| 1740/00/00 |
John Smibert |
Architect |
Funded by merchant Peter Faneuil, Faneuil Hall is built with an open ground floor and a town meeting room above, 1740-1742. |
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| 1742/00/00 |
Shem Drowne |
Craftsman |
Peter Faneuil commissions Shem Drowne to craft a weathervane for Faneuil Hall. Drowne made a copper grasshopper weathervane gilded with gold leaf with glass eyes. |
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| 1746/00/00 |
Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company of Massachusetts |
Headquarters |
Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company of Massachusetts move to Faneuil Hall. Daniel Webster, Charles Sumner, Frederick Douglass, John F Kennedy and Wendell Phillips delivered speeches in this hall. Top floor is a museum, library and armory. |
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| 1755/11/18 |
Shem Drowne |
Craftsman |
The Cape Ann Earthquake topples Shem Drowne's Grasshopper Weathervane from the spire at Faneuil Hall in Boston. Shem and his son Thomas will repair it and remount it. |
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| 1762/00/00 |
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Faneuil Hall is destroyed by fire, nothing but the brick walls remained. It was rebuilt by Boston in 1762. |
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| 1770/02/26 |
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With 500 children walking in front of the bier and 6 of his school mates caring the pall, Christopher Seider's casket, inscribed with "innocence itself is not safe", leaves Faneuil Hall. |
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Death of Christopher Seider |
| 1773/11/29 |
Samuel Adams |
Ringleader |
Before a crowd of 5000 in and around Faneuil Hall, Samuel Adams' resolution, "that the tea should not be landed - that it should be sent back in the same bottom to the place whence it came, at all events, and that no duty should be paid on it," is adopted |
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Boston Tea Party |
| 1806/00/00 |
Charles Bulfinch |
Architect |
Charles Bulfinch remodels the hall, doubling its height and width, adding a third floor, enclosing the open arcades and moving the cupola to the opposite end of the building. |
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| 1810/00/00 |
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Gilbert Stuart's painting of George "Washington at Dorchester Heights" hangs at Fanueil Hall. |
Washington at Dorchester Heights (painting) |
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| 1820/10/02 |
Daniel Webster |
Speaker |
Daniel Webster gives the main address in favor of free trade at a meeting of New England importers in Faneuil Hall in Boston. |
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| 1824/08/26 |
Marquis de Lafayette |
National Guest |
In the lower hall, Lafayette attends a ceremony at Faneuil Hall, the "consecrated cradle of America, and I hope, of universal liberty." |
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Lafayette's Triumphal Tour of America |
| 1826/08/02 |
Daniel Webster |
Speaker |
Daniel Webster delivers a 2 hour eulogy of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. "A superior and commanding human intellect, a truly great man, when Heaven vouchsafes so rare a gift ...." DW |
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| 1833/05/00 |
Sally Foster Otis |
Benefactor |
The Boston Ladies Fair, led by Mrs Harrison Gray Otis, at Faneuil Hall raises $11,000 for the Samuel Howe's New England Institution for the Education of the Blind. |
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| 1837/12/07 |
Wendell Phillips |
Abolitionist Speaker |
As Bostonians gathered at Faneuil Hall to discuss Elijah P Lovejoy's murder in Alton, Attorney general James T Austin compares the killers to 1776 patriots who fought against the British. Phillips praises Lovejoy as a defender of liberty. |
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Abolitionist Movement |
| 1837/12/07 |
William Ellery Channing |
Abolitionist |
William Ellery Channing sponsores an antislavery meeting at Faneuil Hall, Boston. |
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Abolitionist Movement |
| 1837/12/18 |
Samuel Joseph May |
Author |
In a letter to William Garrison, Samuel May is critical of the Boston city government for objecting to using Faneuil Hall as an antislavery meeting sponsored by William Ellery Channing. |
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Abolitionist Movement |
| 1837/12/18 |
William Lloyd Garrison |
Addressee |
In a letter to William Garrison, Samuel May is critical of the Boston city government for objecting to using Faneuil Hall as an antislavery meeting sponsored by William Ellery Channing. |
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Abolitionist Movement |
| 1854/05/26 |
Thomas Wentworth Higginson |
Abolitionist |
Between three to five thousand antislavery protesters attend the Great Meeting Organize by the Boston Vigilance Committee (BVC) to aid Anthony Burns. |
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Fugitive Slave Trial of Anthony Burns |
| 1899/00/00 |
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Faneuil Hall is entirely rebuilt to be fire resistant, 1898-1899. |
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| 1917/04/11 |
Pauline Agassiz Shaw |
In Memoriam |
2,000 mourners, including Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts David Walsh, attend a Memorial service held on Easter Sunday for Pauline Agassiz Shaw. |
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| 1979/11/07 |
Edward Kennedy |
Politics |
Senator Edward M Kennedy announces his candidacy for President of the United States. |
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