Thanks for those thoughts, Mr. Tarter, and please indulge this addendum. In 
this morning's Richmond Times Dispatch appeared Tyler Whitley's summary of 
the Thomas Jefferson birthday event held yesterday afternoon in the 
Jefferson Room at the state Capitol, which I was lucky to attend. 
Unaccountably, Mr. Whitley omitted (or maybe an editor removed) reporting 
about the fine talk by Thomas E. Camden, director of the LVA's special 
collections, who explained the room's paintings and other artifacts quite 
informatively and entertainingly. That talk and others provided a nice 
context for considering the generational arithmetic of speaker Harrison 
Tyler, the son of a quite elderly dad who in turn was the son of another 
quite elderly dad. That is, as many in this forum already know, Virginia's 
present Mr. Tyler is the grandson -- not great-grandson, mind you, or 
great-great-grandson -- of John Tyler, who was U.S. president in the early 
1840s. I agree: sometimes the mere arithmetic of history affects how we 
"think about and perceive connections between the present and events in the 
past," as you put it. I had met Mr. Tyler before, because he's a true friend 
of Fort Monroe, and this time, after the formal part of the event ended, I 
enjoyed the chance to seek memory stories from him, which I plan to share 
with grandchildren. I can't help adding how something like that generational 
arithmetic, on a much more trivial scale, also strikes me when I return to 
my undergraduate campus. If I, a 1970 graduate, talk today to a graduating 
senior there, it's quantitatively akin to my talking in April 1970 to 
someone who had graduated in 1929 -- which seemed ancient even in 1970, 
showing how ancient I would seem (and, in fact, would be) there today. 
Always grateful for this forum.
Steve Corneliussen
Poquoson (and Fort Monroe) 

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