The BHS Reading Program

Don Miller, Reading Program Administrator presents “Celebrating 250 Years: The American Dream Revisited”, a reading list supporting the 250th Anniversary of Vermont. Organized as a book-of-the-month, 4-year reading program, beginning in January of 2024 and culminating in 2027, the list roughly reflects our state and national development.

Each reader decides what to read, and when. Individual participants will select which books to read, in whole or in part, based on personal interests and energies. Some might choose to read 4 books a year; some will read all 48. A reader may start a book, but then decide to skip parts, or to stop reading that book altogether; it’s the reader’s choice.

As the texts in our reading list will bear out, the new United States’ founding principles were lofty, and needed time to evolve. Time and again, political, social, and economic tensions tried our patience, frustrating our desire for instant gratification.

And the Vermont experience did not develop in a historical or cultural vacuum. Ethan Allen and the Battle of Bennington played defining roles not only in our statehood, but our notions of Vermont’s true character. But these are hollow events unless properly contextualized alongside the battles of Bunker Hill and Saratoga. So too, Calvin Coolidge and Dorothy Canfield Fisher reflect Vermont’s uniqueness in the context of our national history.

Biographies will dominate. Founding fathers like Alexander Hamilton and James Madison created our government, but it was later leaders who shaped it. Men like Washington, Lincoln, and the Roosevelts solved important social and economic issues as they arose. The Executive branch led, but the Legislative and Judicial branches served as checks on the power of the Presidents.

Minorities fought for their rights from the beginning, from indigenous peoples to African Americans, and many more. From King Philip’s War to Frederick Douglass, their voices resound. More recently, James Baldwin, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Michael Eric Dyson have challenged our commitment to the Dream. Great literature offers insight into many of these challenges, including Uncle Tom’s Cabin, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Grapes of Wrath, and Animal Farm.

Towards the close of each month, a summary article about that month’s book will appear, in either the BHS newsletter or the local press (if accepted–if not, on this web page).

For each book read, participants will be asked to complete a short form which will serve as an entry to an annual lottery drawing (one entry per book read).

The winner of the annual lottery wins a prize. Lottery prizes will include trips to the Vermont Historical Society Museum, Fort Ticonderoga, Saratoga Battlefield, and Calvin Coolidge’s homestead. In 2027, when the program concludes, those who read the greatest number of books will be recognized and have their names entered in a drawing for a grand prize.

That said, if you choose to delve into the “Celebrating 250 Years” reading list and don’t win the prize drawing, simply immersing oneself in Vermont’s history offers its own enduring rewards.