A Resignation? YES. How one small broadside turned Boston’s outrage into public proof.

Before push notifications, Boston had broadsides, single sheets that could turn rumor into rendezvous and outrage into action. If the Sons of Liberty wanted the truth to travel, they didn’t whisper it. They printed it.

A hand-printed call to meet under the Liberty Tree at noon

This broadside, dated Tuesday morning, December 17, 1765, summons the “True-born Sons of Liberty” to gather under LIBERTY-TREE at XII o’Clock to hear, under oath, whether Andrew Oliver had truly resigned as stamp distributor. Not a private promise. A public statement, staged in daylight, with witnesses.

Behind it is the organizing instinct of the Loyal Nine, an early core that helped shape what became the Sons of Liberty. They understood something timeless: movements run on coordination and credibility. If Oliver resigned, Boston needed more than “someone said.” It needed proof the whole town could share.

One of the best details is the headline’s rhythmic snarl: “St—p! … No:” and then the verdict at the bottom: “A Resignation? YES.” It reads like a chant and a receipt. The broadside isn’t just information; it’s confirmation.

 Under the Liberty Tree: reading, signing, treating a printed sheet as evidence.

At the bottom sits a quiet credit: Edes & Gill, because printers weren’t background characters. They were infrastructure. They made ideas portable, repeatable, and hard to erase. This is the Revolution before muskets: paper, witnesses, and a town insisting on reality together.