President’s Message from June 2026

Dear Friends of Lafayette,

We are pleased to present to you the final installment of a trilogy of Gazettes of the American Friends of Lafayette which together cover over 300 Farewell Tour Bicentennial events. The events described in this Gazette, number 102, begin in late May in Wheeling, West Virginia (formerly Virginia) and conclude in early September in Washington, D.C., followed by a celebratory Lafayette Legacy Tour in France.

Having read and edited, with colleague Jan O’Sullivan, scores of articles about these events, about 50 of which I was able to attend, I would like to express my sincere appreciation for the excellent work of our authors.

Frankly, I continue to be awestruck by the quality and comprehensiveness of the Bicentennial articles. Often written by local committee chairs, these articles detail the events, putting them in context of their 1824-1825 counterparts, in a readable and often charming way. They also manifest the enthusiasm of the participants. Finally, they often describe the incredible amount of work that our 400 hundred or more volunteers performed to make the AFL Bicentennial Tour a resounding success.

In addition to thanking our authors, great thanks go to committee chairs, committee members, other volunteers, and partner organizations. Thanks as well to the AFL’s Executive Steering Committee for the Bicentennial: Executive Director Chuck Schwam and governing board members Dr. Patti Maclay, Robert Kelly, Lisa Meunier, Bonnie Fritz, and Jan O’Sullivan. I also served on this committee. Like Lafayette and Alexander Hamilton in the musical Hamilton, “we [got] the job done.”

Because of space constraints, this issue will not include reports of Yorktown Day 2025 or AFL events in the first half of 2026 such as Virginia Lafayette Day, the French National Archive/Lafayette College exhibition and the related symposium in Paris, Massachusetts

Lafayette Day, New Hampshire Lafayette Day, France’s award to Chuck Schwam and Robert Kelly of the National Order of Merit, and our annual meeting in New Orleans. We will report on these events in the next issue of the Gazette.

Meanwhile, our Executive Director has not been sitting on his hands. Starting in the Fall, Chuck orchestrated a very successful free series of speakers on Zoom which has been well received and very well attended. Also, planning for our 2027 annual meeting in Georgetown and Charleston, South Carolina is well underway. This meeting, which will mark the 250th anniversary of Lafayette’s arrival in America, will be the kickoff event of the AFL’s rolling Semiquincentennial, during which we will commemorate milestones of Lafayette’s career in the American Revolution.

Our current membership totals 1,203. As the map shows, we are missing representation in five states—the Dakotas, Nevada, Nebraska, and Alaska. Friends, it’s time to step up and deliver. Let the recruiting begin!

Best regards,

Alan R. Hoffman

President