He’s not the only “impoverished Caribbean orphan who immigrated to the United States,” as
the flack for the New York Historical Society describes him in a press release. But I’d bet he’s the
only one ever to be given an exhibition by the society. The reason,
of course, is that this particular impoverished Caribbean orphan immigrant
was Alexander Hamilton.
“Alexander Hamilton: The Man Who Made Modern
America” explores his life and times, and offers what is described as
“an unprecedented array of more than 150 original documents, letters, paintings and artifacts —
many of which have not previously been publicly displayed.” The exhibition is to include:
+ The pistols used in the duel with Vice President Aaron Burr, who killed
him.
+ A rare version of the Declaration of Independence printed in Boston in July
1776.
+ Benjamin Franklin’s signed, personal copy of the
Constitution of the United States.
+ The Federalist Papers.
+ More than
30 portraits of leading figures from the founding era, including iconic portraits of
Jefferson and Washington by Rembrandt Peale.
+ Minutes from the New York Manumission
Society, which remain unpublished to this day.
+ Hamilton’s handwritten drafts for
Washington’s Farewell Address, which he ghostwrote.
Some of them would make me go “Ooooh!” So if you’d like to see them and learn more about
1) “the force behind the ratification of the Constitution”; 2) the “financial genius” who founded
the Bank of the United States”; 3) “an ardent opponent of slavery and a founding member of the
New York Manumission Society”; and 4) the “hard-hitting journalist who founded the New York
Post” a couple of centuries before Rupert Murdoch tucked it like a toy whistle into his pocket, get
thee to 170 Central Park West (between 76th and 77th Streets). The exhibition opens Friday and
runs through Feb. 28, 2005.
Don’t have the time? Don’t live in New York and can’t get here for it? You’ll have to settle for
a virtual tour of
the exhibition, or you could settle in at home with either Ron Chernow’s recent biography or Robert Brookhiser’s
earlier biography. Fair warning: Chernow’s the liberal,
Brookhiser’s the conservative.
