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BASTROP — A free public program June 28 will mark the approaching 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence with readings and historical excerpts tracing the document’s influence across American history.
The Bastrop County Historical Commission will host the event at 4 p.m. at the Jerry Fay Wilhelm Center for the Performing Arts, 1401 Cedar St. Commission members will read from the Declaration alongside passages from speeches, letters and writings by figures including Thomas Paine, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln.
Ken Kesselus, co-chair of the program and a Historical Commission member, said the event focuses on the symbolism of the document and how its ideas have evolved over time rather than on the Revolutionary War itself.
“We’re celebrating the spirit of the Declaration of Independence,” Kesselus said. “I hope people will see that it continues to unfold.”
The program will trace the Declaration’s influence from the American Revolution through the Civil War, the women’s suffrage movement and the civil rights era, with Kesselus narrating portions of the presentation.
“It is the continuing, unfolding realization of the words that are in that Declaration, especially that all men are created equal as we have expanded throughout two and a half centuries,” Kesselus said.
The event is part of the commission’s participation in America 250, the nationwide commemoration of the country’s semiquincentennial. In addition to the June 28 program, the commission has organized an essay contest and plans to distribute about 2,300 American flags during Fourth of July celebrations in Bastrop, Elgin, Smithville and Rockne.
“We have 250 years of living into that document,” Kesselus said. “We have to renew ourselves of what it means again and again and again, because it’s easy to lose it and easy to forget it.”
For more information, visit bastropcountyhistorical.org.
