Alumni Weekend Walking Tour: Penn’s Revolutionary Campus in photos
A lively tour through Philadelphia’s Old City revealed the original sites of the University’s 18th-century campus.
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During Penn’s Alumni Weekend in mid-May, and part of the University’s ongoing America 250 programming, alumni from a range of graduating classes joined “Revolution at Penn?” curators Jim Duffin and John Pollack for a walking tour of Penn’s earliest history in Old City in Philadelphia.
Starting at 5th and Arch streets—the original site of the College of Philadelphia (Penn’s former moniker) from 1750 to 1802—Duffin and Pollack led alumni to 10 sites from Penn’s history in the area, including William Shippen’s Anatomical Theatre, Ben Franklin’s home, and the Pennsylvania Assembly House.
Both tours spanned 1.5 miles in two hours. Alumni learned stories of the sites and figures from the University’s past, including the cell William Smith taught from while incarcerated by the Pennsylvania Assembly in 1758.
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