Category Archives: Rufus King

Rufus King, 1755-1827

24 Tuesday Mar 2020

Posted by in Rufus King, Those we remember

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Rufus King as portrayed by Gilbert Stuart circa 1820

Founding Father Rufus King was born on this date 265 years ago today, March 24, 1755. I do not want to write too much about King right now because I am currently working on a project relating to this forgotten early American, a drafter of the Constitution, and want to save my thoughts for that undertaking. In the meantime check out this piece I wrote last summer about visiting King Manor in Queens. I had intended to write about King more this past winter but got caught up in other things. I’ll say one about the self-isolating thing: it helps one be productive and get some work done. I was texting yesterday with a friend of mine, an intelligent person who works at a New York cultural institution currently closed due to the health crisis, saying I felt I must spend this time as fruitfully as possible amidst so much turmoil and loss. He said he understood and was doing the same.

Hopefully by summer everything will be back to normal, or at least a semblance of what passes for normal in our current historical moment. Among other things I want to return to Queens to see the King family’s final resting place around the corner from King Manor. The church grounds where they lay is only open certain hours in the morning, which I did not know at the time of my first visit. I saw the graveyard itself but had no way from the sidewalk on the other side of the gate where specifically he and his family within the grounds. People walk past every day without knowing that in their midst lies this Constitutional framer, three-term U.S. senator from New York, vice-presidential and presidential candidate.

(image/National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution)

Constitution Day

17 Tuesday Sep 2019

Posted by in Alexander Hamilton, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, James Madison, Rufus King

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Audience at FDR’s Constitution Day speech, September 17, 1937

Today, September 17, is Constitution Day. It was on this date in 1787 that the Framers met for the final time to sign the document they had written over that contentious summer. It was never a sure thing and was still not a done deal; after that the Constitution went to the states for ratification, a process that took several years as state delegates argued for and against. It was in this period that Hamilton, Jay, and Madison authored The Federalist.

Constitution Day is one of those holidays, like Flag Day and Evacuation Day, that used to be a significant part of American culture but that are hardly remembered today. We would do wise to keep in mind what we stand to lose; if we have learned anything over the past few years it is that our world is more fragile than we would like to think. Many thousands used to turn out in places like Brooklyn’s Prospect Park and Borough Hall for speeches and parades. There is still some of that. The Rufus King Manor in Queens, for instance, is having its annual observation and fundraiser today. King himself was one of the drafters of the Constitution and was there in Philadelphia for most of the convention. Other events are undoubtedly taking place elsewhere.

President Roosevelt gave his 1937 Constitution Day speech during his Supreme Court packing initiative, largely seen today as one of the major blunders of his administration.

Here are two images from the 1937 Constitution.Day. President Roosevelt spoke that evening at the base of the Washington Monument. One can see the seriousness on his face. That is because this event came during his notorious Courting Packing controversy and he was trying to rally support. The thing never went his way and it is justifiably seen as a low mark in his twelve year presidency.

(images/Library of Congress)

 

The King Manor of Jamaica, Queens

07 Wednesday Aug 2019

Posted by in Federal Hall National Memorial, Founding Fathers, Heritage tourism, Incorporating New York (book manuscript project), Interpretation, John Alsop King (1788-1867), Philip Schuyler, Rufus King

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King Manor, Jamaica Queens

I ventured to Queens today for a visit to the King Manor. It is part of my wider project to visit places affiliated in one manner or another with Federal Hall. The home belonged to Rufus King, one of the lesser known but well-deserving Founding Fathers. King was born in what is now Maine and fought in the Revolutionary War before serving in the Confederation Congress. He helped write the Constitution and then served in the First Congress, where he worked in the upper chamber alongside Philip Schuyler as a New York senator. His son John Alsop King took over the house after his father’s death in 1827. The name John A. King fang faintly familiar and when I got home I checked the draft of “Incorporating New York,” my manuscript about Civil War Era New York City, and realized he was a minor figure in my narrative; King the Younger was defeated by Edwin D. Morgan in the 1858 New York gubernatorial election. Until today though the name John A. King had just been a name in a history book. That’s why place is so important.

King Manor library

King Manor became a historic site in 1900, the house itself owned by the New York City Parks Department and managed by the King Manor Association. As best I can tell, this is still the arrangement 120 years on. A perusal of online newspapers shows the house was used rigorously for various things and by various organizations over the decades. This would make sense. Queens developed later than the other buroughs and there probably much less infrastructure where groups could have gathered. Jamaica was more Long Island than New York City. The Daughters of the American Revolution, for one, created a Rufus King Chapter in 1918 during the Great War that met at the spacious house. The D.A.R. met there for decades. Like much of New York King Manor struggled in the harsh years before gentrification. In 1973 some punk teenagers started a fire on the porch that almost burned down the then-almost 250-year-old house. Thankfully the custodian kept it in check before the firemen arrived and put it out.

The tour was led by an extraordinary young person who incredibly is still in high school. There is no way I could have pulled off something like that when I was that age. I asked the person when they began at the house and the answer was July, just last month. I had to ask again because I thought I’d heard wrong. The is something about watching Interpretation done well. And when it’s done by a person so young and just starting out, it is that much more incredible.