Newtown Poet Laureate Lauren Clifford will present “American Mettle: Original Poetry Capturing the American Spirit During the Revolutionary War” at C.H. Booth Library on Wednesday, June 17. The program is part of a series of historic programming hosted by the library to observe and celebrate the Semiquincentennial.

Clifford and her collection of poetry focusing on heroes and heroines that impacted Connecticut 250 years ago, including signers of The Declaration of Independence, women, slaves, indigenous people, and children, were originally planned for April.

The rescheduled event will begin at 7 pm in the meeting room of the library, 25 Main Street. Registration is requested and available at chboothlibrary.org.

Clifford has been working for a few years on poetry to celebrate America 250, the 250th anniversary of the signing of The Declaration of Independence. She has been researching and visiting towns and cities across the state, following themes encompassing the American spirit before composing documentary and narrative poems to portray some of the lesser-known stories.

The first works she introduced publicly were part of her “American Mettle” series focusing on the four Founding Fathers of Connecticut who signed The Declaration of Independence: Oliver Wolcott, Samuel Huntington, Roger Sherman, and William Williams.

The first installment begins on July 9, 1776, the day a copy of The Declaration of Independence was read in New York City to General Washington’s troops and a surrounding crowd. Its message, she said, gave those soldiers a new-found hope integral to the American spirit.

She premiered that piece on July 4, 2025, at East Cemetery in Litchfield, where Wolcott is buried.

Her second installment takes place in the Pennsylvania State House as Huntington is signing The Declaration of Independence on August 2, 1776. That second installment debuted on July 5, 2025, at The Samuel Huntington Homestead in Scotland (Conn.), where the property’s namesake was born.

With Connecticut being one of the original 13 colonies, Clifford told The Newtown Bee in April, “It means we have so much rich history in our state. One of the reasons I wanted to do this was for my own education.”

Even the small state of Connecticut has multiple layers to sort through and decipher, Clifford said.

“When I was in elementary and middle school, it was all about the white males and the Founding Fathers,” she said. With the nation heading toward its 250th anniversary — while looking a little deeper into its past — Clifford wants the record to be clearer and more inclusive.

“I want to take a deeper dive. I want to understand who else was involved — the Native Americans who were involved, the enslaved families who were involved,” she said. “Even from a global perspective, when you think of the American Revolution, you think about Empire vs Colonies but there were so many more layers than that,” she continued. “It was Loyalists vs Patriots, and then there was the view of civilized people vs the savages, so you get the Native Americans in there too.”

The poems she has selected for her readings at Booth Library will focus on people with ties to Connecticut. “Revered and Hailed,” told in conversation form between 16-year-old Sybil Ludington and her father ahead of the young girl’s 40-mile all-night horseback ride to stir American militiamen to attack British forces near Danbury, will be among them.

A poetic story about Phillis Wheatley, a woman whose enslavers educated her and whose elegies later appeared in The Connecticut Courant (now The Hartford Courant) — but who had to go to trial in front of white leaders in order to prove herself — will also be part of the program.

“My poetry is very historically based. My style is rooted in history,” Clifford said in April when she sat down with The Bee to talk poetry, history, inspiration, and the special event in her hometown. “I like doing research, especially in my own community and surrounding communities.”

When the America 250-CT Commission was established in July 2022 by Governor Ned Lamont, Clifford was quick to see where her writing would work perfectly as the state, and the entire nation, began looking at its past to celebrate the milestone.

“When I found out about Governor Lamont’s initiative I thought ‘This is right up my alley!’ That really set the spark. I love doing the research and then presenting it to communities,” she said.