Thomas McKean was an American lawyer, politician, and Founding Father. During the American Revolution, he was a Delaware delegate to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia, where he signed the Continental Association, the Declaration of Independence, and the Articles of Confederation. McKean served as a President of Congress.
The United States Declaration of Independence, officially The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America, is the pronouncement and founding document adopted by the Second Continental Congress meeting at Pennsylvania State House, which was later renamed Independence Hall, in the revolutionary capital of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on July 4, 1776. The Declaration explains why the Thirteen Colonies, which were in the beginning phases of war with the Kingdom of Great Britain, regarded themselves as thirteen independent sovereign states no longer subject to British colonial rule. With the Declaration, the 13 states took a collective step that proved the first step in forming the United States but also, in its adoption, formalized the Revolutionary War, which had been ongoing since the Battles of Lexington and Concord in April 1775.
Common Sense is a 47-page pamphlet written by Thomas Paine in 1775–1776 advocating independence from Great Britain to people in the Thirteen Colonies. Writing in clear and persuasive prose, Paine collected various moral and political arguments to encourage common people in the Colonies to fight for egalitarian government. It was published anonymously on January 10, 1776, at the beginning of the American Revolution and became an immediate sensation.
As a result of the American Revolution between 1776 and 1789 thirteen British colonies emerged as a newly independent nation, the United States of America. Fighting in the American Revolutionary War started between colonial militias and the British Army in 1775. The Second Continental Congress issued the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. The Articles of Confederation were ratified in 1781 to form the Congress of the Confederation. Under the leadership of General George Washington, the Continental Army and Navy defeated the British military, securing the independence of the thirteen colonies. The Confederation period continued until 1789, when the states replaced the Articles of Confederation with the Constitution of the United States, which remains the fundamental governing law of the United States.
The Second Continental Congress was a late-18th-century meeting of delegates from the Thirteen Colonies that united in support of the American Revolutionary War. The Congress created a new country that it first named the United Colonies, and in 1776, renamed the United States of America. The Congress convened in Philadelphia, then the federal capital, on May 10, 1775, with representatives from 12 of the 13 colonies. This came shortly after the Battles of Lexington and Concord and was in succession to the First Continental Congress which met from September 5 to October 26, 1774. The Second Congress functioned as a de facto national government at the outset of the Revolutionary War by raising armies, directing strategy, appointing diplomats, and writing petitions such as the Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms and the Olive Branch Petition. All thirteen colonies were represented by the time the Congress adopted the Lee Resolution which declared independence from Britain on July 2, 1776, and the congress agreed to the Declaration of Independence two days later.
Joseph Galloway was an American attorney and a leading political figure in the events immediately preceding the founding of the United States in the late 1700s. As a staunch opponent of American independence, he would become one of the most prominent Loyalists in North America during the early part of the Revolutionary War.
John Morton was an American farmer, surveyor, and jurist from the Province of Pennsylvania and a Founding Father of the United States. As a delegate to the Continental Congress during the American Revolution, he was a signatory to the Continental Association and Declaration of Independence. Morton provided the swing vote that allowed Pennsylvania to vote in favor of the Declaration. Morton chaired the committee that wrote the Articles of Confederation, though he died before signing.
John Dunlap was an early American printer who emigrated from Ireland and who printed the first copies of the United States Declaration of Independence and was one of the most successful Irish/American printers of his era. He served in the Continental Army under George Washington during the American Revolutionary War.
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.
The physical history of the United States Declaration of Independence spans from its original drafting in 1776 into the discovery of historical documents in modern time. This includes a number of drafts, handwritten copies, and published broadsides. The Declaration of Independence states that the thirteen colonies were now the "United Colonies" which "are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States"; and were no longer a part of the British Empire.
William Goddard was an early American patriot, publisher, printer and postal inspector. Born in New London, Connecticut, Goddard lived through the American Revolutionary era, during which he opposed British rule of the colonies through his actions and publications. He was a major figure in the development of the colonial postal system, which became the U.S. Post Office after the American Revolution.
The Pennsylvania Chronicle and Universal Advertiser was an American colonial newspaper founded in 1767 that was published in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, prior to the American Revolution and was founded by William Goddard and his silent business partners Joseph Galloway and Thomas Wharton. Benjamin Franklin, an associate of Galloway, was also a partner with the Chronicle.
The Museum of the American Revolution, formerly The American Revolution Center, is a museum in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania dedicated to telling the story of the American Revolution. The museum was opened to the public on April 19, 2017, the 242nd anniversary of the Battles of Lexington and Concord, the first battles of the American Revolutionary War, on April 19, 1775.
Mary Katharine Goddard was an early American publisher, and the postmaster of the Baltimore Post Office from 1775 to 1789. She was the older sister of William Goddard, also a publisher and printer. She was the second printer to print the Declaration of Independence. Her copy, the Goddard Broadside, was commissioned by Congress in 1777, and was the first to include the names of the signatories. In 1998, Goddard was inducted into the Maryland Women's Hall of Fame.
The following bibliography includes notable books concerning the American Revolutionary War. These books are listed in the bibliographies of books by prominent historians as shown in the footnotes.
The South-Carolina and American General Gazette was an 18th-century newspaper published in colonial Charleston, South Carolina.
Early American publishers and printers played a central role in the social, religious, political and commercial developments in colonial America, before, during, and after the American Revolution. Printing and publishing in the 17th and 18th centuries among the Thirteen Colonies of British North America first emerged as a result of religious enthusiasm and over the scarcity and subsequent great demand for bibles and other religious literature. By the mid-18th century, printing took on new proportions with the newspapers that began to emerge, most notably in Boston. When the British Crown began imposing new taxes, many of these newspapers became highly critical and outspoken about the British colonial government, which was widely considered unfair among the colonists.
Robert Bell (1732–1784) was a Scottish immigrant to the British colonies in America and became one of many early American printers and publishers active during the years leading up to and through the American Revolution. Bell became widely noted for printing Thomas Paine's celebrated work, Common Sense, a highly influential work during the revolution that openly criticized the British Parliament and their management and taxation of the British-American colonies. Bell and Paine later had a falling out over profits and publication issues. As a dedicated patriot, Bell printed many pamphlets and books before and during the revolution, many of which "glowingly" expressed his patriotic views. He also reprinted a number of popular English works, presenting them to the colonies for the first time. He ran an auction house which sold rare books in Lancaster, and in later life he toured the colonies selling off his massive book collection. After Bell's death, his printing press and other items were sold at a Philadelphia auction house to another prominent printer at an unusually high price.
Samuel Loudon (1727–1813) was a colonial American printer, publisher and merchant who emigrated from Ireland some time prior to 1753. Loudon founded The New-York Packet and The American Advertiser and became the postmaster at New York State's first post office in Fishkill, New York. During the American Revolution he became the official printer of New York State and printed its first Constitution, laws, acts and other official documents, while also taking on some private commissions. Before and during the Revolution Loudon became active through the use of his newspapers promoting the cause for American independence, and for freedom of the press. After the war Loudon printed the Laws of the City of New York, and later promoted ratification of the proposed Constitution by publishing selected essays of The Federalist Papers in his newspaper.
