Thanks to dedicated Palo Alto Battlefield volunteers, the park can now tell a little-known story of Great Britain’s interest for preventing the U.S.-Mexican War. Britain wanted to prevent U.S. expansion and were worried a victory by the U.S. would lead to the extension of its territory all the way to California.
In 2018, NPS volunteer David Davenport donated six boxes of U.S.-Mexican War related primary documents to the park. Davenport had traveled to London, poured through the British archives, and photocopied handwritten documents about the War.
Palo Alto was thrilled by the donation of the documents but finding the time to decipher reams of 19th century cursive penmanship was a challenge. The park turned to the U.S. State Department’s Virtual Student Federal Service (VSFS) internship program for help. VSFS recruits college student volunteers to work on government projects during the academic year. After working with two VSFS interns last year, Palo Alto still had boxes of documents.
Source: U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service
