PHILADELPHIA REFLECTIONS
The musings of a Philadelphia Physician who has served the community for nearly six decades

Related Topics

Delaware (State of)
Originally the "lower counties" of Pennsylvania, and thus one of three Quaker colonies founded by William Penn, Delaware has developed its own set of traditions and history.

Revolutionary Philadelphia's Patriots
Hotheads in the London Coffee House got stirred up about an inoffensive Tea Act, Scotch-Irish had come here to escape the British Crown, both the local artisan class and the local smuggler class had unexpectedly prospered under non-importation, and the local gentry were offended to be denied seats in Parliament like other Englishmen. But Pennsylvania wavered until the day Ben Franklin stepped off the boat from London with a grievance.

Conventions and Convention Centers
When you have a big convention center, some circus is always coming to town. Philadelphia has always been a convention town, has had and still has lots of convention sites, and hopes to have more of the kind of famous convention we have had in the past.

Land Tour Around Delaware Bay
Starting in Philadelphia, it takes two days to tour around Delaware Bay. Down the New Jersey side to Cape May, ferry over to Lewes, tour up to Dover and New Castle, visit Winterthur, Longwood Gardens, Brandywine Battlefield and art museum, then back to Philadelphia.

Caesar Rodney Rides Through the Rain

{Caesar Rodney}
Caesar Rodney

If you have a quarter minted in 1999, you can see a depiction of Caesar Rodney riding through the rain, mud and heat, all night, to cast his July 2 vote for independence at the 1776 Continental Congress. There are no known portraits of Rodney, probably because his face was badly mutilated by the cancer which ultimately killed him.

On July 1, Thomas McKean and George Read had split Delaware's votes in a tie, and McKean had urgently sent word to Rodney, the absent third vote, that he must come to Philadelphia quickly. Admiral Howe

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statue

was already starting to land his seven hundred ships at Staten Island and Perth Amboy, where it would not be difficult for him to travel a hundred miles across New Jersey to Trenton and down the Delaware River -- to hang them all as rebels. Only if they could establish the notion that they were an independent country could they hope to shelter themselves in the rules of war. (Even so, most of them found it prudent to wait a few weeks before signing Jefferson's somewhat specious arguments.) In the background, of course, Benjamin Franklin had a shrewder assessment or possibly even overt threat: the King of France wasn't going to help them unless they severed their allegiance with England.

Schoolchildren in Delaware can be forgiven for asking why Rodney wasn't in Philadelphia for the vote without being sent for. And we don't really know. Rodney certainly had plenty of other things competing for his attention, like being a Supreme Court Justice, the Speaker of the Delaware Assembly and the de facto Governor of the State, as well as being a Brigadier General in the Militia (he later was made Major General in charge of the garrison at Trenton). One has to suspect, however, that he had not expected George Read to vote against independence. Read, after all, had married the widowed sister of George Ross, who did sign the Declaration.

Asthma, a notoriously intermittent condition, may have been a worse impediment to Caesar Rodney's ride than his cancer. Although he was badly disfigured, the cancer did not kill him until 1784. The prospect of riding eighty miles in the rain with asthma may well have been the reason Rodney held off until he was absolutely certain his vote was needed. The esteem and affection that Delaware holds for this farmer from Dover can be gauged by the fact that he remained the elected speaker until the day he died, and during the last three months, the legislature held its meetings in his house so he could be present.

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