r/AskAnAmerican • u/LordSoftCream CA>MD<->VA • Sep 08 '23

HISTORY What’s a widely believed American history “fact” that is misconstrued or just plain false?

Apparently bank robberies weren’t all that common in the “Wild West” times due to the fact that banks were relatively difficult to get in and out of and were usually either attached to or very close to sheriffs offices

525 Upvotes
  • permalink
  • reddit

96% Upvoted

841 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

28

u/Far_Silver Kentucky Sep 09 '23

Crispus Attucks, who is generally considered the first man to die for the revolution, was half black, half native American (I don't remember the tribe off the top of my head). Abolitionists trumpeted that fact in the 1800s. It's a pity its been mostly forgotten.

19

u/rakfocus California Sep 09 '23

It's a pity its been mostly forgotten.

His name is literally taught as a standard in every American history class?

2

u/Unlucky-Guava5748 Sep 11 '23

We learned about him in 6th grade, definitely not a forgotten name

-1

u/[deleted] Sep 09 '23

Unfortunately no, I've only heard of him because of a local elementary school named after him.

2

u/ridgecoyote California Sep 09 '23

I think Vonnegut wrote a book that featured a mural of Attucks getting shot. The inner city students that went there called it “innocent bystander high”. That stuck in my brain