New edition coming in 2026! Independence Hall is a place Americans think they know well. But Independence Hall is more than a symbol of the young nation. Beyond this it has a long and varied history of changing uses in an urban environment, almost all of which have been forgotten.
From 1944 to 1946, as the world pivoted from the Second World War to an unsteady peace, Americans in more than two hundred cities and towns mobilized to chase an implausible dream. The newly-created United Nations needed a meeting place, a central place for global diplomacy—a Capital of the World.
The Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia is a civic project to increase understanding of one of America’s greatest cities.
Learning from Cooper Street:
Cooper Street and adjacent blocks in Camden, New Jersey, are a setting for learning about how cities grow and change–and for discovering how individual decision-making affects the vitality and sustainability of urban neighborhoods.
Charlene Mires | Historian 