Skip to main content

In Transit

March 2023
1min read


The city of Philadelphia, which artist David J. Kennedy has so winningly recaptured for us in this issue (see pages 17-32), has not always been the only place where the Liberty Bell could be viewed. In mid-June of 1903, the venerable noisemaker (below), bedecked with wreaths- including one shaped like the bell itself—was put on a special railroad flat car and transported to Boston for the 128th anniversary celebration of the Battle of Bunker Hill. Lewis S. Milts of East Hartford photographed the strange cargo as it passed through Plainfield, Connecticut, obviously much admired by a surprised public.

We hope you enjoy our work.

Please support this 72-year tradition of trusted historical writing and the volunteers that sustain it with a donation to American Heritage.

Donate

Stories published from "December 1971"

Authored by: Basil Burwell

THE EARNEST QUAKER JOHN WOOLMAN PREACHED AND ACTUALLY PRACTICED THE BROTHERHOOD OF MAN

Authored by: Edgar P. Richardson

The simple, affectionate water colors of an unassuming Scots immigrant, David J. Kennedy, bring back the Philadelphia of 1876 and our first great world’s fair

Authored by: Lincoln Barnett

The law was against the poor printer. The governor wanted his scalp. His attorneys were disbarred. Could anything save him—and free speech?

Authored by: Richard Schickel

Superstar of the Silents

Authored by: Richard Reinhardt

One day San Franciscans suddenly learned that their city was the property of a Frenchman, one Monsieur Limantour

Authored by: Richard M. Ketchum
Overcoming painful ailments, Greene emerged from the Revolution with a military reputation second only to that of George Washington.
Authored by: Richard B. Morris

“So convenient a thing it is to be a reasonable creature , since it enables one to find or make a reason for everything one has a mind to do’

Featured Articles

Rarely has the full story been told about how a famed botanist, a pioneering female journalist, and First Lady Helen Taft battled reluctant bureaucrats to bring Japanese cherry trees to Washington. 

Often thought to have been a weak president, Carter was strong-willed in doing what he thought was right, regardless of expediency or the political fallout.

Why have thousands of U.S. banks failed over the years? The answers are in our history and politics.

In his Second Inaugural Address, Abraham Lincoln embodied leading in a time of polarization, political disagreement, and differing understandings of reality.

Native American peoples and the lands they possessed loomed large for Washington, from his first trips westward as a surveyor to his years as President.