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- NATION, Page 25American NotesHISTORYA Real Yankee Doodler
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- For 86 years, two copies of the Constitution lay forgotten in
- a Boston bank vault. The documents -- one with doodles and
- scribbled notes by Nicholas Gilman, a New Hampshire delegate
- to the Constitutional Convention -- were discovered four years
- ago. Their existence was made public last week after scholars
- authenticated them. They are expected to shed new light on the
- deliberations of 1787 since less than half of the original 60
- draft copies are still around.
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- Gilman was hardly a famous Founding Father, but he left
- behind a treasure trove. His clapboard home in Exeter, N.H., is
- now a museum, and its executive director, Richard Tobin,
- learned of the vault in a note that turned up in the house.
- "We've been finding things all over," he says, "under the beds,
- in closets, everywhere." So far, the booty includes a drawing
- by Paul Revere of the Boston Massacre, papers signed by Louis
- XVI and Lafayette, and a ring with a lock of George Washington's
- hair.
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