At three o’clock in the afternoon the meeting was adjourned, and the members stepped out into the Philadelphia summer. The city had much of interest to offer the delegates. There were bookstores and stationery shops where one could buy editions of Blackstone’s Commentaries in 4 vols. There was the Library Company, conveniently located only a block from the State House, on the second floor of Carpenters’ Hall, the same building where the First Continental Congress had met back in ’74. One could visit Mr. Peale’s Museum to view the fossil bones, the stuffed animals, the portraits, and even meet Charles Willson Peale himself, who had fought in the Revolutionary War, was active in local politics, had studied painting under Benjamin West in London, and had already painted five famous portraits of General Washington. The Delaware River front was another colorful sight; it was from there that three years earlier the Empress of China had sailed on her pioneer voyage to Canton in China. Now the shops in Philadelphia were able to offer everything from tea, cocoa, China silk and ivory fans to Spanish oranges, French soaps and Carolina rice. Every so often a load of indentured servants would arrive on the docks, strong young men and likely young women from Ireland, Scotland or the German states, whose time would be sold right there on the docks to the highest bidder.
On Wednesday and Saturday mornings the market opened early, with newly caught fish laid out, fresh meat, butter, vegetables, fruit, and by daybreak already so crowded one could hardly make way through its aisles. America, restless to be self-sufficient, was more and more manufacturing her own products and proud of it. In the newspapers, Mr. Long, “Cabinet-Maker, late of London,” advertised French sofas in the latest fashion. Gordon on Arch Street would fashion a pair of boots complete in nine hours for any person choosing to leave his measures. Dr. Baker sold his “well-known antiscorbutic dentifrice and Albion essence.” Toothbrushes were just coming into fashion, and they were still considered somewhat effete; if a gentleman wished to sweeten his breath, he rubbed his teeth with a rag dipped in snuff. Along the streets at brief intervals stood the famous Philadelphia pumps with their iron handles. But the city was not healthy in summer, and the drinking water barely drinkable. Flies and mosquitoes were a continual torment; householders were not overly particular where they threw their slops, and there were complaints of dead animals lying in the gutters. Prisoners from the jail were occasionally put to cleaning the streets and privies; known as the wheelbarrow men, they were shorn and wore shackles.
Evenings were spent by Convention members in talk at the City Tavern, the Indian Queen, the George, and the Black Horse, often in preparation for the next day’s meeting. There was much conviviality. After the fashion of the day – or perhaps of conventions anywhere, anytime – large amounts of drink were consumed; one account of a dinner for twelve included sixty bottles of Madeira. To some delegates Philadelphia was a city dangerously lax in morals and rife with luxury, fond of dancing, clamoring after a new theater to be built. George Mason had not been in town ten days when he complained of being tired “of the etiquette and nonsense so fashionable in this city.” French visitors, on the other hand, considered Philadelphia alarmingly virtuous, its maidens unbelievably prim. “The men are grave, the women serious. There are no finical airs to be found here, no libertine wives, no coffee-houses, no agreeable walks.” The Federal convention, in short, found itself in a busy, thriving, growing town, where one meets on its streets all nations and classes: Germans from the farms inland; sailors jabbering in outlandish tongues; French noblemen, returned since the peace to tour the country they had fought for; frontiersmen in fringed leggings; Quakers in their broad hats; Shawnee and Delaware Indians from the backwoods.
And always, bells rang and chimed above the city’s roofs. Twice a week, the evening bell announced the next morning’s market; after dinner a churchbell signaled that the library was open in Carpenters’ Hall. Hawkers rang their handbells along the morning streets, and on Sundays the churchbells made the day seem even quieter. At night from bed one could hear the watchman call the time and the weather every hour until dawn. If a man desired to catch the early coach out of town at two or three a.m., the watchman would wake him – a service peculiar to the city, and much appreciated by the visitors.
