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Listen to the song “History Has Its Eyes on You” from the Broadway musical Hamilton. In it, George Washington sings about the birth of America during the Revolutionary War.
Thomas Paine’s famous pamphlet Common Sense was published in 1776. The following excerpt explains why it was important to declare freedom from Great Britain:
Youth is the seed time of good habits, as well in nations as in individuals. It might be difficult, if not impossible, to form the Continent into one government half a century hence. The vast variety of interests, occasioned by an increase of trade and population, would create confusion. Colony would be against colony. Each being able might scorn each other’s assistance; and while the proud and the foolish gloried in their little distinctions, the wise would lament, that the union had not been formed before. Wherefore, the PRESENT TIME is the TRUE TIME for establishing it.
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Making Connections
Text-to-Self
After reading this book, what do you think life would have been like for you if you were alive during the Revolutionary War?
Text-to-Text
Have you read any other books about what life was like during the Revolutionary War? Did you learn any new information from those books?
Text-to-World
How did America’s independence after the Revolutionary War change or affect other parts of the world?