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Just guessing, but it’s probably been a hot minute since you wrote by hand for two hours straight. And it’s probably also been a while since you spent that amount of time contemplating any of our nation’s founding documents.
Good news: your opportunity to do both at the same time is this Wednesday, Sept. 17 at Multnomah County’s Midland Library.
Midland is hosting a “Handwriting the Constitution” event where participants are invited to put pen to paper and transcribe the document, in honor of National Constitution Day which commemorates the signing in 1787.
The event is a partnership between the Portland-based company Handwriting Success and a social art project called Handwriting the Constitution, which started in 2017 by artist Morgan O’Hara as “an important form of activism for introverts,” according to its website.
Handwriting Success has sponsored six of these events since 2020, including one in January at Hillsdale Library. The librarians pre-soaked the paper in tea to make it look older, and provided participants with feather quills.
“They really went all out,” says Jonathan Dubay, CEO and curriculum specialist of Handwriting Success.
Dubay himself has written out the entire U.S. Constitution before; it took him nine hours, so participants shouldn’t expect to finish the whole thing during the two-hour Midland event. He will bring a handout of handwriting tips for participants, including alternative pen-holds to avoid hand cramping since writing for two hours can be challenging. It’s worth it, Dubay says.
“For me, there’s a connection with the past,” Dubay says. “You’re joining 3,000 years of cultural history every time you put pen to paper.”
There’s also the connection one makes to American history when copying a founding document by hand: “It’s eye-opening to see what’s there,” Dubay says.
GO: Handwriting the Constitution at Midland Library, 805 SE 122nd Ave. 503-988-5123, https://multcolib.org/events-classes/handwriting-constitution-1. 5:30-7:30 pm Wednesday, Sept. 17. Free.
