... sought refuge behind British lines.

Yeah, yeah.

The biggest block of loyalists went to Nova Scotia, went to Canada.

The loyalists themselves called it Nova Scarcity.

I mean, they, it, they had gone to a really very alien, especially the southern loyalists, a very ail- alien environment, and most of them had gone, though they were given land there, they couldn't farm extensively the way the growing season was different.

And I mean, the French, who had controlled Canada, took one look at it and said, "Fur trapping, fur trading is better than trying to plant." And so they experienced a kind of decline in their economic positions.

Secondly, the homesickness was just extraordinary.

Mm-hmm.

Professor Carol Berkin is author of A Brilliant Solution: Inventing the Constitution.

They met in secret because not only could everyone talk more freely, but they did not want the government of their state to know that they were going to compromise with others.

Every state sent a list of, "Don't give in on this.

Demand this." And as soon as the men got together, they realized if we all, it's my way or the highway, nothing will happen.

The essential spirit of that convention was compromise.

They compromised on everything because they knew it was important.

I admire these men enormously just for that reason, that they understood that politics was a game of compromise if you had a goal.

He now sees the wisdom of having a bill of rights.

Mm

...

Native American women have a completely other gender sys- system, and African American enslaved people have a limited...

Actually, they also have a reverse gender system 'cause the women went out to work in the fields, and the men became artisans.

But anyway, if you're talking about white women, one of the first things what...

The colonies are all different.

Peoples don't realize they were founded by different groups.

[laughs]

Professor Carol Berkin.

A woman writes to her husband and she says, "Winter is coming.

We have no food.

Your children will starve.

We have no firewood.

Your children will freeze.

Pray come home." And many men got those letters.

Professor Carol Berkin is the author of Revolutionary Mothers.

Gender rules were that women were in charge of the dairy, the garden, the household, and turning raw materials into usable manufactured goods.

So now they set up spinning wheels and they spin cloth, and they call themselves the Daughters of Liberty.

That's a political identity.

People often ask me what were the most radical things in the American Revolution, and I say, "Well, one of them was the politicization of women." It happened virtually overnight.

Professor Carol Berkin is the author of Revolutionary Mothers.

Gender rules were that women were in charge of the dairy, the garden, the household, and turning raw materials into usable manufactured goods.

So now they set up spinning wheels and they spin cloth, and they call themselves the Daughters of Liberty.

That's a political identity.

People often ask me what were the most radical things in the American Revolution, and I say, "Well, one of them was the politicization of women." It happened virtually overnight.

So why don't we talk about Roger Sherman more? That's an incredible achievement.

In your list of questions you asked, who would I suggest people start with in examining the lives of...

And it's definitely Roger Sherman.

This is a story that... has everything.

He was born in Massachusetts.

He was a farmer's son.

He grew up helping his farmer and learning how to make shoes, which is, he was a cobbler.

No, the