Collaboratory for Research in Computing for Humanities

The John Dickinson Writings Project

Projector Director
Dr. Jane E. Calvert
Assistant Professor of History
University of Kentucky

Projector Co-Director
Dr. Mark Richard Lauersdorf
Associate Professor of Languages and Linguistics
University of Kentucky

Above is a printed version of Dickinson's Address to the Inhabitants of the Province of Quebec, published by the First Continental Congress in 1774 and housed at the American Antiquarian Society. Next to the printed version is Dickinson’s manuscript draft, located at the Library Company of Philadelphia.
[click images to enlarge]

Project Description

John Dickinson (1732-1808) was the most prolific of the Founding Fathers and one of the most influential from 1765 with the passage of the Stamp Act to the ratification of the Constitution in 1789. In addition to authoring among the most important treatises and articles on the American cause, he also drafted many of the seminal state papers produced by the Continental Congresses. After his retirement from public life in 1792, he continued writing on foreign policy into the era of the Jefferson presidency. The John Dickinson Writings Project will be the first collection of his entire corpus of published works and manuscript documents that were intended for a public audience. Totaling around 150 items, these works will be transcribed and published in print and digital editions with a complete scholarly apparatus. The Project Team anticipates launching the digital edition in 2014.