Excerpts

Pinball hasn’t always been an all-American game of fun: for decades it was an object of widespread moral outrage.

A recent biography reveals the many contradictions of the photographer who fastidiously documented postwar American life.

Lewis Hine captured the misery, dignity, and occasional bursts of solidarity within US working-class life in the early twentieth century.

Our foremothers wove spiritual beliefs, cultural values, and historical knowledge into their flax, wool, silk, and cotton webs.

The smallpox epidemic of the 1860s offers us a valuable, if disconcerting, clue about how epidemics actually end.

An account of the first female to serve in the U.S. Navy.

For too long, we've ignored our real history. We must face where truth can take us.

Old feuds remind us that history is continually revised, driven by new evidence and present-day imperatives.

A local gay rights activist launched a publicity stunt that became so much more. Congress couldn’t help but notice.

The memoirist is at the center of two new, very different books: a biography of D. H. Lawrence and a novel by Rachel Cusk. Has she been rescued or reduced?

How an evil sea captain and a beloved queen made the world crave KFC.

Why the Black Lives Matter movement might help shift the conversation about a conflict thousands of miles away.

The daughter of Buddy Holly's bandmate reflects on the defensiveness some white people have about the roots of rock 'n' roll.

In 1836, the House passed a resolution that automatically tabled all petitions on slavery without a hearing.

Business groups have always worked with both parties to support globalization and free trade.

After the sinking of the USS Indianapolis in 1945, Mochitsura Hashimoto, a Japanese sub commander, pushed to exonerate Navy Capt. Charles McVay.

We tend to think of "they," "Mx.," and "hir" as recent inventions. But English speakers have been looking for better ways to talk about gender for a long time.

Democracy requires something more than a handful of super-rich universities.

Sixty years ago, the company modernized animation when it used Xerox technology on the classic film.

Soul City in North Carolina was designed to build Black wealth and address racial injustice. Then its opponents lined up.

When Tuskegee student Sammy Younge, Jr., was murdered in 1966, his classmates focused their righteous anger on a local monument.

Although he did not openly endorse every one of the many precepts of the antislavery Constitution, Lincoln framed his positions entirely within its parameters.

Why John Adams was peculiarly unsuited to the moment.

Whatever the “City on a Hill” is, the phrase was not discovered by Kennedy or Reagan.

In a new book, the often under-appreciated contribution that black soldiers made during the civil war is brought to light with a trove of unseen photos.

Consumer activists taking on the companies that support former President Donald Trump can learn from the boycott that never ended.

A new book says “the Internet was developed as a weapon and remains a weapon today.” Does the charge hold up?

The vagrancy law regime regulated so much more than what is generally considered “vagrancy.”

On the 75th anniversary of the A-bomb, a Japanese-American writer speaks to one of the last living survivors.

The New York-to-Washington train had 21 cars, 700 passengers—and millions of trackside mourners.

A desire to fish created an epic 1889 flood.

Instead of caring for Black children, child welfare systems subject them to abuse and harsh conditions.

An excerpt from a discussion between Malcolm X and Robert Penn Warren on guilt and innocence.

The first edition of the beloved novel Charlie and the Chocolate Factory featured "pygmy" characters taken from Africa.

How activists fought to create LGBTQ+ pride.

Today, very few white Americans openly celebrate the horrors of black enslavement—most refuse to recognize the brutal nature of the institution or activ...

To preserve Black history, a 19th-century archivist filled hundreds of scrapbooks with newspaper clippings and other materials.

What Milton Bradley started.

The beloved line of fictional characters taught children about American history and encouraged them to realize their potential.

Ann Banks on the history of her father's Civil War seal and her family's past connection to the Confederacy.

Remembering Asian-American activists Corky Lee and Yuri Kochiyama.

Life across the United States in 1880.

What haunts the land? When two artists dig up the tangled history of slavery and soil exhaustion in Maryland, soil memory reveals ongoing racial violence.

His blazing rendition at Woodstock still echoes throughout the years, reminding us of what is worth fighting for in the American experiment.

The Biden administration’s proposed “child allowances” draw on the feminist thought of Crystal Eastman, who advocated “motherhood endowments” 100 years ago.

Martha Saxton dives into the life of the mother of George Washington and how historians have misrepresented her in the past.

Understanding how inflation came to be a mainstay in modern economics.

A look at the evolution of the prison system in California.

At E. 38th Street and Chicago Avenue in Minneapolis, a self-organizing network explores what it means to construct and maintain a public memorial.

A new book recovers long-suppressed alternative politics.