BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN & THE STREETS OF PHILADELPHIA

The Beans & The Boss in a private session

After visiting Atlantic City, The Beans were invited by Bruce Springsteen to have dinner. The Boss surprised them with an unplugged and private concert where he played lots of fantastic songs. 

Bruce Springsteen is one of the most important singers and composers of the history. He and his incredible band have created the soundtrack of millions of people around the world. Springsteen's music has a personal style and his lyrics are full of social critic and hope. He's like Charles Dickens nowadays offering hope for the no-hoppers. It's very difficult to choose only one song of all his compositions but if The Grandma has to choose, she decides Thunder Road, a song that talks about not surrender, not give up and continue in the search of our dreams and happiness.

More information: Bruce Springsteen

 

The Grandma & The Cold Case Team

The Beans have continued their travel to Washington, DC but they have decided to stop in Philadelphia. 

The Grandma wants to talk to Lili Rush and Scotty Valens two detectives of the Philadelphia PD division who are specialized in investigating cold cases. The Grandma has contracted their services in a private way to try to discover what happened with Corto, her lover, who disappeared some decades ago without a trace.

While the Grandma was talking with Rush and Valens, the rest of the family visited this beautiful city, witness of the most important events during the Revolutionary War and nowadays, symbol of tolerance, freedom and open mind thinking.

More information: Philadelphia Government

 

The Beans visiting Liberty Bell

Philadelphia is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the sixth-most populous city in the United States, with an estimated population of 1,567,872. 

Philadelphia is the economic and cultural anchor of the Delaware Valley, located along the lower Delaware and Schuylkill Rivers, within both the Mid-Atlantic region and the Northeast megalopolis. The Delaware Valley's population of 7.2 million ranks it as the eighth-largest combined statistical area in the United States.

Before Europeans arrived, the Philadelphia area was home to the Lenape (Delaware) Indians in the village of Shackamaxon. The Lenape are a Native American tribe and First Nations band government. They are also called Delaware Indians, and their historical territory was along the Delaware River watershed, western Long Island, and the Lower Hudson Valley. Most Lenape were pushed out of their Delaware homeland during the 18th century by expanding European colonies, exacerbated by losses from intertribal conflicts. Lenape communities were weakened by newly introduced diseases, mainly smallpox, and violent conflict with Europeans. 

More information: Lenape Lifeways

Maps of Philadelphia, 1681

The American Revolutionary War and United States' independence pushed them further west. In the 1860s, the United States government sent most Lenape remaining in the eastern United States to the Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma and surrounding territory) under the Indian removal policy. 

In the 21st century, most Lenape reside in Oklahoma, with some communities living also in Wisconsin, Ontario (Canada) and their traditional homelands.

William Penn, an English Quaker, founded the city in 1682 to serve as capital of the Pennsylvania Colony. Philadelphia played an instrumental role in the American Revolution as a meeting place for the Founding Fathers of the United States, who signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776 at the Second Continental Congress, and the Constitution at the Philadelphia Convention of 1787. 

Several other key events occurred in Philadelphia during the Revolutionary War including the First Continental Congress, the preservation of the Liberty Bell, the Battle of Germantown, and the Siege of Fort Mifflin. 

More information: Civil War

The Grandma with her Liberty Bell souvenir

Philadelphia was one of the nation's capitals during the revolution, and served as temporary U.S. capital while Washington, D.C., was under construction. In the 19th century, Philadelphia became a major industrial center and a railroad hub. 

The city grew from an influx of European immigrants, most of whom came from Ireland, Italy and Germany, the three largest reported ancestry groups in the city as of 2015. 

In the early 20th century, Philadelphia became a prime destination for African Americans during the Great Migration after the Civil War, as well as Puerto Ricans. The city's population doubled from one million to two million people between 1890 and 1950.

Finally, The Beans have decided to buy a little reproduction of Liberty Bell and travel around the world with her as a symbol of freedom, tolerance and respect.

More information: National Archives

I walked the avenue, 'til my legs felt like stone.
I heard the voices of friends vanished and gone

at night I could hear the blood in my veins.
It was just as black and whispering as the rain

on the Streets of Philadelphia.

Bruce Springsteen

JULY 4, 1776: THE UNITED STATES INDEPENDENCE

The US Declaration of Independence

Independence Day, also referred to as the Fourth of July or July Fourth, is a federal holiday in the United States commemorating the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. The Continental Congress declared that the thirteen American colonies regarded themselves as a new nation, the United States of America, and were no longer part of the British Empire. The Congress actually voted to declare independence two days earlier, on July 2.

Independence Day is commonly associated with fireworks, parades, barbecues, carnivals, fairs, picnics, concerts, baseball games, family reunions, and political speeches and ceremonies, in addition to various other public and private events celebrating the history, government, and traditions of the United States. Independence Day is the National Day of the United States.

More information: History.com

During the American Revolution, the legal separation of the Thirteen Colonies from Great Britain in 1776 actually occurred on July 2, when the Second Continental Congress voted to approve a resolution of independence that had been proposed in June by Richard Henry Lee of Virginia declaring the United States independent from Great Britain rule. 

After voting for independence, Congress turned its attention to the Declaration of Independence, a statement explaining this decision, which had been prepared by a Committee of Five, with Thomas Jefferson as its principal author. 

Signing of the Declaration of Independence, 1776

Congress debated and revised the wording of the Declaration, finally approving it two days later on July 4. A day earlier, John Adams had written to his wife Abigail:

The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forever more.

Adams's prediction was off by two days. From the outset, Americans celebrated independence on July 4, the date shown on the much-publicized Declaration of Independence, rather than on July 2, the date the resolution of independence was approved in a closed session of Congress.

More information: The Declaration of Independence

Held since 1785, the Bristol Fourth of July Parade in Bristol, Rhode Island is the oldest continuous Independence Day celebration in the United States.

I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past. 

Thomas Jefferson