[LAFAYETTE, Gilbert du Motier, marquis de] Lettre autographe signée par David Francis, secrétaire Boston, 21 août 1824 1 p. in-4
Estimation :
200 / 300
Adjudication :
Invendu
Description
EXEMPLAIRE DE LAFAYETTE : INVITATION DE LA MASSACHUSETTS CHARITABLE ASSOCIATION OF BOSTON Promulgation officielle de l’invitation à dîner et de la création d’un comité d’accueil comprenant : John Cotton, Samuel Perkins, Jonathan Hun[n]ewell, Benjamin Russell et John P. Thorndik, écrit comme “a true copy of the record, attested [by] David Francis, Secretary" Lafayette was to be guest of the MCMA the following July, after laying the foundation stone of the Bunker Hill Monument. For the Resolution enrolling Lafayette in the MCMA, see under 28 September, below : “Yielding to the wishes of the inhabitants of Boston, General Lafayette remained several days in their city after the ceremonies at Bunker’s hill... On the 20th he accepted a dinner given him by the Mechanics’ Society, where he met all the public functionaries, and the most distinguished personages of the state, who had accepted the invitation with equal warmth, so great is the deference paid by every one in the United States to the useful classes of society’ (Levasseur, Lafayette in America, ii, 207). The Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association (est.1795) of Boston, Massachusetts, was “formed for the sole purposes of promoting the mechanic arts and extending the practice of benevolence." Founders included Paul Revere, Jonathan Hunnewell, and Benjamin Russell. Through much of the 19th century, the association organized conferences and exhibitions devoted to innovation in the mechanical arts. It is still existant today (cf. http ://www.masshist.org/)
