Benjamin Franklin was an American polymath: a leading writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher and political philosopher. Among the most influential intellectuals of his time, Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States; a drafter and signer of the Declaration of Independence; and the first postmaster general.
John Penn was an English-born colonial administrator who served as the last governor of colonial Pennsylvania, serving in that office from 1763 to 1771 and from 1773 to 1776. Educated in Britain and Switzerland, he was also one of the Penn family proprietors of the Province of Pennsylvania from 1771 until 1776, holding a one-fourth share, when the creation of the independent Commonwealth of Pennsylvania during the American Revolution removed the Penn family from power.
Samuel Rhoads was an American architect who served as the 59th mayor of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
The Biddle family of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania is an Old Philadelphian family descended from English immigrants William Biddle (1630–1712) and Sarah Kempe (1634–1709), who arrived in the Province of New Jersey in 1681. Quakers, they had emigrated from England in part to escape religious persecution. Having acquired extensive rights to more than 43,000 acres (170 km2) of lands in West Jersey, they settled first at Burlington, a city which developed along the east side of the Delaware River.
Morgan John Rhys, also Rhees was a Welsh radical evangelical Baptist minister. He preached the principles of the French Revolution, against slavery, and in favour of the reform of parliament.
Richard Bache, born in Settle, West Riding of Yorkshire, England, immigrated to Philadelphia, in the colony of Pennsylvania, where he was a businessman, a marine insurance underwriter, and later served as Postmaster-General of the American Post Office. He also was the son-in-law of Benjamin Franklin.
Sarah Franklin Bache, sometimes known as Sally Bache, was the daughter of Benjamin Franklin and Deborah Read. She was a leader in relief work during the American Revolutionary War and frequently served as her father's political hostess, like her mother before her death in 1774. Sarah was also an important leader for women in the pro-independence effort in Philadelphia. She was an active member of the community until her death in 1808. She was 65 years old.
The Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania, officially The Right Worshipful Grand Lodge of the Most Ancient and Honorable Fraternity of Free and Accepted Masons of Pennsylvania and Masonic Jurisdictions Thereunto Belonging, sometimes referred to as Freemasons of Pennsylvania, is the premier masonic organization in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. The Grand Lodge claims to be the oldest in the United States, and the third-oldest in the world after England and Ireland, having been originally established as the Provincial Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania in 1731. This claim is disputed by both the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts and the Grand Lodge of Virginia.
Pennsylvania was the site of many key events associated with the American Revolution and American Revolutionary War. The city of Philadelphia, then capital of the Thirteen Colonies and the largest city in the colonies, was a gathering place for the Founding Fathers who discussed, debated, developed, and ultimately implemented many of the acts, including signing the Declaration of Independence, that inspired and launched the revolution and the quest for independence from the British Empire.
Carpenters' Hall, in Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is the official birthplace of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and a key meeting place in the early history of the United States. Completed in 1775, the two-story brick meeting hall was built for and is still privately owned by the Carpenters' Company of the City and County of Philadelphia, the country's oldest extant craft guild.
James Harper was an Irish-American politician who served as a National Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives for Pennsylvania's 2nd congressional district from 1833 to 1837.
Joseph Wharton was a successful American merchant, and the owner of "Walnut Grove," a country place on Fifth street, near Washington Avenue, Philadelphia, in which the Mischianza of 1778 was held. The house was the finest of its day near that city. It was torn down in 1862, to make room for a schoolhouse. He was called "Duke Wharton", because of his stately bearing.
Enoch Edwards was an American physician and a leading Patriot during the American Revolution. Born in Byberry Township, Pennsylvania, Edwards was a member of the Provincial Congress in Carpenters' Hall on June 18, 1776, which led to the Pennsylvania Constitution of 1776. He was also a signatory of the 1790 Pennsylvania Constitution. During the war he served as attending physician for George Washington, was a close friend of both Benjamin Rush and Thomas Jefferson, and kept up correspondence with James Monroe and John Quincy Adams.
Associators were members of 17th- and 18th-century volunteer military associations in the British American thirteen colonies and British Colony of Canada. These were more commonly known as Maryland Protestant, Pennsylvania, and American Patriot and British Loyalist colonial militias. But unlike militias, the associator military volunteers were exempt from regular mandatory military service. Other names used to describe associators were "Associations", "Associated", "Refugees", "Volunteers", and "Partisans".
The Carpenters’ Company of the City and County of Philadelphia is the oldest extant craft guild in the United States. Founded in 1724, the Company consists of nearly 200 prominent Philadelphia area architects, building contractors and structural engineers and has had nearly 900 members in its almost three centuries of existence. The Company built, owns and continues to operate Carpenters' Hall located in Philadelphia's Independence National Historical Park. In 1774 the Hall served as the site of the First Continental Congress.
Horace Thompson Carpenter, was an illustrator, artist and art writer of the late 19th and early 20th century United States.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Samuel Howell was an American Quaker who became a prominent merchant in colonial Philadelphia and a leading patriot, proponent, leader and financier for American independence.
David Hall was a British printer who immigrated from Scotland to America and became an early American printer, publisher and business partner with Benjamin Franklin in Philadelphia. He eventually took over Franklin's printing business of producing official documents for the colonial province of Pennsylvania and that of publishing The Pennsylvania Gazette newspaper that Franklin had acquired in 1729. Hall formed his own printing firm in 1766 and formed partnership firms with others. He published material for the colonial government.
Julius Friedrich (Frederick) Adolph Sachse was an American scholar of the history of Pennsylvania, particularly of the Ephrata Cloister and sectarian Pennsylvania German groups, as well as of American Freemasonry, and photographer. He was born in Philadelphia and graduated from Muhlenberg College. He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1894. He was editor of the American Journal of Photography from 1890 to 1897. Although raised a Lutheran, Sachse's children were baptized in the German Reformed Church, and he attended Episcopal churches in Philadelphia from about 1895 until his death.
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