Rex Lee Applegate

George Washington's amateurish leadership came close to causing catastrophe in the 1776 Battle of New York. Complete annihilation of the Continental Army was only averted because the British commander, General William Howe, squandered opportunities for total victory offered by a hapless Washington. To this day historians scratch their heads and ask, "What were they thinking?" These mysteries are a few of the many knobs and protuberances that stick out from the smooth flow of history. Harry Frankel, a high school history teacher, used to think these bumps came from the vagaries of the human mind and personality. Now he knows better. Sometimes they are the result of timeline tampering. But the struggles of Harry and others to repair the damage are rarely enough to put things back exactly as they were.
This work is the first in a series that rationalizes the historical detritus resulting from such episodes. Harry provides a personal account of his necessarily imperfect efforts to repair timelines in: “Benedict Arnold and the Second Revolutionary War;” “King George and the German Empire;” and “Richelieu, the Huguenots and New France.” He is one of a select group who know what really happened the first time around.