Remembering the How?

The year 1776 dawned in a most inglorious fashion.

King George III of England had, just before the calendar turned over a new year, declared the American colonies in rebellion, a rebellion he insisted would be vanquished by what was then the mightiest military on the planet.

The ensuing months would be filled with intrigue, attacks and counterattacks as the colonies formed the second Continental Congress - the first, convened in 1775 established a united 13 colonies and an army - to consider how best to answer draconian measures from the King, such as the Stamp Act which effectively taxed every sheet of written word in the colonies.

The massacres at Lexington and Concord in April 1775 lit a fuse to a fire of freedom that still burns more than 220 years later.

The Continental Congress the following year charged a five-man committee charged with drafting a declaration telling the king, in effect, to jump in a lake.

Of course, the language that Thomas Jefferson, the primary author of the document though the members of that nascent Congress made some 50 revisions, mostly minor with the exception of the deletion of a paragraph assailing the King for the pox of slavery, was much more soaring and dignified than "jump in the lake" but the effect was the same.

The colonies had had enough, they insisted on their independence from their masters across the ocean, from where many of those colonists fled to the promise of freedom and a fresh start on different continent.

The push for independence - and it was a divided nation back then with many so-called Tories wanting nothing more than to remain under the fold of the King - risked the lives of the founding brothers and their like-minded countrymen in front of a firing squad or in the hangman's noose through their "treasonous" actions.

And they really didn't have a country, just an idea, a concept conceived by ordinary men who undertook extraordinary efforts to forge a slice of freedom and a republic unlike any seen before in history.

That country, in fact, looked like a long shot in the year we celebrate this weekend.

The representatives of the Continental Congress had signed the Declaration of Independence in the July heat, though not technically all signed on July 4, but it was nothing more than paper, ink and language that would ring for two centuries and more.

On the farms and fields of the colonies, the British were routing a rag-tag band of colonial militiamen, typically lightly-armed men from every day walks of life, blacksmiths, carpenters, farmers and tavern keepers, many who had never taken up arms before.

While George Washington had made earned something of a name during the French and Indian War, and by that time created something of a force of regular army, his top lieutenants were two men who had little to no experience with battle or strategy.

Washington actually spent most of 1776 on the run, retreating from Boston, New York and northern New Jersey while facing a lack of supplies, an army that was inexperienced and lacked proper equipment, and one that seemed to dwindle daily due to desertions and the intent of many in this faux "army" to serve their six month initial enlistment and go home.

But stunning victories at Trenton and Princeton late in the year; won when Washington, against all odds, divided his available troops and surprised the British, routing them in the field and establishing that this rebellion would not be easily put to a close by the King, his army and navy.

There would be hardships ahead and five more years of bloodshed before the British surrendered.

Two years later would come from the Continental Congress a Bill of Rights and a Constitution.

The sacrifices of those seven years are reminders of the foundation laid for this country that remains a beacon of freedom and democracy for much of the world, a country that celebrates, but too often forgets, the sacrifices that mere ordinary mortals have made in the spirit of those founding brothers in arms and pen.

The sacrifices of men such as Bill Bricker, a survivor of the horrific attack on Pearl Harbor that beckoned the country into World War II.

Bricker, who died after a lengthy illness last week, lived with the images of what he saw that December day in 1941 while clinging to the ideals of what this country was made of, often writing about his feelings about country, freedom and democracy on these pages under the pseudonym of Reynard the Saltwater Fox.

The sacrifices of a man like Clifford Sims, embraced in death by a hometown that barely recognized him in life, but who lived and died for his band of brothers on the fields of combat in another far-flung dot on the map.

Sacrifices like those being made today by men and women of all ages and demographics, who continue to battle an enemy in the Middle East even though far too many of us have forgotten there even is a war in Iraq or Afghanistan, so caught up are we in our everyday lives and the impacts of a sinking economy.

So, enjoy a barbecue, a visit from the pirates, a day at the beach and fireworks as the sun sets on July 4, 2009.

But do so while remembering all those who made possible this celebration of the birthday of the finest country, even with all our foibles and tribulations, on the globe.