MOFB’s “Cut to the Chase” : A correction, one year later

I shared a story with you last year called "The Real Uncle Sam." In the story I mentioned Samuel Wilson was the real person Uncle Sam was modeled after. I also mentioned he was born in 1776, that he was the son of a Minuteman, and that he served in the Revolutionary War as a messenger and service boy for the Army of the colonies.

It was pointed out to me after releasing the story that Samuel could not have served in the war if he was born in 1776, so a year late and a whole lot of dollars short I am correcting the error. Suffice it to say math was not one of my strong subjects in school. Neither were the rest of the subjects they attempted to teach me.

Further research shows Samuel was born a decade earlier, in 1766, so by the time the Revolutionary War ended he would have been 17 – still young for a veteran, but not out of norm for the time. Like most people from the era, Sam was raised on a farm, tended livestock and performed other routine farm chores typical for boys his age.

He grew to become a prosperous meat-packer, and by 1812 he was involved in the effort to help feed American soldiers when the British tried to make the fledgling United States colonies of the crown again. Samuel Wilson’s meat-packing business was an important part of the war effort, and the barrels of beef he shipped to feed the soldiers were marked with the letters "U.S.," which stood for "United States." The soldiers receiving the barrels of beef, however, said the "U.S." stood for the nickname of the benefactor who supplied the beef.

Samuel Wilson’s generosity was widely known, and his many friends and neighbors nicknamed him "Uncle Sam." The soldiers knew about the generosity of Samuel Wilson, and they knew the barrels of beef were from his meat-packing business, so they insisted the "U.S." on the barrels of meat stood for "Uncle Sam." Before long, a fictitious cartoon character called "Uncle Sam" became synonymous with the United States.

While he did not sport a goatee or wear a red, white and blue stars-and-stripes tuxedo, Samuel "Uncle Sam" Wilson was very real. In 1961, Congress ensured Samuel Wilson would not be forgotten to history by printing in the Federal Register a resolution officially recognizing the patriot farmer and meat-packing merchant Samuel Wilson as the real Uncle Sam.

(Denny Banister, of Jefferson City, is the assistant director of public affairs for the Missouri Farm Bureau, the state’s largest farm organization.)