Calendar of Historical Programs

Supporting scholarship and promoting popular understanding of the American Revolution is central to the work of the American Revolution Institute. The Institute welcomes distinguished scholars and authors to share their insights and discuss their latest research with the public at Anderson House through lectures, author's talks and panel discussions. The Institute also hosts a variety of other historical programs throughout the year, including our Lunch Bite object talks, battlefield tours, special Anderson House tour programs and other events. Many of the events we offer are free.

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May 2023

Lecture – On Tea, Taxes and World History: The British East India Company and the Origins of the American Revolution

May 24, 2023 @ 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm
Anderson House, 2118 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20008 United States
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In May 1773, Parliament passed the Tea Act, which instituted a tax of three cents per pound on all British tea sold in America. The act effectively granted a monopoly on the sale of tea in the American colonies to the British East India Company, which was looking to reduce its excessive stores of tea and relieve its financial burdens. To commemorate the 250th anniversary of the Tea Act’s passage, James Vaughn, a historian of the British Empire at the…

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June 2023

Author’s Talk – Disunion Among Ourselves: The Perilous Politics of the American Revolution

June 7, 2023 @ 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm
Anderson House, 2118 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20008 United States
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Far from a harmonious collaboration, the Continental Congress during the Revolutionary War was so filled with political strife that the delegates feared the Revolutionary War would end in disunion or civil war. But instead of disbanding, these founders managed to unite for the sake of liberty and self-preservation, forging grueling compromises and holding the young nation together. Political historian Eli Merritt discusses his new book and explores the deep political divisions that almost tore the Union apart during the Revolution.…

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Author’s Talk – Prisoners of Congress: Philadelphia’s Quakers in Exile, 1777-1778

June 20, 2023 @ 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm
Anderson House, 2118 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20008 United States
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In 1777, Congress labeled a group of Philadelphia Quakers who refused to help defend the city against the imminent invasion by British troops as “the most Dangerous Enemies America knows.” They ordered Pennsylvania to apprehend them. In response, state officials sent twenty men—seventeen of them Quakers—into exile, banishing them to Virginia, where they were held for over seven months. Reconstructing this moment in American history through the experiences of four families—the Drinkers, Fishers, Pembertons and Gilpins—historian Norman Donoghue discusses how the…

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Author’s Talk – Washington’s Marines: The Origins of the Corps and the American Revolution, 1775-1777

June 27, 2023 @ 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm
Anderson House, 2118 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20008 United States
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In the early days of the Revolutionary War, the Continental Congress rushed to form an army but soon realized that, to win its freedom, America would need men who could fight both on land and sea. Enter the Marines. As Washington struggled to preserve his command after defeats in New York and New Jersey in 1776, the nascent U.S. Navy and Marines deployed the first American fleet, conducted their first amphibious operation, and waged a war on the rivers and…

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July 2023

Lecture – The Franco-British Struggle for Global Hegemony and the Career of Lt. Col. Dupleix de Cadignan, 1755-1784

July 13, 2023 @ 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm
Anderson House, 2118 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20008 United States
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Jean-Baptiste Dupleix de Cadignan (1738-1824) entered the French army’s Régiment de Bourgogne-Infanterie as a lieutenant on April 15, 1754, five weeks before his sixteenth birthday. That same day, he began a diary that forms the basis for his over four-hundred page, two-volume journal owned by the Society of the Cincinnati. Commencing in April 1755, when he embarked for Louisbourg, Canada, Dupleix de Cadignan's journal describes his experience as a prisoner of war in July 1758, his exchange the following year…

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