Certain origin stories have embedded themselves in the American foundational canon despite — or maybe because of — the degree to which the truth was embellished or outright fabricated. The anecdote of George Washington chopping down a cherry tree was invented by biographer Mason Locke Weems. The midnight ride of Paul Revere to warn of approaching Redcoats was exaggerated by poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. And the cross-cultural relationship between Pocahontas and Captain John Smith, originally documented with minimal romantic elements by the latter, has been twisted and reformulated enough times that most people have little ...Read More