IX. The Politics of Storytelling

Paul Revere's Color Print of the Boston Massacre

Twenty-one days before -- on the night of March 5, 1770 --  five men had been shot to death in
Boston town by British soldiers. Precipitating the event known as the Boston Massacre was a mob of men and boys taunting a sentry standing guard at the city's customs house. When other British soldiers came to the sentry's support, a free-for-all ensued and shots were fired into the crowd.
Notice how the British Grenadiers are shown standing in a straight line shooting their rifles in a regular volley, whereas when the disturbance actually erupted both sides were belligerent and riotous. 
Notice also that Revere's engraving shows a blue sky. Only a wisp of a moon suggests that the riot occurred after nine o'clock on a cold winter night.
Notice too the absence of snow and ice on the street, while Crispus Attacks-- a black man lying on the ground closest to the British soldiers-- is shown to be white. As an aside, it should be noted that as a result of his death in the Boston Massacre, Crispus Attacks would emerge as the most famous of all the black men to fight in the cause of the Revolution, and become its first martyr.
From the Early America Review

Sign for Apotheosis of George Washington

However, search as I might, I could find no re-telling of the tale of the cherry tree.  Some strange facts, though.  George Washington's father died when he was only 10 (so if the cherry tree story is true, he must have been precocious, indeed!)--

Although Washington is known as "The Father of Our Country"-- he and the widow Custis, Martha Washington, that is, had no children of their own.  And a couple of sites that debunked the cherry tree episode. . . .

from The Surprising George Washington

By Richard Norton Smith
© 1994 by Richard Norton Smith

About those teeth . . . According to John Adams, Washington lost his teeth as the result of cracking Brazil nuts between his jaws. By the time he became President, he had but a single tooth left and a set of dentures fashioned from cow's teeth. In hopes of finding something better, Washington contacted a leading dentist in Philadelphia, who produced a state-of-the-art set carved, not from wood, but from hippopotamus tusk. The new dentures were thoughtfully drilled with a hole to fit over his one remaining tooth. Unfortunately, they also rubbed against this natural tooth, causing more or less constant pain for which the President took laudanum.

So much for the wooden teeth. What about other Washington
legends? We can write off the cherry tree as a product of
Parson Weems's sugary imagination. No Washington myth is
easier to dismiss than the story of his hurling a coin across the
Potomac (or Rappahannock?) if only because no man was less
likely to throw away a dollar. "Many mickles make a muckle"
Washington liked to tell anyone who would listen, and he was
as frugal in his personal lifestyle as he was profligate in
furnishing an official residence and projecting the new nation's
sense of importance.

Other moments in Washington's life have legendary quality.  The Crossing of the Delaware has all the attributes of the Green Knight in winter, the bold move, the bitter cold.

George Washington crossing the Delaware River (New Jersey)

Washington's death was also the subject of lively folk interest for years afterward. 

Sketch of The Death of George Washington

I had always heard that his death was caused by a "barber" who practiced the then-common recourse of blood-letting to cure infection.  But another strange account is also given:

"His contemporaries were less willing to let him go. On the last
night of his life, having defied the might of the British empire and
planted the seeds of republican government, the old hero was
invited to challenge the very laws of nature. Among those who
learned of Washington's lethally sore throat was his friend William
Thornton, a practicing doctor and amateur architect who had
secretly designed the new Capitol building in Washington city as a
final resting place for his friend. In hopes of forestalling that event,
Dr. Thornton hurried to Mount Vernon to perform an emergency
tracheotomy

He arrived too late, or so it seemed to everyone but the good
doctor. Refusing to accept the verdict of death, this quintessential
child of the Enlightenment proposed to resurrect Washington "in
the following manner. First to thaw him in cold water, then to lay
him in blankets, and by degrees and by friction to give him
warmth, and to put into activity the minute blood vessels, at the
same time to open a passage to the lungs by the trachea, and to
inflate them with air, to produce an artificial respiration, and to
transfuse blood into him from a lamb."

But after his death, the attempt to create the same kind of popular folk hero as was admired in Europe began, as well.

this information is from the website, The Apotheosis of Washington.

Ceiling painting of Washington in Heaven with the Angels

This image of Washington, painted in 1865, reflects a vision of Washington that appealed to the American public just after his death. The "apotheosis" served as a powerful symbol of the moralization of the country's hero. Paintings and sculptures of Washington's celestial rise were soon to be found in living rooms and civic halls across the country. The religious connotation was clear: here was a man so virtuous and beloved that he surely had ascended to heaven, escorted honorably by classical personifications of freedom and liberty. In effect, the public's civic worship of Washington led to a nearly religious worship just after his death. Washington was suddenly deified.

Over the next two centuries, this hero worship of the Father of His Country would take on many forms. After his death, the moral educators of the early 19th century crowned Washington as the ultimate symbol of virtue: an honest mortal worthy of imitation. Once defined as the embodiment of virtue, Washington was able to be appropriated by groups of all stripes. He could be an icon of domestic perfection and almost-aristocratic refinement or the ultimate symbol of the selfless citizen soldier. Politically, socially--and of course, commercially--Washington's image has become an easily-recognized and powerful tool.

A referee separating two political rivals

Tippecanoe and Tyler too.

One of the first presidential elections to have "spin" was the campaign of Harrison and Tyler in 1840.   Harrison, actually born at the Virginia "Berkeley" plantation and so of course a Virginia patrician, took as his campaign image the log cabin and jug of hard cider.  Thus, he successfully linked himself to the "people."  The campaign slogan was Tippecanoe and Tyler, too.  Tippecanoe was originally the site of an Indian uprising.

from The Tippecanoe Web Site [no longer available]
and the battle
at Tippecanoe Creek