30posts
A single poem written by an enslaved African girl moved George Washington, father of American independence. But even after gaining her freedom, a harsh new reality awaited her.
May 7, 2026
In August 1776, seven weeks after the Declaration of Independence, 32,000 British troops landed. Washington lost all of New York.
Apr 19, 2026
After the American victory at Saratoga in 1777, France joined the American side. It was the result of two years of diplomacy by Benjamin Franklin in Paris.
Apr 19, 2026
In June 1776, the Continental Congress gave a 33-year-old Virginian 17 days to write the founding document of a nation.
Apr 19, 2026
In September 1775, America struck Canada from two directions simultaneously. Arnold pushed through the Maine wilderness. Montgomery took fort after fort from the north. And one commander took the food and turned back.
Apr 19, 2026
In August 1775, Washington banned Black men from the Continental Army. Three months later, the British offered freedom to enslaved people who joined their side. Washington reversed course.
Apr 19, 2026
On April 19, 1775, a single gunshot rang out in the town square of Lexington, Massachusetts, firing the opening salvo of the American Revolutionary War. Explore how that one shot — fired by an unknown hand — changed the course of world history.
Apr 19, 2026
In September 1775, Benedict Arnold led 1,100 men through the Maine wilderness to surprise-attack Quebec. The map was wrong, food ran out, rivers ran backward. Only 350 men survived to stand before the walls of Quebec.
Apr 18, 2026
In August 1775, George Washington received a shocking report: the entire Continental Army had enough gunpowder for just 9 rounds per soldier. If the British had known, the war would have ended that day.
Apr 18, 2026
A month after the colonies sent a peace letter to the king, George III refused to even read it — and declared all the colonies in a state of rebellion. The door to negotiation slammed shut.
Apr 18, 2026
After Bunker Hill, 1,054 of 2,200 British troops were dead or wounded. The reaction from the winning side was stunning. Generals went silent. London shook. This 'victory' began Britain's defeat.
Apr 18, 2026
Henry Knox was a 25-year-old bookseller with zero military experience. He dragged 60 cannons 480 kilometers through winter mountains to free Boston. This is how a bookshop owner ended an 11-month siege.
Apr 18, 2026
In January 1776, a British immigrant who had been in America for barely 14 months published a 47-page pamphlet that turned 'independence' from a radical whisper into a universal demand.
Apr 18, 2026
Joseph Warren was Boston's finest physician and a key leader of the independence movement. Given the rank of general, he chose to fight as a common soldier at Bunker Hill. He was 34 years old.
Apr 18, 2026
On July 3, 1775, George Washington arrived in Cambridge to take command of the Continental Army. What he found was not an army — it was chaos.
Apr 18, 2026
On June 17, 1775, 1,200 colonial militia held off 2,200 British regulars from trenches they had dug overnight. The British eventually won, but lost nearly half their force. A British general wrote: A few more such victories and we are done.
Apr 18, 2026
The shots fired at Lexington ripple south to Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia. Women organize supply lines, Gage begs London for reinforcements, and Benedict Arnold eyes Fort Ticonderoga.
Apr 18, 2026
Ethan Allen's Green Mountain Boys — 83 men — captured Fort Ticonderoga without firing a single shot. The 83 cannons they seized would later free Boston.
Apr 18, 2026
It took six weeks for the news of Lexington to cross the Atlantic. George III was furious. Parliament was divided. And on both sides of the ocean, the point of no return was approaching.
Apr 18, 2026
In the spring of 1775, thousands of colonists picked up their muskets and marched toward Boston. They were fighting, but most of them had no desire for independence. They just wanted their rights back.
Apr 18, 2026
On May 10, 1775, delegates gathered in Philadelphia to figure out what to do about a war nobody had planned. Their solution was characteristically contradictory: pledge loyalty to the king while simultaneously raising an army against him.
Apr 18, 2026
By December 1776, the American Revolution was on the verge of collapse. George Washington staked everything on a desperate Christmas night crossing of the icy Delaware River — and changed the war.
Apr 18, 2026
On April 19, 1775, a small group of colonial militia faced down a massive British force on Lexington Green. What followed would ignite a revolution and change the course of history forever.
Apr 18, 2026
In 1777, the British devised an ambitious plan to split the American colonies in half. It was a brilliant strategy on paper — but on the ground, everything fell apart at Saratoga.
Apr 18, 2026
In October 1781, a combined American and French force trapped the British army at Yorktown, Virginia. The surrender that followed effectively ended the American Revolution.
Apr 18, 2026
On the night of April 18, 1775, Boston silversmith Paul Revere rode through the Massachusetts countryside to warn colonial militia that British troops were marching to seize their weapons. His midnight ride triggered a chain reaction that led to the first shots of the American Revolution.
Apr 18, 2026
Not everyone in that Philadelphia room was an aristocrat or a wealthy man. An Irish indentured servant, a shoemaker's apprentice, a self-taught surveyor, and orphaned immigrants put their names on the Declaration alongside Jefferson and Franklin. Who were they, and how did they get there?
Apr 14, 2026In the summer of 1776, 56 men in a Philadelphia room put their names on a piece of parchment. That signature was treason against the British Crown — and the penalty was the noose. They closed with a promise: that they pledged to each other their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.
Apr 13, 2026
On March 23, 1775, Patrick Henry delivered a historic speech at the Virginia colonial assembly that sparked the flame of American independence. Discover how a few minutes of oratory changed the course of a revolution.
Mar 23, 2026430 years of Boston's history, from the founding of the Puritan colony to the American Revolution, the Industrial Revolution, and its role as a modern technology hub
Mar 8, 2026