From History Extra by Nicholas John Cull: There is a moment in the first Star Wars film when the mystic Obi Wan Kenobi (Alec Guinness) detects across at great distance of space the destruction of a planet and remarks: “I felt a… Read More ›
United States History
The Most Damaging Myths About Slavery, Debunked
From History by Yohuru Williams: Were U.S. slaves in any way responsible for their own misery? Were there any silver linings to forced bondage? These questions surface from time to time in the American cultural conversation, rekindling a longstanding debate… Read More ›
The Founders Worried too, About Foreign Meddling in Our Elections
From History New Network by Jeanne Abrams author of First Ladies of the Republic: Martha Washington, Abigail Adams, and Dolley Madison and the Creation of an Iconic American Role (New York University Press, 2018): In December of 1787, leading American statesmen Thomas Jefferson… Read More ›
How Vietnam War Protests Accelerated the Rise of the Christian Right
From Smithsonian.com by David Mislin: May of 1968, a high-profile trial began in Boston that dramatically illustrated a larger phenomenon fueling the rise of conservative Christianity in the United States. Five men had been charged with conspiracy for encouraging Americans… Read More ›
The Myth of the Roosevelt “Trustbusters”
From The New Republic by Robert D. Atkinson and Michael Lind: In the aftermath of the Great Recession, amid growing concerns about income inequality and wage stagnation, politicians and pundits on the left and right have blamed the problems of twenty-first-century America on a… Read More ›
When Did Jackie Robinson Integrate Baseball and Why Is It Important?
Jackie Robinson was the first African-American to play in major league baseball on April 15, 1947. He went 0 for 3. He reached base once, scoring a run in a Brooklyn Dodgers victory. As a statistical line it was not… Read More ›
What was the Second Great Awakening?
The Second Great Awakening was a religious revival that spread across the United States from 1790s to 1830s. American religious leaders were deeply concerned by low church attendance; only about 10% of the white population was going to church. These… Read More ›
Andrew Jackson’s Love Letters
From Nursing Clio by Melissa J. Gismondi: In our era of political “bromances” between leaders who value aggression and belittle sensitivity, it’s easy to forget that expectations as to how men should interact with other men are always changing…. Read More ›
Why George Washington rejected a military parade in his honor
From The Washington Post by Linda M. Chervinsky author of The President’s Cabinet: George Washington and the Creation of an American Institution: Washington, the first in the pantheon of American military heroes to become president, refused pomp and circumstance as the… Read More ›
The New Orleans Streetcar Protests of 1867
From We’re History by John Bardes: When did America desegregate public transportation? Most people would probably answer 1955, when Rosa Parks’s refusal to surrender her seat ignited the Montgomery Bus Boycott. But the story begins at least 88 years before… Read More ›
History at Home in the Tenement Museum
From Nursing Clio from R. E. Fulton: Several times a day, several days a week, I stand with a group of strangers in the parlor of a Lithuanian immigrant family who arrived in New York’s Lower East Side in 1901…. Read More ›
What was lynching?
Lynching is often described as a form of extralegal, vigilante violence or justice; however, its meaning has evolved over time—from the tarring and feathering of individuals in the Colonial period to the lethal, racial violence that proliferated in the South…. Read More ›
No Reconciliation Without Truth
From The New Republic by Caleb Gayle: When it comes to the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow, there are two kinds of monuments in America. There are memorials that seek to honor this country’s fitful march toward civil rights…. Read More ›
When the Unabomber Was Arrested, One of the Longest Manhunts in FBI History Was Finally Over
From Smithsonian Magazine by William Finnegan: The Unabomber cut a swath both deep and narrow through the country’s psyche. His attacks were frightening and unpredictable, but, in the later stages of his 17-year terror campaign, he emerged from the shadows… Read More ›
American Nostalgia on a Bun
From The Atlantic by Suzy Swartz: In her book Why You Eat What You Eat, the neuroscientist Rachel Herz explains the science behind Americans’ food choices. Comfort foods, she says, are “usually foods that we ate as children because, when it comes to… Read More ›
So How Should We Think About Sherman’s March?
From History New Network by J.D. Dickey author of Rising in Flames: Sherman’s March and the Fight for a New Nation: Although now more than a century and a half in the past, the Civil War is a subject that… Read More ›
Mark Twain made Ulysses S. Grant an offer he couldn’t Refuse
From History Net by John Vacha: IN THE SPRING OF 1885, A DIMINISHED FIGURE WRAPPED IN A SHAWL, a knitted cap pulled over his brow, toils in a brownstone on East 66th Street in New York City. His right hand,… Read More ›
How Did Spy Services Develop in the United States?
Many Americans today would see that espionage work and spying by the United States is critical for their national security. The history of the services that have provided this, however, is more complex, and often mirrored the development and transformations… Read More ›
If not for Vasili Arkhipov – 100s of millions of people could have died
From History New Network by Douglas Gilbert author of The Last Saturday of October: The Declassified Secrets of Black Saturday: “Vasili Arkhipov is arguably the most important person in modern history, thanks to whom October 27, 2017 isn’t the 55th… Read More ›
Why We Doubt Capable Children: Constructing Childhood in the Revolutionary Era
From The Junto by Julia M. Gossard: “My friends and I might still be 11, and we might still be in elementary school, but we know . . . that we have seven short years until we too have the… Read More ›
