Special Community Reading of the Declaration of Independence this evening, Church Bells to ring after

As part of America’s 250th Birthday Celebration, there will be a special reading of the Declaration of Independence this evening at the Vandalia Statehouse.

The event will start at 4:30 pm with music performed by Lady Liberty with the program to begin at 5 pm.  Then, there will be a community reading of the Declaration of Independence.

Then, tonight at around 6:25 p.m., St. James Lutheran Church, First United Methodist Church and the Holy Cross Lutheran Church will be ringing their church bells which will commemorate the conclusion of the reading of the Declaration of Independence event. On this day (July 8, 1776), a 2,000-pound copper-and-tin bell that came to be known as the Liberty Bell rang out from the tower of the Pennsylvania State House, now Independence Hall, in Philadelphia, calling people to the first public reading of the Declaration of Independence.