Happy birthday, pamphleteer Thomas Paine

It is the birthday of American activist Thomas Paine (1737), whose pamphlet Common Sense (1776) inspired American colonists to take up arms against Great Britain. Scholars say it became the first American bestseller. As a percentage of population, more people had read Common Sense than watch the Super Bowl today. Paine also wrote The American Crisis (1776), which begins "These are the times that try men's souls: the summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country …" George Washington had it read to his soldiers. While living in England, Paine wrote The Rights of Man (1791), a defense of the French Revolution. That got him kicked out of England. Later, while imprisoned in France, he wrote The Age of Reason (1794), a treatise on theism and criticism of the church. When he returned to America, he discovered that his religious views had ruined his reputation. He died at age 72, abandoned by his friends and ridiculed by the public.

Happy birthday, artist Gilbert Stuart

It is the birthday of portrait artist Gilbert Stuart (1755), who is remembered for his remarkable portraits of George Washington and scores of other prominent people in early America. He was prolific, painting more than 1,100 portraits but was inflicted with depression and often bedridden for weeks. He was known for refusing to finish works with which he had become bored. Although well paid for his services, apparently he didn't manage his money well and often was close to bankruptcy. Along with John Singleton Copley, and Benjamin West, with whom he studied, Stuart is considered among the best early American portraitists.

Happy birthday, artist John Trumbull

It is the birthday of American Revolution artist John Trumbull (1756), who is best remembered for his painting, Declaration of Independence (1817), which was used on the reverse of the two-dollar bill. Trumbull created many historical paintings depicting events related to the American Revolutionary War, including The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker Hill (1786), The Death of General Montgomery in the Attack on Quebec (1786) and the Surrender of Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown (1820). Trumbull also painted portraits of George Washington and John Adams. His paintings are on display in the rotunda of the Capitol Building, the Boston Athenaeum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, New York City Hall, Yale University, Boston Museum of Fine Arts, and the National Museum of American History.

Happy birthday, Thomas Paine

Thomas Paine

It is the birthday of early American political activist Thomas Paine (1737), whose pamphlet Common Sense (1776) credited with inspiring American colonists to embrace the idea of independence from Great Britain. The American Revolution had already started but the work served to spur volunteers for the Continental Army. It was widely distributed throughout the colonies, read aloud in taverns, and unabashedly pirated. Some scholars say it was the first American bestseller.

A pamphlet series, The American Crisis (1776-1783), was first published in December of 1776, and served as inspiration to citizen soldiers fighting the British Army. George Washington had the first in the series read to his troops. That's the one that begins "These are the times that try men's souls: the summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country …"

Paine, who was born Thomas Pain and evidently added the "e" to the end himself, didn't start out as a revolutionary writer. He trained as a corset maker (his father's trade) and later had a shop of his own. The politics came later. In his mid 30s, while working as a excise officer, Paine wrote his first political piece, a 21-page article making a case to Parliament for better pay and working conditions for those in his profession. 

Eventually, Paine had his own tobacco shop but it went out of business and Paine sold everything to stay out of debtor's prison. He moved to London, where a mutual friend introduced him to Benjamin Franklin. It was Franklin who helped him emigrate to the colonies. He did so in 1774, but the voyage was so arduous that Paine arrived quite ill and had to be carried off the ship. Within a few months, though, he had recovered and he became editor of Pennsylvania Magazine.

In the early days of the republic, Paine took a role in negotiating loans from France to aid the fledgling United States. During his time in Paris, he lived with political activist Nicholas Bonneville and his wife and children. Later, he helped Bonneville's family get to America. Eventually, Bonneville joined them and lived for a time in America. In 1818, Bonneville returned to Paris and opened a bookshop.

Paine also wrote Rights of Man (1791), a treatise in support of the French Revolution. It makes the case that if the government doesn't safeguard the people and their natural rights, then popular political revolution is permissible.

Philip Freneau edited Jefferson's newspaper

Philip Freneau

It is the birthday of early American poet and newspaper editor Philip Freneau (1752), who was known as the poet of the American Revolution. He wrote poems and essays critical of the British rulers before the Revolutionary War. He served on an American privateer that attacked British ships. At the request of Thomas Jefferson, Freneau served as editor of the National Gazette, a partisan newspaper aimed at Alexander Hamilton's Federalists.

