July 8 · This Day in America
It had been adopted four days earlier behind closed doors. On this Monday, at noon in the State House yard in Philadelphia, Colonel John Nixon climbs a platform and reads the Declaration of Independence aloud — the first official public reading, the moment the words leave the room and reach the street. The bells of the city ring out (the State House bell among them, the one later called the Liberty Bell, though whether it truly rang that day is debated). The crowd answers with huzzas. That night, the king's coat of arms is pulled down and burned in a bonfire. Until now independence was a vote and a parchment. This is the day it became a thing ordinary people heard with their own ears, in the open air, and cheered.
Source: www.nps.gov
Also on this day · 1889
Two reporters, Charles Dow and Edward Jones, who had been hand-delivering brief financial bulletins to Wall Street traders, publish the first issue of The Wall Street Journal — two cents a copy. From a slim daily of stock prices grew one of the most influential newspapers in the world, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average that still flashes across screens every trading day. American business learned to read about itself.
Source: www.loc.gov