Lester Richardson photograph

This photograph of Lester Richardson was taken during the Northwest Territory Celebration trek. He has his hand tucked in the front of his shirt and in the background are tents and automobiles. The 1937-1938 Northwest Territory Sesquicentennial Celebration was a federally funded yearlong celebration which commemorated the journey of the Ohio Company of Associates of 48 men who traveled westward from Ipswich, Massachusetts to Marietta, Ohio in 1787. A main feature of the celebration was to recruit a caravan of 38 men to re-create the journey. At each stop along the 52 day trek, the pioneers presented a pageant called “Freedom on the March.” In West Newton, Pennsylvania, the participants were given tools of the 1700s to build a flat boat and canoes to travel to Marietta, Ohio. The men stayed in touch with reunions over the years, and Carl Givler and four other men had a final reunion reenactment of the 1937 trek in 1987