(Photo by Madeline Scarborough) Campus Martius Museum historian Bill Reynolds led an “Insiders Tour” on Saturday, celebrating the area pioneers.

Campus Martius Museum historian Bill Reynolds led an “Insiders Tour” on Saturday, celebrating the area pioneers.

This tour was more than an inside look at the area, but also an inside look at Reynolds’ journey with Mike Hall and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner David McCullough when writing “The Pioneers”.

Reynolds told those gathered, many of whom have read the book, about things like the initial phone call, the book and documentary he encouraged them to look into before deciding if it was the right story for them to write, and about meeting them in person for the first time to start gathering information.

McCullough said he “has never had all the material for a book in one place” before this one.

Reynolds described him as someone who really wanted to get into character and better understand those he was writing about.

(Photo by Madeline Scarborough) Campus Martius Museum historian Bill Reynolds led an “Insiders Tour” on Saturday, celebrating the area pioneers. Those in attendance got to travel though the museum and learn the in-depth history surrounding the events and people covered in David McCullough’s book “The Pioneers”. They saw copies of letters, pictures of people and much of the exact research that led to its creation.

“Here, he got to spend a few hours sitting in Rufus Putnam’s house, sitting in his chair and reading letters or other documents Putnam had written or read,” said Reynolds.

More than just Putnam’s history lives on at the museum and in the archives, however. A full story could be seen unraveling, starting with a win for the U.S. in the Revolutionary War, a great debt owed, government owned lands and an idea shared between George Washington and Rufus Putnam.

This idea, however, was only made possible by the help of Manasseh Cutler, who is known as many things… a lawyer, minister, physician and in Reynolds’ opinion, the best lobbyist our nation has ever seen.

It was Cutler who ultimately got the government to sell 1.5 million acres of land to the Ohio Company for $1 an acre and helped create the Ordinance of 1787, or the Northwest Ordinance. The ordinance established a government for the Northwest Territory, outlined the process for admitting a new state to the Union, and guaranteed that newly created states would be equal to the original 13 states.

Those in attendance got to travel though the museum and learn the in-depth history surrounding the events and people covered in the book. They saw copies of letters, pictures of people and much of the exact research that led to its creation.

Madeline Scarborough can be reached at mscarborough@newsandsentinel.com