Special to the Independent
Rep. Joe McGonagle visited Everett City Hall earlier this month to deliver an authentic, handprinted copy of the Declaration of Independence to Mayor Van Campen and the City in honor of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration. The Mayor and Representative were joined by McGonagle summer intern and Everett native Emily Buss who is a rising junior at University of Massachusetts Boston.
“I thought this was a fantastic idea to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the signing and bring together the Commonwealth through our different communities,” said McGonagle. “Seeing and reading the Declaration in this format brings to life the magnitude of such a document, what it meant in 1776 and what it means today. I am so grateful to my colleague Rep. Sean Garballey for organizing this venture and thankful for to Mayor Van Campen for all he continues to do for this City.”
The ceremony was part of a push across the Commonwealth for legislators to deliver these documents to each city and town in Massachusetts. The copies come as a result of the efforts of historian and printer Gary Gregory, who has printed hundreds of copies of the Declaration at the Museum of Printing in Haverhill using 18th-century techniques, recreating a labor-intensive process similar to that used in 1776. The effort brings to life a lesser-known chapter of Revolutionary history, the distribution of the Declaration across all Massachusetts cities and towns just weeks after the Founding Fathers drafted the original document on July 4, 1776.
After its adoption, more than 300 printed copies of the Declaration were sent to parishes throughout the state, where they were read aloud to residents by their ministers, and recorded into official town records. Over one hundred of the original copies remain preserved today, with more still being discovered.