By Ralph P. Davidson

The enemy is off Manhattan. The largest expeditionary force in British history seizes Staten Island and prepares to invade the mainland to crush General George Washington's ragtag Continentals --and with them the Revolution. Near Wall Street, frenzied New Yorkers tear down George III's statue. Delaware Congressional Delegate Rodney Caesar rides 80 miles through thunderstorms to Philadelphia to help make the colonies' Declaration of Independence unanimous.

These were the top stories in the first days of July 1776. They will also be top stories in a very unusual issue of TIME. The news of that momentous week made history; next spring TIME will treat that history as news. In a special edition to commemorate the Bicentennial, we will cover the events of the week section by section, as if today's TIME had existed then. The Bicentennial issue will be the first TIME has ever wholly devoted to a historical subject. Our cover face remains to be decided. Among the leading contenders: Washington, Jefferson and Franklin.

Our journalistic time machine has already been set in motion. A special staff headed by Senior Editor Otto Friedrich is winnowing 18th century chronicles for eyewitness reports, memoirs and documents to enable writers and researchers in the regular TIME sections to evaluate the news as they do today. Gathering illustrations for the issue may pose some difficulties since newsmakers like Admiral Howe are not available for photographs. The Nation section will, of course, report on the Declaration itself, among many other Revolutionary developments. World is scheduling stories on the European reaction to the embattled American "national liberation front," and on Captain James Cook's plans for a third voyage of exploration to the Pacific. The Sexes expects to deal with love and other emotions among the Puritans. Business will comment on the shocking colonial inflation rate, and Environment on the wasteful use of farm land. Medicine plans to cover the smallpox epidemic then raging in America. One of the current bestsellers to be reviewed in the Books section: Edward Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Since advertising was then as now a part of almost all magazines, this special issue will also contain a limited number of ads.

For Editor Friedrich and for all of us, the project offers an adventure in journalism. We hope that we can use the TIME format to convey not only the big news events but the flavor and quality of colonial life. Perhaps in discussing what we faced in 1776, we can also put the problems of our own time in better perspective.

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