Independence National Historical Park: Independence Hall

During a long weekend in late May and early June, I visited Philadelphia, PA to see historic sites and watch a professional track & field meet. This is my second post about Independence National Historical Park, a part of the United States National Park System (NPS) that focuses on the American Revolutionary War. While I inevitably saw the outside of Independence Hall every day during my trip, I took a special tour inside the building on the first day. This birthplace of American democracy has been on the National Register of Historic Places since 1966 and was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1979.

Independence Hall was originally the Pennsylvania State House since Philadelphia was the capital. The state government moved to more strategically located Harrisburg in 1812. The original building was a big deal for colonists because of its size and design when it was built in 1753. The two stories of red brick plus the towering clock tower complete with a bell, steeple, and weathervane made the building much bigger than any other structure in the surrounding area. By the 1770s, the building was a hotspot for patriot activity.

Statues near Independence Hall depict Founding Fathers such as Irish-American naval hero John Barry and general of the armies George Washington. Barry is considered by some to be “The Father of the American Navy” much like another man appearing on this blog, John Paul Jones. (I had visited the so-called John Paul Jones House in Portsmouth, NH back in 2022, and based on what I learned then and since, I am more impressed by Barry.) The West Wing of the building contains an exhibit called the “Great Essentials”. This includes original and replica documents along with other artifacts pertaining to the American Revolution. The lighting and cleanliness of cases in this area left something to be desired. The most interesting document I saw was called “Declaration of Common Aims of the Independent Mid-European Nations”. Towards the end of World War I, Central and Eastern European countries gathered at Independence Hall and tried to band together as the Austro-Hungarian empire collapsed. They were not much successful, as World War II and the Cold War soon followed.

The main building cannot be visited except by guided tour, which is led by a ranger in the National Park Service. Each tour takes visitors on the first floor, which lasts for twenty minutes, but a very special tour at the end of the day takes visitors to the second floor and lasts a total of forty-five minutes. You can guess which tour I took. The first floor contains an impressive staircase painted blue, the Supreme Court Chamber painted yellow, and the Assembly Room painted greenish-grey. The Pennsylvania coat of arms above the judges’ bench in the Supreme Court Chamber has hung there since 1785 since the coat of arms for King George III had been destroyed by a mob in 1776. The Assembly Room across the hall was where the Second Continental Congress met and signed the Declaration of Independence. Later in 1865, a casket containing the body of Abraham Lincoln was placed in this room after his assassination.

Going up the beautiful staircase to the second floor, the tour group entered a massive hall called the Long Gallery. While traditionally a party area for the governor, it was turned into a prisoner of war camp by British military forces during the revolution. Smaller rooms on either side of the landing were set up as meeting spaces. On the left was the Governor’s Council Chamber, which contained a desk, meeting table, and shelves of books and was originally used by the descendants of William Penn who ruled over Pennsylvania until the revolution. After the war, Benjamin Franklin took over the role for three years, from 1785 to 1788. On the right was the Committee of the Assembly Chamber, which had a full gun rack to demonstrate that this space was used for storing military goods during the war.

The enclosed area around Independence Hall is open from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. You will need to go through security to enter this area, but the wait was never longer than a minute when I visited. The West Wing is open without a ticket, but timed tickets are required for tours. The tickets are free with a $1 per ticket handling fee and can be reserved online through Recreation.gov. Be sure to have a calm and computer savvy member of your group request the tickets, as they are booked up quickly upon release. If this is your first visit to Philadelphia, Independence Hall is a must see.