A piece of fabric now hung on the walls of the Museum of the American Revolution in Old City might seem trivial but its far from it.
Its now a piece of the puzzle in the exhibition called “ Witness to Revolution: The Unlikely Travel’s of Washington’s Tent.”
"It’s a special exhibit that tells the story of how Washington’s tent that’s on display on the second floor of the museum got from revolutionary war to this museum,” Curator of Exhibitions Museum of the American Revolution Matthew Skic told NBC10.
What is the piece of fabric you might ask? It belongs to a dining marquee, a relic that 70-year-old Richard "Dana" Moore from Virginia stumbled upon while scrolling through Goodwill's online thrift store in 2022.
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“That’s how I found this fragment, under historical documents in the Goodwill auction online,” Dana said.
Dana added that a note attached to the piece of fabric caught his attention and ultimately got him to spend $1,700 on the piece.
The note reads, "a piece of George Washington's tent," and dated in 1907 from the Jamestown Exposition.
“Prior to Dana getting in touch with us, we knew that George Washington’s dining marquee, a large tent that he used for meetings and a dining place for him and his officers, we knew that tent was on loan to that exposition in 1907," said Skic.
The marquee - or big tent - was used as George Washington's sleeping and office quarters during the Revolutionary War. And it was used to authenticate that piece of fragment purchased by Dana as the trim of both tents are identical.
"This is one in a million. Its more than that. You know I’ve purchased many relics online. I’ll never come across this ever in my lifetime again,” Dana said.
The historical item will be loaned to the Museum of American Revolution until 2025.
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