George Washington is my “home skillet.” I grew up just a few miles from where he did in the Northern Neck of Virginia. It’s a safe assumption he visited, perhaps spent the night in the house where I grew up. He was a bad ass. He didn’t go to Harvard or William and Mary. At 20, he became a major in the Virginia militia and was sent as a special emissary to French controlled lands in the Ohio Valley. The next year he led a company of men in combat against regular French troops. Washington was not an ivory tower academic; he was a man involved in all manner of practical necessities, what we call today “the real world.” He had plenty of academic knowledge, not just in classical history and the humanities, but also in the physical sciences which served him well in his military and commercial endeavors. However, his most acute aptitude was his understanding of human nature and this was born from a lifetime of “real world” practical experiences.
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