BGES News

Reliving 15 Years of BGES Lectures

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Sometimes you instinctively do the right things from the start and then eventually realize what you have done was really important. So it is with BGES’s latest project, The BGES Video Archives. In October 1994 we assembled an all-star team at the Holiday Inn at the Richmond Airport to do a one-day symposium of lectures preceding … Read more

Exciting Fort Branch Update—and an invitation

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I am excited to update the membership of the Blue and Gray Education Society about the progress being made on our interpretive project at Fort Branch, North Carolina. As you may recall, BGES partnered with Fort Branch to create and install six large and 12 small signs at the fort to enhance the visitor experience. … Read more

Announcing BGES’s 20th Monograph!

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After a long holiday, BGES is pleased to announce that it has finished editing and submitted for publication its 20th scholarly monograph. The Grand Gulf to Raymond Driving Tour Guide is a content-rich, 96-page publication that reveals the significance of the old historic road that linked the formerly thriving river town of Grand Gulf on the Mississippi River with the … Read more

BGES Updated Mission Statement

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Sheridan and his generals.
The BGES Board of Directors recently undertook the process of evaluating our corporate documents as part of the process of updating our Strategic Plan and the operational parameters of the organization. The mission statement was approved by video conference in late July and is shared here for your consideration. Words mean things, and you can and should read between the lines as this provides the range and limitations of what the BGES will do in its operational mission. Maj. Gen. Bill Terpeluk, US Army Retired, is the head of the BGES Strategic Planning group.

The Blue and Gray Education Society is dedicated to the preservation of the legacy of the American Civil War and related events by the objective study and understanding of its battlefields and other historic sites. It provides engaging platforms through the conduct of field study tours and seminars, collaborative evaluation and publication of scholarly research and writings, sponsorship of interpretative projects, and open discussion of issues relating to the case for preserving its sites and artifacts. Its members and larger community actively promote the value and significance of the role of the American Civil War in the greater perspective of U.S. and world history.

Take another look at our website and see if you can figure out what we are doing and have done. I believe you will find us a very focused and mission-oriented organization, and that is what you are supporting. If you are not a member, you can join at http://www.blueandgrayeducation.org.
—Len Riedel
Executive Director

Len Riedel’s Birthday Challenge

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  Greetings from Chatham! Facebook has been a tremendous asset for the BGES, and I enjoy about 1,000 friends, many of whom are BGES members. At the same time, BGES has a FACEBOOK page that is liked and followed by approximately 1,600 people.  Each year Facebook offers its members the chance to raise money in … Read more

War Stories: How Virginia’s Owens & Ramsey is Forging Ahead in the Midst of Challenging Times

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In the age of the Covid-19 pandemic and what many decry as the “cancel culture” era, you might think being an independent bookseller with a focus on military history, particularly the Civil War, would be just about the worst business model to pursue. But as the old saying goes, don’t judge a book by its … Read more

Raising Dollars for BGES

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Just in the last year, BGES has raised $150 using a very simple tool—AmazonSmile. And that amount came from just six people. What is AmazonSmile? It’s a website operated by Amazon that offers the same shopping experience and same prices as Amazon, but with benefit of donating 0.5% of your eligible purchases to the selected … Read more

A Cannon for Fort Clinch

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Sometimes it takes a village. That was the case seven years ago when Fort Clinch, located on a peninsula near the northernmost point of Amelia Island in Florida, got a full-scale operating 10-pounder Parrott Rifle artillery piece. Built in 1847, the fort was part of the “Third System Fortifications” that gained prominence after the War … Read more

Plan B for BGES Tours

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We don’t know what’s going to happen this year with our tours. We are counting on science and the medical community to get us back in the driver’s seat. We haven’t canceled the 2020 season completely, and we tentatively expect to start again in September. But if it doesn’t work out that way, we have … Read more