Q. What is red, white, blue and yellow?
A. The star-spangled banana!
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NJ proposes $200,000 to honor Reese Witherspoon's ancestor
A person often honored by OutofTheInBox, Reese Witherspoon, has ancestral roots back to the founding of the nation. Reese is a descendant of John Witherspoon, born in Scotland, who became a preacher and the sixth president of Princeton University. He signed the Declaration of Independence for New Jersey and is buried in Princeton. John Witherspoon and the other signers stood up for freedom, pledging "our lives, our Fortunes, & our sacred Honor" to the cause. Now New Jersey lawmakers are considering a proposal to spend $200,000 marking and maintaining their burial sites, but budget problems keep delaying the plan. From the AP:
The proposal would establish a state program to preserve the graves and promote Abraham Clark, John Hart, Richard Stockton, and John Witherspoon, who signed for New Jersey, and George Clymer, who signed for Pennsylvania but is buried in Trenton.
Stockton and Witherspoon , an ancestor to Academy Award-winning actress Reese Witherspoon , are buried in Princeton, while Hart is in Hopewell Borough and Clark in Rahway.
Francis Hopkinson, who also signed the Declaration for New Jersey, is buried in Philadelphia.
The plan would make money available to spruce up grave sites and place new historical plaques indicating grave locations. It would also involve a campaign to inform people about the signers and their grave sites.
"These five men literally pledged their lives, fortunes and sacred honor for the independence of this country," said Assemblyman Bill Baroni, paraphrasing the Declaration's famous final line.
"We should be honoring these five men," Baroni said. "Keeping their graves marked and restored is the least we can do."
Any chance that Reese can make a donation? Maybe Jon Corzine can make the request.
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"A prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people."
Read the rest of the Declaration of Independence here.
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