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General president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters Sean O'Brien speaks during the first day of the 2024 Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, July 15, 2024.

A Return to Gompers

Sean O’Brien’s speech at the RNC may represent a return to nonpartisan realpolitik for unions. But does that reflect labor's strength or its decline?
by Dustin Guastella via Jacobin on July 17, 2024
Oil on canvas (1993–94) depicting the third signing of the Louisiana Treaty in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Trade, Ambition, and the Rise of American Empire

High ideals have always gone together with economic self-interest in the history of the United States.
by Samuel Gregg via Law & Liberty on July 17, 2024
President Ronald Reagan, pictured waving to a crowd shortly before John Hinckley Jr. tried to assassinate him on March 30, 1981.

The History of Presidential Assassination Attempts, From Andrew Jackson to Teddy Roosevelt

Before last weekend’s attack on Donald Trump, would-be assassins targeted Ronald Reagan, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and seven other presidents or candidates.
by Meilan Solly via Smithsonian on July 17, 2024
The side of Donald Trump's face, focused on his bandaged ear from his attempted assassination.

Historians See Echoes of 1968 in Trump Assassination Attempt

But they also find key differences.
by Olivia B. Waxman via Time on July 17, 2024
Donald Trump speaking into microphone and pointing his finger.

‘I’d Rather Have 10 Ken Starrs Than One Donald Trump’

A new book explores the history of presidents who abused their constitutional power and the citizen movements that stopped them.
by Michael Kruse, Corey Brettschneider via Politico on July 8, 2024
Table of illustrations of various diverse human faces from "Ethnographic Tableau."

Baffled by Human Diversity

Confused 17th-century Europeans argued that human groups were separately created, a precursor to racist thought today.
by Jacob Zellmer via Aeon on July 8, 2024
J. Robert Oppenheimer lecturing in front of chalkboard.

Oppenheimer’s Second Coming

Japanese were interested when Oppenheimer visited Japan as an honored guest in 1960. Will they be also interested in the Nolan film released today in Japan?
by Gregory Kulacki via Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists on March 28, 2024
The Bahá’í House of Worship, a tall, ornate building made of concrete, illuminated against a cloudy sky.

The Beauty of Concrete

Why are buildings today simple and austere, while buildings of the past were ornate and elaborately ornamented? The answer is not the cost of labor.
by Samuel Hughes via Works In Progress on May 17, 2024
Designed picture of Lambert Adolphe Quetelet and Ancel Keys.

The Strange History of BMI, the Body Mass Index

BMI is a simple calculation, but how it is translated into a diagnosis is complex and flawed.
via STAT on March 9, 2023
A collection of supplies inside of a fallout shelter.

Nine Hot Weeks, with Misgivings

Cataloguing basement fallout shelters in the summer of 1967.
by Monte Davis via 3 Quarks Daily on July 16, 2024
A rally for the 1970 Revolutionary People’s Constitutional Convention hosted by the Black Panthers.

Democracy Was a Decolonial Project

For generations of American radicals, the path to liberation required a new constitution, not forced removal.
by Aziz Rana via Boston Review on May 30, 2024
Runners on a track and crowds in the stands at the All Africa Games, 1973.
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Afraid of an Inspiring Olympics Story

How Europe reacted when Ethiopia tried to join the famed global sporting tradition at the 1924 Paris Olympics.
by Hannah Borenstein via HNN on July 16, 2024
Horseshoe crab remains on the beach on Parsons Island.

Ancient Chesapeake Site Challenges Timeline of Humans in the Americas

An island eroding into the bay offers tantalizing clues about when and how humans first made their way into North America.
by Carolyn Y. Johnson via Washington Post on May 19, 2024
“Scene Representing the Suffering of Animals in a Railroad Stable” in the 1873 annual report of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

How the Civil War Spurred The Animal Welfare Movement

The story of American abolitionists who, after Emancipation, pivoted from antislavery campaigns to animal welfare advocacy.
by Barbara Spindel via The Christian Science Monitor on June 11, 2024
Person holding tree marked with carvings of various symbols, made by Basque herders.

Arborglyphs – Basque Immigrant Sheepherders Left Their Marks on Aspen Trees in the American West

Herders carved names, slogans, nude silhouettes and more into the trees around them. Now, researchers rush to find the arborglyphs before they disappear.
by John Bieter, Cheryl Oestreicher, Iñaki Arrieta Baro via The Conversation on June 20, 2024
Sticker showing the slogan: "Reparations Now!" and photo of Tulsa burning.

What’s Really at Stake in The Tulsa Race Massacre Reparations Trial

With over 100 lawsuits dismissed, a last-ditch effort is underway to force the city to put into legal record what happened after that day.
by Caleb Gayle via The Emancipator on May 21, 2024
John Gast's 1872 painting "American Progress," in which Miss Columbia, a personification of the enlightening United States, is depicted leading pioneers over the western plains.

Two Years That Made the West

In a momentous couple of years, the young United States added more than a million square miles of territory, including Texas and California. 
by Elliott West via American Heritage on July 3, 2024
Joe Biden lifting finger.

