Let the 250th birthday party begin

The nation embarked on its 250th birthday on Saturday.
July 4th, 2025 was the country’s 249th birthday, but many are looking at it as the kickoff to what is called the semiquincentennial…or the bisesquicentennial, or even the quarter millennial.
Either way, it says America is still only ¼ of 1,000 years old.
But what a 249 years and one day it has been.
From throwing tea into the Boston Harbor in 1773, we started climbing the three-year staircase to independence. We cornered the market on whale blubber, which was the first source of oil, allowing the United States to become a superpower probably quicker than the world was expecting. After realizing the power of oil and its impact across the geopolitical spectrum, the U.S. began a quest to secure as much as possible, we became a military superpower, an economic superpower…and here we are.
But what’s the impact of individuals in America for its 250th trip around the sun, which will likely be a yearlong celebration if President Donald Trump has his way. And he usually does.
History books, or Google nowadays, and even AI, can elaborate on how America has risen on the world stage, but we have to wait for the future to define our history. Yeah, that’s a lot to process.
What I’m saying is we can’t yet tell where we stand in the face of history. Two hundred and fifty years is nothing. It’s not even a blink of an eye in the realm of existence. Yet we have so much to talk about in that fraction of a moment in time.
Wars and celebrations, sports and medicine, humanity and AI-generation – our country has seen and done all of that which can be seen and done. Space travel, even catching solid rocket boosters as they fall back to earth. That was one of the most, and I hate this word, amazing things I’ve ever seen. Manufacturing, minimalizing, automations, we’re growing at a rate we probably won’t be able to sustain, but no one will argue it’s been fantastic to watch happen.
We’re going on 250 years old. What’s the next 250 years look like? Heck, what does the next year look like and how do we celebrate it? One would hope that it is a year filled with a celebratory mood and not war and destruction or a “razor throat” pandemic. I would hope we would find ourselves in an economic resurgence as promised by the president. Maybe another breakthrough for children and adults with Type 1 diabetes. Maybe a Minnesota Vikings championship. Not sure there would be a bigger hallmark for me living in the country’s 250th year than for my Vikings to get their first ever Super Bowl win. But that would be my birthday wish.
Andy Andrews mentioned the 250th birthday in his remarks at the annual Charlie Korschgen Kiddie Parade Friday morning in downtown Fort Madison. Where bicycles, tricycles, sport vehicles, strollers, and kids themselves were decked out in spangled attire and attributes as they moved down Avenue G.
At the end of the parade, they gathered in the east parking lot of the Moose lodge for popsickles and prizes. The Andrews family has been spearheading the annual celebration and seeing the faces light up on the kids who won bicycles was well worth the heat of the day.
Even in its mere 249 years, the U.S. has become a land of tradition. I remember the year of the bicentennial in 1976 and the pageantry it brought to the country. I was only eight at the time, but I remember there being television programs and celebrations befitting a nation at the top of its game.
I don’t know if we’re still at the top of our game. We like to think so, but it is a very emotional time politically, and our patriotism is strained.
Wouldn’t it be great if this 250th celebration was part of a healing process and the nation began to come back together and remember what we did to get here in the first place? But that’s Beside the Point.
Chuck Vandenberg is editor and co-owner of Pen City Current and can be reached at Charles.V@PenCityCurrent.com.