On May 25, 1787, enough delegates finally arrived in Philadelphia to form a quorum, allowing the Constitutional Convention to begin behind sealed windows in the suffocating summer heat. The secrecy was absolute — the public was kept out, the press barred, and the debates so fierce that the delegates nailed the shutters shut to prevent eavesdropping. Though they met to revise the failing Articles of Confederation, they soon found themselves building an entirely new government. Even George Washington, presiding with stoic calm, privately confessed his fear that “the fabric must fall, for it certainly is tottering.” Months of hidden deliberations would culminate in the creation of the U.S. Constitution.