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To the Constitutional Convention

The Potomac River and the Mount Vernon Conference of 1785

Historian William diGiacomantonio will share fascinating information about the Mount Vernon Conference of 1785.

Hear about the origins, course, and consequences of one of the most important, but least-known episodes in the zig-zag path towards the Federal Convention of 1787, and how its moving spirit helped produce the U.S. Constitution. diGiacomantonio reveals the stakes and stakeholders who transformed the economic and political regulation of the Potomac River into a greater argument underlying the U.S.'s early constitutional development.

William diGiacomantonio credits his love of early American history to growing up in the Boston area during the nation's first great bicentennial of the 1970s. He graduated from Georgetown University and the University of Chicago before joining the editorial team of The George Washington University's First Federal Congress Project in the other great bicentennial year, 1989. He helped edit the 22-volume Documentary History of the First Federal Congress, 1789-1791 until becoming Chief Historian of the US Capitol Historical Society, 2015-20. In addition to studying and writing about early American constitutional history, "Chuck" is interested in Quaker history, creative writing, and bicycling around DC.

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