Six Frigates, cont.

Still working on Six Frigates. It's pretty dense, and I'm trying to keep track of all of the personalities. I've never really been able to keep straight any kind of detailed information about the various founding fathers, plus I think all of their names sound kind of similar. John Adams, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson -- lots of "J"s, short "a"s, and "s"s. But now I find that there was an intense and bitter rivalry between Jefferson and Adams, that the Federalists were totally anti-navy. I think -- this is the kind of thing I have to keep re-reading to cement in my mind, whereas the anecdote about the swampy path between the White House and the Capitol building, and the fact that housing was so scarce in the new capitol city that congressmen were staying in dorm-like boarding houses, that I remember with no effort at all. I do remember the name Truxtun; he was the captain who won the first of the navy's victories, against a French frigate in the Caribbean. And Humphreys is a Quaker shipbuilder who's never been to sea. And the first ships are the United States, the Constitution, and the Constellation.

Anyway, I've made it to part two.