On Monday, September 2, 2024 (Labor Day), Lafayette reenactor Benjamin J. Goldman will come to First Parish in Concord, commemorating the day and site where the town gave the French general a hero’s welcome two hundred years ago. The public is warmly invited to assemble on the lawn of First Parish to watch a reenactment of Lafayette’s visit to Concord at 3:00 this Labor Day.
Lafayette was a French aristocrat who volunteered with the Continental Army, defying the will of his family to pursue what his heart commended him to do. His commitment to the American cause continues to be a powerful reminder of the universal appeal of the American Revolution.
Concord, Massachusetts, is home to two important revolutions: a military one starting on April 19, 1775, and a moral, intellectual, and ideological one, epitomized more than half a century later by the Transcendentalist movement and its staunch support for the abolition of those enslaved in America. Few heroes in American history resonate so strongly with both of these movements as the iconic Frenchman, the Marquis de Lafayette.