Events

Essex Historical Society and Essex Meadows present History Hour. This program features a speaker, author, presenter, or musician once a month through 2026. Stay tuned as we announce the topic and presentation of each month’s program. May’s History Hour features our rescheduled speaker from our January Winter Lecture Series. Join us in welcoming Dr. Emily Sneff, author of the new book: When the Declaration of Independence Was News, as she presents "The Woman Who Printed the Declaration." Connecticut-born printer Mary Katharine Goddard created the first broadsides of the Declaration of Independence to include the names of the men who had signed that document. Dr. Emily Sneff, a leading expert on the Declaration and author of the forthcoming book, When the Declaration of Independence Was News, will explore Goddard's career and the choices she made when printing the Declaration, first in her newspaper in July 1776 and then on the broadsides ordered by the Continental Congress in January 1777. Dr. Sneff will contrast the printings under Goddard's name with newspapers printed under the name of another Mary, on the other side of the Atlantic.