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Philadelphia during the Constitutional Convention
Feb 08 2012 Published by James Lorenz under Volume Four: Chapter Two: The Constitutional Convention, Volume Four: The Birth of a Nation
At three o’clock in the afternoon the meeting was adjourned, and the members stepped out into the Philadelphia summer. The city had much of interest to offer the delegates. There were bookstores and stationery shops where one could buy editions of Blackstone’s Commentaries in 4 vols. There was the Library Company, conveniently located only a block from the State House, on the second floor of Carpenters’ Hall, the same building where the First Continental Congress had met back in ’74. One could visit Mr. Peale’s Museum to view the fossil bones, the stuffed animals, the portraits, and even meet Charles Willson Peale himself, who had fought in the Revolutionary War, was active in local politics, had studied painting under Benjamin West in London, and had already painted five famous portraits of General Washington. The Delaware River front was another colorful sight; it was from there that three years earlier the Empress of China had sailed on her pioneer voyage to Canton in China. Now the shops in Philadelphia were able to offer everything from tea, cocoa, China silk and ivory fans to Spanish oranges, French soaps and Carolina rice. Every so often a load of indentured servants would arrive on the docks, strong young men and likely young women from Ireland, Scotland or the German states, whose time would be sold right there on the docks to the highest bidder.
On Wednesday and Saturday mornings the market opened early, with newly caught fish laid out, fresh meat, butter, vegetables, fruit, and by daybreak already so crowded one could hardly make way through its aisles. America, restless to be self-sufficient, was more and more manufacturing her own products and proud of it. In the newspapers, Mr. Long, “Cabinet-Maker, late of London,” advertised French sofas in the latest fashion. Gordon on Arch Street would fashion a pair of boots complete in nine hours for any person choosing to leave his measures. Dr. Baker sold his “well-known antiscorbutic dentifrice and Albion essence.” Toothbrushes were just coming into fashion, and they were still considered somewhat effete; if a gentleman wished to sweeten his breath, he rubbed his teeth with a rag dipped in snuff. Along the streets at brief intervals stood the famous Philadelphia pumps with their iron handles. But the city was not healthy in summer, and the drinking water barely drinkable. Flies and mosquitoes were a continual torment; householders were not overly particular where they threw their slops, and there were complaints of dead animals lying in the gutters. Prisoners from the jail were occasionally put to cleaning the streets and privies; known as the wheelbarrow men, they were shorn and wore shackles.
Evenings were spent by Convention members in talk at the City Tavern, the Indian Queen, the George, and the Black Horse, often in preparation for the next day’s meeting. There was much conviviality. After the fashion of the day – or perhaps of conventions anywhere, anytime – large amounts of drink were consumed; one account of a dinner for twelve included sixty bottles of Madeira. To some delegates Philadelphia was a city dangerously lax in morals and rife with luxury, fond of dancing, clamoring after a new theater to be built. George Mason had not been in town ten days when he complained of being tired “of the etiquette and nonsense so fashionable in this city.” French visitors, on the other hand, considered Philadelphia alarmingly virtuous, its maidens unbelievably prim. “The men are grave, the women serious. There are no finical airs to be found here, no libertine wives, no coffee-houses, no agreeable walks.” The Federal convention, in short, found itself in a busy, thriving, growing town, where one meets on its streets all nations and classes: Germans from the farms inland; sailors jabbering in outlandish tongues; French noblemen, returned since the peace to tour the country they had fought for; frontiersmen in fringed leggings; Quakers in their broad hats; Shawnee and Delaware Indians from the backwoods.
And always, bells rang and chimed above the city’s roofs. Twice a week, the evening bell announced the next morning’s market; after dinner a churchbell signaled that the library was open in Carpenters’ Hall. Hawkers rang their handbells along the morning streets, and on Sundays the churchbells made the day seem even quieter. At night from bed one could hear the watchman call the time and the weather every hour until dawn. If a man desired to catch the early coach out of town at two or three a.m., the watchman would wake him – a service peculiar to the city, and much appreciated by the visitors.
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