Freneau's father was a French Huguenot wine merchant, whose family settled in America after fleeing religious persecution in France. His mother was Scottish. Freneau was born in New York City and grew up in New Jersey. He graduated from College of New Jersey (later Princeton College) in 1771. He was a friend and classmate of James Madison, who was an unsuccessful suitor to his sister Mary. Aaron Burr was another classmate.

While he was a student, Freneau cowrote with Hugh Henry Brackenridge (later to become a justice of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court), Father Bombo's Pilgrimage to Mecca, a satire about a clergy who is commanded by an apparition to go to Mecca after plagiarizing the work of Lucian, the Assyrian satirist who wrote in ancient Rome and Greece. The book was said to be a novel about actual events and was one of the first novels published in America. As graduating seniors, he and Brackenridge also wrote A Poem, On the Rising Glory of America for their Commencement Day. (Freneau published his own version in 1786).

In 1776, Freneau went to the West Indies (where he wrote the poems The Beauties of Santa Cruz and The House of Night), but returned within two years and acquired ownership of a privateering ship, Aurora. He served on its crew, and when a British man-of-war captured the Aurora, Freneau was held on a British prison ship for six weeks. His poem The British Prison-Ship (1780) details the harsh treatment he received aboard the ship.

Ten years later, Freneau became assistant editor of a newspaper in New York. By then, Thomas Jefferson was Secretary of State and James Madison was active in national politics. They persuaded Freneau to become editor of a weekly Democratic-Republican newspaper they were creating to counter the views of The Gazette of the United States that carried the Federalist writing of Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, and John Adams. Jefferson and Madison's National Gazette regularly lambasted the Washington administration.

Freneau's first two collections of poems were Poetry (1786) and Miscellaneous Works (1788). He also produced collections published in 1795, 1809, and 1815. He wrote such poems as The Wild Honey Suckle (1786) and The Indian Burying Ground (1787).

Addison's play inspired American Revolution

Joseph Addison

It is the birthday of English essayist and playwright Joseph Addison (1672), whose play, Cato (1712), is believed to be a literary inspiration for the American Revolution. The play, which concerns the Roman statesman's final days, was popular in Britain, Ireland, and the American colonies. George Washington is said to have performed it for the Continental Army at Valley Forge. Scholars note that Patrick Henry's famous proclamation, "Give me liberty or give me death" is certainly a reference to a line in the play as is Nathan Hale's vow "I regret that I have but one life to lose for my country." Indeed, George Washington wrote in a letter praising Benedict Arnold (an act he no doubt later regretted) that "It is not in the power of any man to command success; but you have done more—you have deserved it," which scholars believe is a reference to "Tis not in mortals to command success; but we'll do more, Sempronius, we'll deserve it." The play is set at Utica as Cato the Younger awaits the arrival of Julius Caesar after Caesar's victory at Thapsus. Cato struggles with his personal beliefs in individual liberty and republicanism in the face of Caesar's tyrannical rule. In the end, Cato kills himself rather than live under Caesar's despotism. Addison also was known as an essayist. He helped his childhood friend Richard Steele start The Spectator, a daily sheet intended to make the discussion of philosophical issues accessible to the educated public in coffeehouses, clubs and at tea. The publication had a press run of about 3,000 copies but Addison estimated that the readership was far greater—about 60,000—because readers devoured them in subscribing coffeehouses. Maybe they also found Addison's work accessible because of his relaxed conversational writing style. Indeed, he earned the censure of renowned writers of the day for consistently ending a sentence with a preposition.

Happy birthday, Washington Irving

Washington Irving

It is the birthday of historian and author Washington Irving (1783), who is best known for his short stories Rip Van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, though he also wrote biographies of Muhammad, Oliver Goldsmith and George Washington as well as books on the Moors of Spain, the Alhambra and Christopher Columbus. Irving's work was popular in Europe and he may have been the first American best-selling author. he was a favorite of Charles Dickens, Lord Byron, Thomas Campbell and Sir Walter Scott. He offered encouragement to such American literary luminaries as Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Herman Melville and Edgar Allan Poe. Irving's nephew, Theodore Irving, wrote Conquest of Florida, a history of Florida under Hernando de Soto.