October 12, 2024
SAR250 Events - Charles Thomson Grave Marking and Wreath Commemorative at Carpenter’s Hall
Charles Thomson (November 29, 1729 – August 16, 1824) was an Irish-born patriot leader in Philadelphia during the American Revolution and the secretary of the Continental Congress (1774–1789) throughout its existence. As secretary, Thomson, a Founding Father of the United States, prepared the Journals of the Continental Congress, and his and John Hancock's names were the only two to appear on the first printing of the United States Declaration of Independence. Thomson is also known for co-designing the Great Seal of the United States and adding its Latin mottoes Annuit cœptisand Novus ordo seclorum, and for his translation of the Bible's Old Testament. Thomson is interned at the Laurel Hill East Cemetery in Philadelphia.
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. The First Continental Congress met from September 5 to October 26, 1774. and passed and signed the Continental Association. In June 1776, it was where the Pennsylvania Provincial Conference officially declared the Province of Pennsylvania's independence from the British Empire and established the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, mobilized the Pennsylvania militia for the American Revolutionary War, set up the machinery for the Pennsylvania Provincial Convention from July 15 to September 28 in 1776, which framed the Pennsylvania Constitution of 1776 and enabled the Declaration of Independence to be written and ultimately adopted. It was briefly occupied in 1777 by the British Army during the war. 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.
Photos in the sections with the Colonial Blue background are by Randi Fonseca
