Morristown was the first national historical park in the NPS system, created via a bill signed by Herbert Hoover on March 2, 1933. Fifteen years later President Harry S. Truman created Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia when on June 28, 1948 he signed Public Law 795, seventy-five (75) years ago today. The development of Independence Hall and associated structures as a tourist site just after the Second World War was greatly influenced by the work of John D. Rockefeller Jr. and others at Colonial Williamsburg around the time of the Revolutionary War sesquicentennial in the 1920s and 1930s. One really cannot understand historic sites as historic sites without understanding the provenance behind how they got that way. The photograph we see here was taken in early October 1948, just over three months after Truman signed the Independence NHP enabling legislation. He is of course the one on the right and standing with Philadelphia Mayor Bernard Samuel. This visit was a campaign stop in the middle of his re-election bid that one month later would produce the famous “Dewey Defeats Truman” headline in the Chicago Daily Tribune. When this photo was taken that autumn day in 1948 he signed the visitor log: “Harry S. Truman, Independence, Mo.: temporary address: 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D.C.”

(image/Harry S. Truman Library & Museum)