Do You Know Who Printed the Declaration of Independence?

Credit: Library of Congress, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Continental Congress & Constitutional Convention Broadsides Collection

Perhaps you never thought about it before, as you cheered at your local Independence Day parade and loaded burgers onto your barbecue to celebrate the Fourth of July: someone had to print the first copies of the Declaration of Independence. Otherwise, how would the first U.S. citizens have read for themselves what the founding fathers had so boldly declared?

No, not the well-known original copy in Thomas Jefferson’s handwriting, signed by all of the founders. Nor the one hastily printed on the night of July 4, 1776, by John Dunlap, which lacked all the names of those great men. But the version widely distributed around the new country, with all of the original signers’ names on it.

If you look closely at the bottom of the Declaration of Independence, you'll see a surprising name of the printer at the bottom. Who is this mystery person? Mary Katharine Goddard.

This column from The Washington Post tells her story.

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