Historical fiction author Geoff Baggett brings the world of his writing to life by carrying it around with him.

Baggett wore breeches and buckled shoes Sunday afternoon to share stories and his trunk of American Revolutionary War-era artifacts with a crowd of 20 at the historic Hobson House.

“That show-and-tell approach is engaging, no matter the audience,” Baggett said. “It brings a very different perspective to history for people. It did for me. I like to go to the events where everyone’s dressed up and you get lost in time.”

Baggett’s “Revolutionary War in a Trunk” was the second event in the three-part Lunch & Learn series hosted by Riverview at Hobson Grove Historic House Museum.

“I think we’re a very forward-looking society, which is wonderful, but I also think it’s important to look back for context,” said the site’s Executive Director, Brooke Peterson. “Time marches on, and you take the best of the past as we go and we learn from it.”

Peterson said the series was planned in observance of the 250th anniversary of the United States Declaration of Independence this coming July.

“I think it’s a good time to look back at the things that people thought were important then,” Peterson said. “Why did they want to break off into a new nation? What were their principles? What sort of literature were they reading to come to those decisions? I think it’s really important to understand the past to understand why things are the way they are today — the good, the bad, the ugly.”

Though he’s always enjoyed history, Baggett said his particular interest in the Revolutionary War came around 15 years ago, when he found his first participant relative.

“I started getting into documents…I found these really neat people and thought, well, I need to start writing some of this down, and it became telling stories,” Baggett said. “I think, more than anything, it’s just to be able to put a ‘humanity’ face on the history.”

Suzanne Myers, who brought her husband Don as part of his eightieth birthday weekend, said the event was “worth the hour trip” from their home in Breckenridge County.

“He’s (Don is) kind of a history nut, so it was really up his alley,” Myers said. “We’ve always been interested in reenactments, because we do like to see the history come alive.”

Myers said their favorite part of Baggett’s presentation was his explanation of several common idioms, now detached from the particular historic meanings they once held.

They noted the phrase “flash-in-the-pan,” which Baggett explained was a kind of flintlock misfire where the gunpowder explodes from the chamber without discharging the round. Baggett said he experienced his own “geyser” of sparks during his first and only Revolutionary War battle reenactment. Now, the phrase refers broadly to fleeting phenomena.

With musket in hand, Baggett demonstrated a real example of a gun’s hammer half-cocked, a position from which a trigger pull would not properly fire the gun. Now, to “go off at half-cock” refers to sporadic, often poorly-planned action, semi-detached from its original meaning.

Commanding officers of the era would tell rows of hundreds, thousands of men to “make ready,” and “take aim,” or alternatively to “level,” as the very literal “round” would otherwise simply roll out the end of the barrel.

Even the term “naked,” as Baggett explained, once had a different meaning. While the term is now typically interchangeable with “nude,” “naked” at the time merely meant one was improperly dressed, like being in public without a hat, or often in military parlance, without a coat.

“I studied Valley Forge…and I was always so baffled, because it would say, ‘130 men fit for duty,’ and they would have 60 men ‘naked’,” Baggett said. “I thought, ‘Well, I knew things were bad at Valley Forge, but I didn’t know it was that bad.”

Baggett published the eighth book of his “Patriots of the American Revolution” series, “Mountaineers and Captives,” in March 2025.

The event was coordinated with Kentucky Humanities, an independent, nonprofit affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities, according to its website. The organization is connected to events across the state, including an upcoming presentation next Sunday, April 19, on the Underground Railroad in Kentucky at the Hobson House.