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At the Institute’s core is the Gilder Lehrman Collection, one of the great archives in American history. More than 85,000 items cover five hundred years of American history, from Columbus’s 1493 letter describing the New World through the end of the twentieth century.

Constitutional Convention. 5/14/1787-9/17/1787 Constitution. Printed Dunlap & Claypoole edition inscribed to Jonathan Williams

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC03585 Author/Creator: Constitutional Convention. 5/14/1787-9/17/1787 Place Written: Philadelphia Type: Document signed Date: 17 September 1787 Pagination: 4 p. [ of 6] 41 x 25.5 cm Order a Copy PDF Download(s): PDF copy (image only)

Fragment lacking last two pages. Variant early ("official") printing of the Constitution by Dunlap & Claypoole, inscribed by Benjamin Franklin (as President of Pennsylvania) to his nephew Jonathan Williams, Esquire. (Not his grand-nephew, Jonathan Williams, Jr., who accompanied Franklin to Europe.) This is a variant edition of the official editions; compare to Evans 20818 (official, GLC 259) and 20819 (newspaper). Sothebys 1988 sale lot #31 describes this variant edition, which is based on the type-setting of Evans 20819, but with the newspaper masthead removed.

Signer of the U.S. Constitution.

Franklin, Benjamin, 1706-1790

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