Fifty years ago, my wife and I were living in Houston when the Bicentennial celebration occurred. The memories that lasted are the tall ships sailing into New York City, the fireworks at Houston’s Northwest Plaza on July 4 (the the resulting traffic jam when it was over), and Bicentennial Minutes.
Bicentennial Minutes were hosted by CBS. As the name implied, they were one-minute history lessons, each with a different celebrity narrator. Speakers included movie stars like Paul Newman, Kirk Douglas, and Ed Asner; Alfred Hitchcock; Kukla, Fran, & Ollie; Walter Cronkite; and scores more. Reportedly, CBS initially hated the idea, but it turned into one of the most popular events during the Bicentennial.
Somewhat controversial was the sponsor, Shell Oil Company. First, it was an oil company, when many were howling for oil companies to be broken up. Second, it was owned by the Royal Dutch Group, a foreign company, no less, half-owned by British interests. Ultimately, people decided to sit back and enjoy the minutes.
I was working at Shell Oil at the time. And my job was reading, researching, and writing about the effort to “break up Big Oil.” Eventually, the issue died, and I moved into the speechwriting group. But I think I’ll always connect those Bicentennial memories with “breaking up Big Oil.”
And now, it’s 50 years later, and it’s the 250th birthday. Happy birthday to all of us! And to the men and women of 1776 who had the courage to make it happen!
The Declaration of Independence in its moment
The Anticipation of Late June 1776 – Chris Mackowski at Emerging Revolutionary War Era.
Declaration of Independence: A Transcription – National Archives.
Declarations Before THE Declaration of Independence – Ray Rphaeol at Journal of the American Revolution.
The Viking word hidden in the Declaration of Independence – Sophie Hardach at BBC.
The Man Who Argued Against Independence – Jonathan Horn at The Free Press.
July 2, 1776: “the most memorable Epocha, in the History of America: – Kevin Pawlak at Emerging Revolutionary War Era.
The Inner American Revolution – Stephen Mansfield at the Institute for Faith, Work, & Economics.
Scotland and the Birth of the United States – S. Donald Fortson at Ligonier.
On the Semiquincentennial – Spitalfields Life.
The War for Independence
Monmouth: Longest Battle of the American Revolution – Eric Niderost at Warfare History Network.
The Britons who supported the War of Independence – Tom Cutterham at The Conversation.
How a tiny Caribbean island made American independence possible – R. Grant Gilmore III at The Conversation.
General Washington and the Other Declaration of 1776 – Charlton Allen at American Thinker.
The America 250 Celebration
Congress dedicates national time capsule ahead of America’s 250th anniversary – Associated Press via PBS.
World Monuments Fund spotlights ten heritage sites for the US’ 250th – Elena Goukassoan at The Art Newspaper.
A History of America’s Milestones: Celebrating Independence – Ron Faucheux at Real Clear History.
The Declaration in American History
Why Americans Once Held Separate Fourth of July Celebrations – Tim Ott at History.
At America 250, Remember the 2 Presidents Who Saved the Declaration – Janice Rogers Brown at Coolidge Review.
When Independence Hall Was Almost Demolished – Elizabeth Yuko at History.
Assessments of the Declaration
Liberty, War, and Sovereignty in American States System: The Declaration of Independence at 250 – Robbie Totten at Isonomia Quarterly.
America 250 Forum, Day 1: The Idea of America, Day 2: The Weight of History; Day 3: Giving Thanks as American Christians – Mere Orthodoxy.
250 Years of Faith: The Story of Christianity in America – Thomas Kidd at Desiring God.
The Radical, Conservative Experiment That Is America – David Deavel at The Imaginative Conservative.
Our Inalienable Declaration – Jack Butler at The Wall Street Journal (story unlocked).
The Heroes of 1776 – Neil Gorsuch and Janet Nitze at The Free Press.
The Declaration of Independence: A Radical Experiment in Liberty by Bradley Birzer – Faith, Fiction, Friends.
Why I Wrote Finding the Founding – Casey Spinks at Mere Orthodoxy.
The Declaration at 250 – 28 thinkers at Modern Age.
Music of the Declaration – Henry Long at The Imaginative Conservative.
People Speak
The Country I Would Still Die For – Ncholas Dockery at The Free Press.
The Summer I Turned Patriot – Josh Kaplan at The Free Press.
If Jesus Founded a Nation – Samuel D. James at Digital Liturgies.
America 250 and Poetry
Bradford Skow and American Independence in Verse – Tweetspeak Poetry.
What America Was Meant to Be – poem by Mike Johansson at Society of Classical Poets.
Philip Freneau: Poet of the American Revolution – Tweetspeak Poetry.
The First of Modern Nations and An Errand into the Wilderness – poems by James Matthew Wilson at Word on Fire.
“Old Ironsides,” poem by Oliver Wendell Holmes – Joseph Bottum at Poems Ancient and Modern.
Paul Revere’s Ride – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
The Declaration of Independence – read by Max McLean
Painting: The Signing of the Declaration of Independence, oil on canvas (1818) by John Trumbull (1756-1843), U.S. Capitol Rotunda.
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