.  He even had one female member of the spy ring use her clothesline!  She would hang her black petticoat on the line if one of the spies had docked in the bay, then she would use white handkerchiefs to indicate which of the bays he was in (1 hanky for the first bay, 2 hankies for the second, and so on).  The other spy would know to go to that exact location to pass on important information.  We had fun learning about Benjamin Tallmadge.  Fletcher especially enjoyed his code book and trying to decode some of the messages hidden in one of the books we checked out at the library.

Here he is in front of  his display (at the beginning of the fair). 

 This was about 10 minutes later when he realized there would be lots of standing around and waiting for someone to stop by. 

Here he is explaning to one of the moms and a classmate about the code book and the map. 



All of the students did a great job.  I had fun learning more about Betsy Ross, John Adams, Sybil Ludington, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and others.