Putting Historic Personalities on Facebook

How General Henry Knox
got a Profile on Facebook

Hey General Washington, was the water cold when you were crossing the Delaware? Hey Socrates, do you really believe all of the stuff you came up with? Don’t go to a seance. Don’t go find a psychic. Want to find a historic personality and chat about their life? You can go find these personalities on Facebook. Yep – Facebook.

Social networking takes a new twist when you get the chance to network socially with some of the most famous people in history. You gotta love Facebook. While it’s become the market leader for kids and even a few adults, a twist comes when people start building historic celebrity facebook profiles.

We went into Facebook and created a profile for General Henry Knox, on of the less noted Generals of the Revolutionary war under Commander in Chief George Washington. Go ahead…click on the Facebook badge and “friend” him! (He needs all the friends he can get).

Henry Knox’s Profile

The badge above is something anyone can create if they have a Facebook profile.

The fun comes in when you get to start looking for your friends. John Adams – friend? Sure. Alexander Hamilton – absolutely. What about Benedict Arnond? Do I (General Knox) really still like this guy enough to “friend” him? Sure why not – he’s on Facebook and really liked my wife Lucy. It’s a way that we’ve begun to use social networking to teach tweens that are on facebook about a bit of history. Funny how those kids take hold when their “friending” these famous people. It’s like they’re proud and have accomplished something!

Using facebook for stuff like this might sound like a waste of time, but it’s actually a deleberate effort to promote history, historic sites, museums, and events.

Never underestimate the power of a social network. Just look what now President Obama did with it! OK, I’ll give his handlers credit.

Facebook sure – go find your historic favorites.

Twitter? I’m not so sure. We just don’t have that much time!

No go out there and find some of your historic celebrities!

Look back when we discuss using Facebook for Non-Profits and the benefits of creating a Facebook Group vs. Facebook Fan pages. There is a difference.