Sarah Katherine Manning Rodriguez

Excerpt: Hemphill was not, like the other men we have followed, so important in his time as to be well known to historians today. Yet he participated in key changes in politics and the economy, from the Missouri Compromise to the conflicts over banking and Indian Removal, to the internal improvements that made the “transportation revolution,” to the development of Philadelphia as a capital of industry. Moreover, born as he was on the eve of the American Revolution, he was witness to a period of rapid transformation and serves as a bridge to hte next generation of Philadelphians that we will meet. (cont.)