The 35,000-Person City That Emptied in One Day in 1776

Philadelphia in 1776 was America's largest city and its most dangerous place to declare independence. From the July 8th reading of the Declaration to the December 12th evacuation when half the city fled, this film traces why the danger came from inside the grid. It covers smallpox and poisoned wells, the British blockade of the Delaware and 130 ships off New York, collapsing paper money, loyalist arrests, and the 1,500 enslaved people who heard liberty proclaimed.