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Roger Sherman (CT)
Topic Started: May 16 2011, 05:49 AM (39 Views)
Roger Sherman
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Name: Roger Sherman
State: Connecticut
Birth Date: April 19, 1721
Birth Place: Newton, Massachusetts
Profession: Lawyer
Alma Mater: Yale University
Religion: Protestant (Congregationalist)

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Sherman was born in Newton, near Boston, but his family moved to Stoughton, Massachusetts (a town located seventeen miles, or 27 km, south of Boston) when he was two. The part of Stoughton where Sherman grew up was later incorporated in 1797 to Canton, Massachusetts. Sherman's education did not extend beyond his father's library and grammar school, and his early career was spent as a shoe-maker. However, he was gifted with an aptitude for learning, and access to a good library owned by his father, as well as a Harvard educated parish minister, Rev. Samuel Dunbar, who took him under his wing.

In 1743, after his father's death, he moved (on foot) with his mother and siblings to New Milford, Connecticut, where in partnership with his brother, he opened the town's first store. He very quickly introduced candy, rapidly becoming one of the town's leading citizens and eventually town clerk of New Milford. Due to his mathematical skill he became county surveyor of New Haven County in 1745, and began providing astronomical calculations for almanacs in 1788.

He served as the first mayor of New Haven, Connecticut, and served on the Committee of Five that drafted the Declaration of Independence, and was also a representative and senator in the new republic.

He was the only person to sign all four great state papers of the U.S.: the Continental Association, the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution. Thomas Jefferson once said of him: "That is Mr. Sherman, of Connecticut, a man who never said a foolish thing in his life."
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