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How Did the Hall Gets Its Name?

This week our online documents collection has grown with the addition of news accounts and other primary sources from the Marquis de Lafayette’s visit to Independence Hall in 1824. As Philadelphians prepared to honor the “nation’s guest,” they began to refer to the east room in the old Pennsylvania State House as the Hall of Independence — beginning a transition to the name “Independence Hall” for the building where independence was declared in 1776 and where the Constitutional Convention met in 1787.  For teachers and researchers interested in this topic, primary sources from the work of the Lafayette Reception Committee are in the collections of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.