Natural / Environmental Change, Revolutionary: Benjamin Banneker and the Rise of the City

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Similar content addressed in SOLs: VS.1a-i; USI.1a-h; USI.8a

During the Revolutionary era, a cultural, economic, and political divide between people who lived in the city and people who lived in frontier country emerged. Each group of people had their own economic systems (agriculture in the frontier and the beginnings of a diverse merchant economy along the coast), different social interactions (people on the frontier were often interacting with Native Americans and people along the coast with a variety of travelers, sailors, and merchants), and different political structures in place.

  • Portrait of Benjamin Banneker from the cover of his 1795 Almanac, Courtesy of the Maryland Historical SocietyA main cause of this divide was the growth of the city along the Eastern seaboard. Cities like Boston, Newport, Hartford, New York, Philadelphia, Washington, DC, and Charlestown all grew in physical size and population during the Revolutionary era. With the help of surveyors like Benjamin Banneker, who worked on the city plans for Washington, DC, the Revolutionary era cities laid the foundations for urban life which would become a major part of the United States in the 19^th century.
  • Benjamin Banneker's Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia Almanack and Ephemeris, for the Year of Our Lord 1792Bannecker became famous for his Almanac, seen here. His skills as a mathematician, scientist, and astronomer helped make his Alamanac one of the most popular of its time.
  • Washington in 1800Banneker's skills as a mathematician became increasingly useful during the Revolutionary era. After the defeat of the British, American cities grew in physical size and population. To accommodate the changing landscape, talented surveyors, architects, and mathematicians were needed to design city layouts.
  • A map of the city of Washington in the District of Columbia established as the permanent seat of the government of the United States of America. City map with depiction of East front of the Capitol of the United States / by Rt. King, surveyor of the CitThomas Jefferson named Banneker to a team of surveyors assigned to oversee the expansion of Washington, DC's territory. Banneker and other city planners thus became integral pieces in defining how the rapidly shifting physical landscape would appear in the future as cities became more prominent.
  • The Seat of war in New England, by an American volunteer, with the marches of the several corps sent by the Colonies towards Boston, with the attack on Bunkers-HillDuring the revolutionary era, Boston was one of the largest cities in the country. Seen her, the urban sprawl of the city already appear to be growing outward from the initial port on the Massachusetts Bay.
  • An east prospect of the city of Philadelphia; taken by George Heap from the Jersey shore, under the direction of Nicholas Scull surveyor general of the Province of Pennsylvania / engrav'd by T. JefferysPhiladelphia was another rapidly changing city. Seen here is the grid lay-out for the city center. Many major cities along the eastern coast followed a similar pattern in their urban design.
  • "Evacuation day" and Washington's triumphal entry in New York City, Nov. 25th, 1783. Lithograph by E. P. & L. Restein, 1879.New York City, particularly the island of Manhattan, became an increasingly large urban area during the Revolutionary era. Here is an example of an artist's interpretation of George Washington entering New York City.