American Revolution Vignette – American and European Cities in 1790

On By Norbert HauptIn History

The American founding fathers, for the most part, had never left America. John Adams had never been to a city larger than New York when he first went to Paris and then London. The culture shock must have been enormous. Here are the sizes of the largest American Cities in 1790, compared to Paris and London:

  • Baltimore – 14,000
  • Boston – 18,000
  • Philadelphia – 29,000
  • New York – 33,000
  • Paris – 600,000
  • London – 1,100,000

You can now see that the society in Paris and London looked at Americans as country bumpkins.

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