re: Young Washington

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I haven't seen it yet but I'm told that the film portrays him as a middle class social climber who is looking to strike it big as a land surveyor. That ain't accurate. The man was born into the wealthy landowner class

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Washington’s father died while he was young and is mother did not remarry. They had land but were hardly wealthy. In fact Washington wrote about the families financial distress when he was 15 years old. His formal education had stopped before that. He did in fact make it big as a land surveyor and his relationship with the Fairfax family allowed him to move up the ladder as a surveyor much more rapidly than was the norm. Washington’s land wealth came as his survey jobs grew.

The movie is fairly accurate in its portrayal of his lot in life at a young age.