INTRODUCTORY REMARKS
By PHILIP C. NASH
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN:
It is my very great pleasure and honor
to declare open the
sessions of the Maumee Valley
International Historical Conven-
tion.
It was 146 years ago that the Battle of
Fallen Timbers was
fought, and all the events that we are
commemorating in this
Convention occurred more than a century
ago.
There has been an orderly and gradual
development of civili-
zation in this neighborhood and in this
country ever since those
days, until we find here in 1940 a free
people living in a peaceful
democracy, joining with their neighbors
across the Lake not as
with persons from a foreign country but
as with friends from the
next town to celebrate the reunion, and
to bind more securely
the ties of friendship.
It is unfortunately true that just as
those Indians and fron-
tiersmen of a century and a half ago
were to some extent the
pawns of a chess game played in far away
Europe, so our meet-
ing tonight is influenced by a threat to
civilization itself that has
sprung up in Europe. One immediate
effect is that our country
in its defense preparations has thought
it necessary to require a
passport for entrance from Canada, not
because we have any fear
from the Canadians themselves but
because of fifth column ac-
tivities, and so it has been hard for
some of our Canadian friends
to be with us tonight. I greatly regret
this red tape and fervently
hope that soon all persons may cross our
mutual boundaries again
with the brief and inconsequential
formalities that I have experi-
enced in my many visits to Canada.
It is the function of the historian, in
mulling over the events
of the past, to better prepare himself
and his contemporaries to
meet the problems of the present and the
future. I hope that
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14 OHIO ARCHEOLOGICAL AND
HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
this may be our function at this
Convention. Especially may
we recall that ten short years ago many
of us thought that world
organization had developed to the point
where perhaps interna-
tional wars in the world had
disappeared. Mankind was under-
taking a wonderful experiment in
complete government of the
whole world. The League of Nations was
truly the hope of the
human race.
Alas, how disillusioned we have been.
The tragic mistakes
of our country and the other democracies
in not taking some of
the risks of peace, in giving only lip
service to the ideals of
world organization, are having terrible
consequences. The peoples
of the earth must learn, at what awful
price I do not know, that
Benjamin Franklin's advice to the early
patriots, "We must all
hang together or assuredly we will all
hang separately," applies to
nations as well as to persons.
We of this country are not in the actual
conflict for the
survival of freedom and democracy. But
as all freedom and
justice, and decent human respect is
being lost in Germany, Poland,
Austria, Czechoslovakia, and now Norway,
Denmark and Holland,
we are rapidly coming to see that we
have a vital stake in events
and we are giving more and more help to
Britain. Where the path
will lead us in the months and years to
come, no one can foretell,
but the human spirit has always longed
for the liberty and justice
of democracy and eventually, even if it
be after a hundred or
even five hundred years of conflict and
despair, eventually
democracy will be the way of life of the
human race.