The Continental Congress voted to break from Great Britain on July 2, 1776, and approved the text of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, but it took weeks for the news to spread throughout the new country and even longer to reach the country they were breaking from and the countries with whom they hoped to find alliances. Along the way, people learned the news from printed broadsides, newspapers, public readings, and letters from friends. I’m joined in this episode by Dr. Emily Sneff, author of When the Declaration of Independence Was News.

Our theme song is “Frogs Legs Rag,” composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “Yankee Doodle,” performed by the U.S. Army Chorus, featuring MSG Michael White and SSG Matthew Bell of The Old Guard Fife and Drum Corps; the composition and audio are in the public domain. The episode image is the Dunlap Broadside of the Declaration of Independence, printed in John Dunlap’s Philadelphia shop on the night of July 4, 1776; the image is in the public domain and is available via the Library of Congress.

Additional Sources:

• “Declaration of Independence (1776),” The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration.
• “Diary of John Adams, volume 3: Wednesday, May 15, 1776,” Adams Papers Digital Editions.
• “Virginia’s Independence Resolution, May 15, 1776,” Colonial Williamsburg.
• “Delegate Discussions: The Lee Resolution(s),” by Emily Sneff, The Declaration Resources Project, Democratic Knowledge Project, June 07, 2018.
• “Jefferson's ‘original Rough draught’ of the Declaration of Independence,” reconstructed by Julian Boyd, from: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson. Vol. 1, 1760-1776. Ed. Julian P. Boyd. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1950, pp 243-247.
• “The Declaration of Independence and the Pursuit of Equality,” The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.
• “Watch How (Slowly) News of the Declaration of Independence Spread in Real Time,” by Ben Panko, Smithsonian Magazine, July 11, 2017.
• “Rare Book of the Month: A Revolutionary Woman and the Declaration of Independence,” by Wendi Maloney, Timeless: Stories from the Library of Congress, Library of Congress Blogs, May 19, 2018.
• “Mary Katherine Goddard's Declaration of Independence,” by Mark Boonshoft, New York Public Library, June 29, 2016.

The Statue of Liberty and the Empire State Building loom large in the American imagination, symbolizing the conflicting ideas of liberty and empire; their meanings and characters have shifted over time as the American ethos has shifted. Joining me in this episode is writer, historian, and freelance editor, Dr. Vaneesa Cook, author of Empire and Liberty: The Tied Histories of Two American Landmarks.

Our theme song is “Frogs Legs Rag,” composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode audio is “Hail to the spirit of liberty,” composed by John Philip Sousa and performed by Prince’s Orchestra in New York City on January 11, 1912; the audio is in the public domain and is available via the Library of Congress National Jukebox. The episode image is a photograph of NASA’s prototype space shuttle Enterprise, mounted atop a NASA 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft 905, during a flyover of New York City on Friday, April 27, 2012; the photographer was Bill Ingalls, and the government image is in the public domain.

Additional Sources:

• “Body of Iron, Soul of Fire: The Statue of Liberty,” by Jessie Kratz, National Archive Pieces of History, October 14, 2024.
• “Liberty Island Chronology,” Statue of Liberty, National Park Service.
• “Letter from Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi (1834–1904) to his mother, June 24, 1871,” Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi Papers, Manuscripts and Archives Division, New York Public Library.
• “Édouard Laboulaye and the Statue of Liberty: Forging the Democratic Experience,” by Stephen W. Sawyer, La lettre du Collège de France, 4, 2008-2009.
• “Gov. Alfred Emanuel Smith,” National Governors Association.
• “Oral history interviews with John J. Raskob family,” Hagley Digital Archives.
• “John J. Raskob Dies of a Heart Attack,” New York Times, October 16, 1950.
• “How the Empire State Building Was Built in Record Time,” by Tim Ott, History.com, Originally published October 10, 2024 and updated November 03, 2025.

Today the US handbag market is estimated to be nearly $12 billion, with most of the purchasing done by women, but into the early 20th Century purses hadn’t yet become the nearly-exclusive domain of women. The integration of pockets into men’s clothing, and the marketing push of toiletry items to women in the 1920s and 1930s drove this differentiated market development. Joining me in this episode is Dr. Kathleen B. Casey, Professor of History and Director of the Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program at Furman University and author of The Things She Carried: A Cultural History of the Purse in America.

Our theme song is “Frogs Legs Rag,” composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “Pack up your troubles in your old kit bag,” composed by Felix Powell with lyrics by George Asaf” and recorded in Camden, New Jersey, on December 22, 1916; the performance is in the public domain and is available via the LIbrary of Congress National Jukebox. The episode image is “Shoppers. Amsterdam, New York,” photographed by John Collier, Jr.; the photograph was taken in October 1941, and is available in the public domain via the Library of Congress.

Related Episodes:

• Fashion, Feminism, and the New Woman of the late 19th Century
• French Fashion in Gilded Age America
• Amelia Bloomer
• The Women who Entered the Federal Workforce during the Civil War Era
• The History of Blue Jeans
• Ericka Huggins & the Black Panther Party
• The 1966 Compton's Cafeteria Riot
• Alice Roosevelt Longworth

Additional Sources:

• “Ötzi the Iceman: Examining New Evidence from the Famous Copper Age Mummy,” by: M. Vidale, L. Bondioli, D.W. Frayer, M. Gallinaro and A. Vanzetti, Penn Museum Expedition Magazine, Volume 58 / Number 2, 2016.
• “MALE ATTIRE.; Charlotte P. Gilman Inveighs Against It but Finds Redeeming Features.” From The Independent, New York Times, March 5, 1905.
• “What you may not know about the Triangle shirtwaist factory fire,” by Peter Liebhold, National Museum of American History, September 5, 2018.
• “The Surprising Origins of Kotex Pads,” by Kat Eschner, Smithsonian Magazine, Originally published August 11, 2017, and updated November 9, 2018.
• “Handbag Market (2026 - 2033),” Grand View Research, GVR Clothing, Footwear & Accessories Research Team, April 2026