Forgotten Founder: Thomas Paine and American Independence

Posted by on Apr 17, 2026 in | Comments Off on Forgotten Founder: Thomas Paine and American Independence Philadelphia was the largest, wealthiest and most cosmopolitan city in all the colonies on the eve of the American Revolution. As the major commercial hub for British North America, the city’s economy was based on trade and commerce and bolstered by shipbuilding, textiles and other industries. Philadelphia was also a hub for political activism, with town meetings and pamphlets disseminating...
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Albert Gallatin, Visionary of the Early Republic

Posted by on Dec 1, 2023 in | Comments Off on Albert Gallatin, Visionary of the Early Republic Albert Gallatin (1761–1849) came to America with a vision, not a dream. While tens of thousands of his fellow immigrants settled the New World in pursuit of personal success, he carried grander hopes. In his pursuit of shaping the young American nation, the Swiss-born Gallatin left behind an impressive legacy as a politician, a diplomat, and the longest-serving secretary of the treasury in U.S....
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Rush by Stephen Fried

Posted by on Apr 14, 2020 in | Comments Off on Rush by Stephen Fried Rush Revolution, Madness, and the Visionary Doctor Who Became a Founding Father by Stephen Fried Crown, 608 pp., hardcover $30 Benjamin Rush is difficult to write about, although at first glance that makes no sense. He was an interesting man who lived during interesting times, someone who knew prominent people and became prominent himself. He had opinions on everything and everyone, with an...
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Monster Bones: Charles Willson Peale and the Mysterious Nondescript Animal

Posted by on Oct 28, 2019 in | Comments Off on Monster Bones: Charles Willson Peale and the Mysterious Nondescript Animal On October 14, 1800, a New York City newspaper called Mercantile Advertiser published a rather lengthy news/opinion piece on some large and very curious bones that had been unearthed on a farm belonging to John Masten, located about 14 miles from the New York state village of Newburgh. The unidentified author observed that “these huge bones irresistibly force upon us by the power of associating...
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Biographer of the Feathered Tribes: Alexander Wilson and American Ornithology

Posted by on May 8, 2015 in | Comments Off on Biographer of the Feathered Tribes: Alexander Wilson and American Ornithology “As it has fallen to my lot to be the biographer of the feathered tribes of the United States,” Alexander Wilson (1766–1813) wrote to William Bartram (1739–1823) on August 4, 1809, “I am solicitous to do full justice to every species; and I would not conceal one good quality that any one of them possesses.” At the age of 43 Wilson – weaver, peddler, poet, teacher and...
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Free-Thinking, 19th-Century Style

Posted by on Dec 2, 2013 in | Comments Off on Free-Thinking, 19th-Century Style Francis Ellingwood Abbot (1836–1903) was nothing if not determined. In 1872, as editor of The Index, the nation’s leading free-thought magazine, he began to muster the full force of his small army of subscribers against what was being called “the God-in-the-Constitution amendment.” A philosopher and theologian, he sought to reconstruct theology in accordance with scientific methodology. From the...
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A Tradition Brewing

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on A Tradition Brewing Perhaps not considered as noble as spirits­ – the clear, silvery gins, the South’s prized bourbons – nor as trendy as wines – particularly Califor­nia’s pale, refreshing whites – ­beer, nevertheless, has been a staple of the American lifestyle for more than three centuries. Pennsylvania’s earliest brewing traditions eventually emerged as an influential...
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Courting the Constitution

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on Courting the Constitution If the delegates to the Constitutional Convention were to awaken this sum­mer in Independence Hall from two centuries of sleep, they would undoubtedly enjoy an exciting session. George Washington as president of the convention, after persuading Ben Franklin to stop tinkering with his electric table light, would call the Convention to order. Upon learning that the government devised by them had...
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The Making of a Miracle

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Making of a Miracle Early in 1788, George Washington wrote his friend the Marquis de Lafayette that there had been a “miracle” in Phila­delphia. Considering the many efforts and failures be­tween 1765 and 1787 to estab­lish an enduring form of government, first for individ­ual states and then for all­ – fundamental laws, orders of government, plans of union, resolutions, declarations,...
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Chronology of Events Relating to Pennsylvania During the Year 1776

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on Chronology of Events Relating to Pennsylvania During the Year 1776 January 1776   1 Defeat of the American assault on Quebec involves heavy losses of troops from Pennsylvania. 2 The Second Continental Congress, sitting in Philadelphia, pro­tests against brutality employed by the British Army in the war against the colonies. The Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, operating in Phila­delphia, begins to vote recommendations for officers to command the 4...
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