Thomas Paine: Voice of the Revolution

FAIN: TP-50096-08

Old Stone House of Brooklyn (Brooklyn, NY 11215-0613)
Karen G. Thorsen (Project Director: November 2007 to January 2011)

Planning of a 90-minute television documentary, multimedia museum exhibit, study guides, and a website that explore the life and writing of Thomas Paine.

Award-winning filmmakers will produce a 90-minute documentary, multi-media museum exhibits, study guides and a website. An ally of Washington, Jefferson and Franklin, Paine was -- literally -- the world's first champion of democracy AND the best-selling author in America ... ever. He embraced the new "natural order," then used it to justify independence from England; he created a new mode of discourse, and helped politicize the disenfranchised; he openly opposed slavery; he pushed for self-government and laissez-faire economics; he promoted freedom of religion and the separation of church and state. In short, his impassioned advocacy of liberty and justice for all inspired one of the greatest shifts in the history of ideas -- and yet for much of the 230 years since he wrote COMMON SENSE, he is the one founder who has been banned from the Pantheon. Only recently has he come back into favor: finally, a good time to explore his contributions and re-examine his words.