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As Americans celebrate the nation’s 250th birthday with parades, speeches, fireworks and other patriotic traditions, much attention will focus on familiar symbols of our history — monuments, battlefields, historic landmarks.

Yet Independence Day also lets us reflect on lesser-known stories of people and places that illuminate the ideals on which our nation was founded.

One such place is Hero Street, a stone’s throw from the Mississippi River and Interstate Highway 80 in Silvis, Illinois, part of the Quad Cities.

Mexican immigrants came to Silvis at the turn of the 20th century to live and work in the blue-collar, calloused-hands town. Jobs at the Rock Island Railroad drew them. They arrived seeking stability in the Heartland of America amid the upheaval of the Mexican Revolution back home.

It has been a while since you heard a United States leader say, “The fault is mine alone.”

If you visit Abilene, Kansas, the Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Museum offers countless artifacts of leadership — far from the battlefields of Europe and the White House where the five-star general left his mark.

One museum artifact that caught my eye on a visit several years ago stands out because of what it says, and its backstory.

Here we go again.

If the University of Iowa and Iowa attorney general's office get their way, a legacy gift from a grateful and accomplished graduate will no longer help students like him.

The graduate, Ezra L. Totton, was an esteemed chemist during the latter half of the 20th century. One chapter in his great American success story was written in the chemistry building at the University of Iowa in the 1940s.

Totton's story deserves retelling because he was at the center of an Iowa Supreme Court decision last week.

Here’s betting District Judge Adria Kester does not read the Aspen Daily News. That Colorado newspaper’s front-page slogan declares, “If you don’t want it printed, don’t let it happen.”

What happened to Judge Kester occurred outside of her usual venue — the 22 courthouses of north-central and northwest Iowa where, until recently, she served as chief judge of the Second Judicial District.

It happened when that Boone County resident found herself on the other side of the law, as a criminal defendant.

Now, she is keeping the story alive by filing a civil lawsuit seeking special treatment she likely did not accord to those who appeared before her.

At the risk of blurring the increasingly fuzzy line between church and state, here is a Gospel reading for public employees and elected officials, according to Matthew:

“But blessed are your eyes, for they see; and your ears, for they hear."

Unfortunately, it does not take much looking these days to see government leaders bedeviled by lousy optics and burdened by tone deafness. Perhaps it is a lack vision or just a refusal to listen.

Come July, Iowa employers may want to add an ominous warning on their job application forms: tell a lie and you could go to jail.

That’s right — no more puffing the resume with false degrees from the University of Okoboji or Faber College.

And do not claim to have chauffeur’s license when you lack the permit needed to drive a truck.

That’s because Gov. Kim Reynolds signed House File 2337 into law last week, making it a crime to knowingly provide false academic degrees or credentials for the purpose of obtaining employment or other personal gain.

The legislation does not use these words, but the bill could have been named the Ian Roberts Resume Fraud Act.

Noah Petersen and Priscilla Villarreal live 1,200 miles from each other, Petersen in Newton, Iowa; Villarreal in Laredo, Texas. They share a key connection despite that distance.

Each has encountered government punishment for exercising their First Amendment rights. Both went to court to fight for their freedoms.

For Petersen, he had the good fortune of litigating in Iowa, where two judges grasp what First Amendment freedoms encompass. So, his civil lawsuit continues today.

Meanwhile, for Villarreal, better luck next time. When her civil case reached the U.S. Supreme Court a week ago, a majority of justices shrugged off the fundamental rights at stake by refusing to hear her appeal.

We all need reminders now and then.

Some of us believe there is only one correct way to think and speak and act in these United States of America. But that is not true.

Americans are not who we are because we are the same. Americans are who we are, and our nation has long been a shining beacon, because we are all different and were brought together by that freedom to be different.

My ancestors trace their roots in America to before the days the Founding Fathers signed the Declaration of Independence.

You may have seen my distant cousin, Joseph Hewes, in the massive painting hanging in the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol. It shows colonial leaders including Cousin Joe presenting the Continental Congress with that declaration of their discontent with King George III and British rule.

Hewes, a merchant, was 46 years old when he signed the most famous document in our nation’s history. In the eyes of the king, Hewes and the other signers were insurrectionists and instigators.

Because of this, Benjamin Franklin is credited with saying, “We must all hang together, or most assuredly we will all hang separately.”

One goal of Cousin Joe and the other Founders in establishing the United States of America was to prevent a concentration of power in a monarch. They had experienced the unchecked authority of a king and wanted no more of it.

So, what would my rebellious ancestor and his compatriots from 1776 think about the course of human events in 21st century America? Would they speak or act against present-day government leaders who have divided and not united us?