Happy birthday, America!
This July Fourth, the USA is commemorating the 250th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, the day when the US formally broke away from England in 1776.
A lot has happened in the last two centuries: inventions, wars, pandemics, space travel, to name a few. But there are plenty of things still around today that predate the United States of America.
If you got in a time machine and went back to 1776, all of these things, in some shape or form, would be waiting for you, like a cold glass of Stella, a hot mug of Twinings, and the latest edition of The Hartford Courant.
Here are 10 things that are older than the USA.
The Methuselah tree
Methuselah, named for the Biblical figure who was said to have lived to be 969 years old, is a Great Basin bristlecone pine tree growing in California’s White Mountains. According to the National Park Service, the tree is 4,765 years old.
Technically, Methusaleh is in a “secret location” to protect it, though if you know where to look on the internet, you may be able to figure out where that is.
Taos Pueblo
Taos Pueblo is “one of the oldest living and continuously inhabited communities in the United States,” according to its tourism website.
It is the home of a group of Tiwa-speaking Pueblo people, who have been in the area since 900 AD, and the main adobe structures there today were built between 1000 and 1450.
You can visit Taos Pueblo, but not all areas are accessible to visitors, and you are asked to follow a set of rules to help protect the community’s culture and traditions.
The Hartford Courant
The Hartford Courant’s origins can be traced back to 1764, when it was a weekly paper called the Connecticut Courant. The paper advertises itself as “America’s oldest continuously published newspaper,” according to the University of Connecticut.
During the colonial period, it kept readers informed about major events, such as the Stamp Act, becoming “the most widely circulated newspaper in the colonies,” according to ConnecticutHistory.org.
In July 1776, the newspaper published the Declaration of Independence in full.
Barclays bank
Barclays was founded in London in 1690 by two bankers, John Freame and Thomas Gould, though the bank didn’t adopt the Barclays name until 1736, when Freame’s son-in-law became a partner. His name? James Barclay.
Now, Barclays is one of the 20 largest banks in the world and the second-largest British bank, behind only HSBC, according to a 2026 S&P Global Market Intelligence report.
Oxford University
In addition to being older than the United States of America, Oxford calls itself the “oldest university in the English-speaking world.”
According to its website, there was some form of teaching at Oxford as far back as 1096. After the University of Paris banned English pupils in 1167, Oxford grew quickly.
Before the turn of the 17th century, it is believed that there were around 3,200 undergraduates at the university. Today, there are more than 12,000.
Harvard University
In the US, Harvard University also got its start before the United States of America.
Then known simply as “the colledge,” it was founded in Massachusetts in 1636 and moved to its current location (in what was soon to be named Cambridge) the following year, according to the university’s timeline. Its first graduates — all nine of them — completed their studies in 1642.
More than a century later, eight of its alumni would sign the Declaration of Independence.
Stella Artois
Stella Artois, the Belgian beer popular in the US and around the world, was founded in Leuven, Belgium, in 1366 — yes, Stella is 660 years old.
It gets its name from the Latin word for “star,” as the brewery originally developed it as a Christmas gift for locals.
Centuries later, it was officially introduced to the US market in 1999, during owner Interbrew’s global expansion.
The pressure cooker
Of course, the modern pressure cooker today is a bit different than the one invented by French physicist Denis Papin in 1679, but an Instant Pot owes its basic design to Papin’s “steam digester.”
Both rely on the same principle of trapping steam and raising pressure inside the cooker to achieve a higher boiling point, cooking food faster.
A domestic version was popularized in the US in 1939, after Presto introduced its model at the New York World’s Fair.
The Greenland shark
The Greenland shark is estimated to live at least 250 years, and could live for as long as 500 years, per NOAA.
This suggests there are some Greenland sharks in the depths of the North Atlantic that may be older than the US.
It has a reputation as the longest-lived vertebrate and can measure up to 23 feet long, although most don’t exceed 13 feet, according to Britannica.
Twinings tea
Twinings has been serving the tea-lovers of London (and later, the world) since Thomas Twining opened Tom’s Coffee House in 1706.
Tea’s popularity continued to skyrocket in the Western world after that, as did Twinings. In fact, when the Boston Tea Party happened in 1773, a local writer noted that “it was not Twinings tea the Boston rebels tossed into the sea.”
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