What most started your lifelong interest in the American Civil War?

privateflemming

Corporal
Joined
Jul 2, 2019
Location
California, USA
I saw a discussion about whether the Civil War needs to be taught more in school for younger people to be interested in it so I decided to make this poll. I know a lot of these factors probably play a role for most people but choose the one that you think is the earliest/most fundamental reason for your interest.

Feel free to elaborate more in the comments.
 
Being an ocean away makes most points rather unlikely; it is such a little-known niche topic over here. It was the movie Gettysburg which I first watched when I was 14, back in 1999. Love at first sight. Not the first about the ACW, the existence of that war was known to me because I had watched the popular Gone with the Wind before and others that were related or referenced it like the wonderful North and South (just the antebellum of book 1 though), the fantastic The Long Riders or the Blueberry comic books. Always been a history nut but it was Gettysburg that brought me into the civil war. Been hooked ever since, and see no reason to change that.
 
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Mine was a combination of doing family genealogy as an adult and reading entertaining anecdotes about CW-era generals when they were at West Point.

My dad's a big Civil War buff and I always appreciated his enthusiasm, but I think it made me subconsciously consider it his little niche for a long time. So, I always liked history (even majored in it and took a class on the war) but didn't really get into the Civil War on my own until I was in my 20s.
 
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As a very young child, probably in kindergarten or first grade, I saw something on TV that I didn’t understand, a reference to Yankees or Rebels, or something about soldiers in blue and gray. I asked Mom, and she answered in a casual, offhand way that it was during the Civil War. The Civil War? I'd never heard of it. Americans fought Americans, she said. Neighbor against neighbor, brother against brother. I was incredulous and baffled. Why would Americans shoot other Americans? We were friends with our neighbors. Why would people want to shoot their neighbors? But I didn’t ask any of those questions. I went on to third grade, in a school that had a wonderful library, where I found The American Heritage Picture History of the Civil War. I pored through it. Two pictures stuck with me, I think because both were beyond my comprehension. One was a crowd of naked, starving prisoners at Andersonville. How could Americans treat other Americans that way? The other was the portrait of Edwin Jemison. How could a boy not much older than I was become a soldier and be killed in a war? And what could make a child look like that? I’ve been fascinated by human interest stories of the Civil War ever since.
 
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Seems like this question was recently asked---maybe there was no poll.

My neighbor began to take a day drive down to Vicksburg. He took me along with his son. The Vicksburg battlefield, with all the rolling clay hills, just captures you imagination as a 10-year old. We climbed the bluffs and rolled down them. We "fired" every type of cannon out there. We climbed the rickety concrete observation tower. It was fun and blew your imagination.
At some time, I bought a Civil War plastic soldier set. I'm sure it was before my battlefield trips. The details of those plastic figures intrigued me---the kepis, the packs, the bayonets. However, the field trips really planted the seeds.
 
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Mine is a combination of several, but the earliest interest started in school, 7th grade U.S. History. My teacher spent considerable time covering the war, and I was fascinated by it. Forgot about it until Senior year of H.S., when we went to Gettysburg on our senior trip. I was hooked then. But then came post H.S. education, became a paramedic, and forgot about it a while longer. After I started working, I had free time, I began to purchase CW books. I was learning and increasing my interest, when I got my first paid vacation. I decided to go back to Gettysburg for a week. That was the end for me, sucked in 30 years ago. Later came reenacting, and then at the age of 29 I was introduced to something known as "Civil War Relic Shows." That was the big downfall. Worse addiction I have ever known.
 
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These maps with all the little men(so evocative of a really big set of toy soldiers) fascinated me as a kid. This is the Battle of Franklin. From the American Heritage history of the war, featured in the American Heritage magazine as well, which we subscribed to, hard cover magazines in the 60s, full of fascinating photographs and images.
 
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