HISTORICAL HONOR
Grant’s life celebrated at Bicentennial Birthday Gala
Eventgoers celebrated the late Ulysses S. Grant, Civil War Commanding General of the U.S. Army and 18th U.S. President, at a Bicentennial Birthday Gala.
The gala, which drew more than 300 attendees to the historic Gideon Putnam hotel in Saratoga Springs, was held to honor Grant’s 200th Birthday year and serve as a fundraiser for the Ulysses S. Grant Cottage National Historic Landmark.
Located atop Mount McGregor in Moreau, the cottage is where Grant completed his personal memoirs and spent his final days in 1885. Visitors from near and far travel to Grant’s Cottage each year to tour the home and learn about Grant and his time there.
Nonprofit organization The Friends of the Ulysses S. Grant Cottage is currently raising funds for an ambitious plan to construct an education and events pavilion, along with a visitor parking expansion, to be set on a four-acre parcel of land that was previously part of the nearby former prison property.
Tim Welch, president of the Friends of the Ulysses S. Grant Cottage Board of Trustees, called this project “the next step in Grant Cottage’s evolution” while speaking at the gala on Sunday evening.
Guests also heard from Ulysses S. Grant’s great great grandson Ulysses Grant Dietz, who made a virtual appearance at the event. “Grant’s Cottage is a small place but it’s a mighty place,” the U.S. president’s descendent said in his address while relaying some of his family history.
Also among Sunday’s speakers was actor Treat Williams, who is currently working on a one-man show about Grant. “I realized I was working on a play about a man who had a great deal of saving a country that was at odds with itself from falling apart,” he said before sharing an excerpt from the script. “And I think that speaks to where we are now.”
Later in the evening, attendees had the opportunity to participate in a Q&A session with virtual live speakers retired United States Army General David Petraeus, former director of the CIA, and author Ron Chernow, whose 2017 biography on Grant debuted at number one on the New York Times bestseller list, inspired a History Channel mini-series and will be the inspiration for a feature film directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Leonardo DiCaprio as Grant.
More information about the Ulysses S. Grant Cottage National Historic Landmark, which recently closed for the season but will reopen in the spring of 2023, is available online at www.grantcottage.org and www.facebook. com/grantcottage.
Details on how to support the historic preservation of Grant’s final home can be found online at www.grantcottage.org/takeaction.