Rag Linen | Online Museum of Historic Newspapers

The Rag Linen 1776 collection begins with important news from Parliament in London at the end of 1775 and concludes with Washington’s victory letter from his headquarters just outside Trenton on December 26, 1776. Between, we make stops to read period reports of the Fortification of Dorchester Heights, the Siege of Quebec, the Declaration of Independence, the pulling down of the equestrian statue of King George III in New York City, the Battle of Long Island and the Articles of Confederation. According to the synopsis for David McCullough’s 1776 book, “The darkest hours of that tumultuous year were as dark as any Americans have known. Especially in our own tumultuous time, 1776 is powerful testimony to how much is owed to a rare few in that brave founding epoch, and what a miracle it was that things turned out as they did.”

New with this collection is a supplemental video to help set the tone and importance of the pieces included in the 1776 collection. Enjoy.

Thanks to the tip from @bostonhistory, we learned today that photographs and video will be banned in the Rotunda of the National Archives, home to the original Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights. The ban goes into effect February 24, 2010.

For an excellent history on the conservation and preservation of the historic documents, check out NOVA’s “Saving the National Treasures“.

While photos and video will soon be prohibited, you can still download high resolution images of the Charters of Freedom at archives.gov or check out the our poor-quality photos we took while visiting Washington DC in 2009 (below). The documents are stored in $5 million state-of-the-art cases, which are housed in the dimly lit Rotunda of the National Archives.