1776: After Evacuation Day, with Professor Robert J. Allison

The South Boston Branch Library is pleased to welcome back Professor Robert J. Allison for a special presentation on 1776 and its connection to South Boston. The year 1776 opened with great optimism—George Washington raised a new flag at Prospect Hill, Thomas Paine published Common Sense, and in March the British evacuated Boston. When Congress declared Independence in July, American independence seemed assured. But then disaster struck, as 30,000 British troops arrived in New York to crush Washington’s army. Could the Americans survive? We will explore the eventful year of 1776. Robert J. Allison, a professor of history at Suffolk University, also teaches in the Harvard Extension School. He has written a series of short books about the American Revolution, on the histories of Boston and of Cape Cod, as well as longer works on the Barbary Wars and Naval hero Stephen Decatur. He edited an edition of The Interesting Narrative of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African. Allison created two classes for The Teaching Company’s series “The Great Courses,” on colonial America (“Before 1776: Life in the American Colonies) and “The Age of Benjamin Franklin,” drawn from his teaching which has covered all phases of American history, though his primary focus is the American Revolution and the early American republic. He is president of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, a scholarly organization which publishes primary documents on early American history, a life-trustee of the USS Constitution Museum, and as chair of Revolution 250 Allison hosts its weekly podcast, a series of conversations on the Revolution with historians, museum curators, and re-enactors. Accessibility Notice: We strive to make our events accessible. To request a disability accommodation and/or language services, contact the department listed in the "Contact Info" pane on the right. Please allow at least two weeks to arrange accommodation.