Publisher, Blackstone Audiobooks (April 1995)

In Miracle at Philadelphia, Catherine Drinker Bowen tells the story of the stormy, brilliant session of 1787 in Philadelphia that saw the birth of the Constitution of the United States. Looked at straight from the records, the Federal Convention is startlingly fresh and new, and Mrs. Bowen evokes it as if the listener were actually there, mingling with the delegates, hearing their arguments, witnessing a dramatic moment in history.

Here is the fascinating record of the hot, sultry summer months of debate and decision when ideas clashed and tempers flared. Here is the country as it was then, described by contemporaries, by Berkshire farmers in Massachusetts, by Patrick Henry’s fringed-legginged Kentucky allies, by French and English travelers. Here, too, are the offstage voices—Thomas Jefferson, Tom Paine, and John Adams from Europe—all intensely concerned with what was going on in Philadelphia.