Not everyone knows that a Philadelphia brewer penned the most famous document in American history. As an assistant Secretary to Congress, Timothy Matlack engrossed the Declaration of Independence. But how was it that a beer-bottler, infamous for cockfighting, once confined to debtor’s prison, was given this responsibility?

Recently Timothy Matlack has been making a come back: he figured in the movie National Treasure; his handwriting inspired the font American Scribe; his portrait was hung in the new American Wing of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts; and a biography was published. Author Chris Coelho discuss Timothy’s life, the first Matlack presentation in the Philadelphia area in over 100 years.

Speakers Bio: Chris Coelho, an independent history writer, graduated from Lafayette College with a degree in economics. He previously worked in magazine publishing in New York and San Francisco. Coelho, who grew up in northern Manhattan, lives in Buenos Aires with his wife and stepdaughter. He is currently working on a book about the unauthorized invasion of that city by a treasure-seeking British regiment in the early nineteenth century.

This program is part of the Pen to Paper program series. Purchase the entire series and the third program is free.