Hey Man, We’re Out of Runway

On three histories of the Biden White House, and the 2024 election.
by Christian Lorentzen via London Review of Books on July 8, 2024
Nora Kenworthy's book: "Crowded Out: The True Costs of Crowdfunding Healthcare".

Crowded Out: The Dark Side Of Crowdfunding Healthcare And Its Historical Precedents

The moral terrain of crowdfunding is fueled by two persistent social ideologies: the dual, and intertwined, myths of meritocracy and the “deserving poor.”
by Nora Kenworthy via HistPhil on July 12, 2024
Map of West Florida.

From Subjects To Citizens

The West Florida revolt in the Age of Revolutions.
by Colin Mathison via Age of Revolutions on July 8, 2024
Photos of assassination attempts on Ronald Reagan, Donald Trump, and Gerald Ford.

Stop Pretending You Know How This Will End

The failed assassination of Donald Trump might not have any lasting effect on the election or politics in general.
by Derek Thompson via The Atlantic on July 16, 2024
A painting of a steamship on the Mississippi River.

A Fundamental Boundary: What the Mississippi River Means to America

On the meaning and use of rivers and other waterways.
by Boyce Upholt via Literary Hub on June 11, 2024
Illustration of Frances Thompson, bordered by smoke from green candles, and a purple flower.

How a Disabled Black Trans Woman Left Her Mark on 19th-Century Memphis

For a brief moment in history, Frances Thompson was Memphis’ biggest scandal. Her life paints a different picture of our civil rights legacy.
by Justin A. Davis via The Emancipator on June 13, 2024
Mexican-American wife standing with her hand on the shoulder of her seated Punjabi husband.
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The “Mexican-Hindus” of Rural California

Anti-Asian immigration restrictions led male Punjabi farm workers in California to marry Mexican and Mexican American women, creating new cultural bonds.
by Bruce LaBrack, Karen Leonard, H. M. A. Leow via JSTOR Daily on July 8, 2024
President Calvin Coolidge raising his hand behind a podium to be sworn into office.
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Behind America’s First Comprehensive Federal Immigration Law

Even as the primary targets of immigration restrictionism have shifted, the consequences for immigrants remain profoundly shaped by the system created in 1924.
by Devin E. Naar via Made by History on July 9, 2024
A sign reading "Love Asheville, Y'all Means All!" with a rainbow heart in the background.

Y’all Means All: Past and Present LGBTQ+ Rights in the South

Despite an unwelcoming political climate and a dearth of LGBTQ+ protections, LGBTQ+ Southerners have persisted.
by Brittany Daniel via Nursing Clio on July 10, 2024
A statue of Woodrow Wilson standing next to a bald eagle in Prague.

A Statue in Prague, Four Presidents, and the Meaning of American Democracy

The histories of the U.S. and Czechia are linked by multiple presidents of both countries.
by Ben Railton via The Saturday Evening Post on July 10, 2024
Ronald Reagan and Walter Mondale at 1984 presidential debate.

When a Debate Flop Raised Concerns About Ronald Reagan's Fitness to Run for Re-Election

During the 1984 campaign, the 73-year-old president meandered his way through his face-off against Walter Mondale, prompting questions about his mental acuity.
by Eli Wizevich via Smithsonian on July 11, 2024
Person sitting on couch watching the news.

Is the Age of the Resistance Historian Coming to an End?

People who study the past don’t always have special insight into politics. Recent events have made that crystal clear.
by William Hogeland via Slate on July 11, 2024
Banner showing the logo of Chiquita.

Chiquita Must Pay for Its Crimes in Latin America

70 years since President Árbenz was ousted for standing up to Chiquita, the firm might finally be held to account for its ties to a far-right paramilitary group in Colombia.
by Klas Lundström via Jacobin on July 10, 2024
John Dudley Sargent standing next to Edith Sargent.
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Something We Were Never Meant to See

Finding a story in the ways Robert Ray Hamilton, John Dudley Sargent, and Edith Sargent weren’t quite forgotten. 
by Maura Jane Farrelly via HNN on July 9, 2024
Syntactic trees filled with words and numbers.

American Grammar: Diagraming Sentences in the 19th Century

A pre-history of the sentence diagrams that were once commonplace in the American classroom.
by Hunter Dukes via The Public Domain Review on June 19, 2024
A collage of photographs of the cast and crew of "The Real World" over the show's logo.

How “The Real World” Created Modern Reality TV

The rules governing everything from “Big Brother” to “The Real Housewives” started three decades ago, with a radical experiment on MTV.
by Emily Nussbaum via The New Yorker on June 15, 2024
Demonstrators holding signs at George Floyd protest in NYC, 2020.

Americans Used to Unite Over Tragic Events − and Now Are Divided By Them

Tragedy seldom unifies Americans today.
by Thomas D. Beamish via The Conversation on June 18, 2024
Painting of Mary Ann Tritt Cassell, a woman with pale skin and curled hair wearing a blue shirt with pink bow collar.

An Art Mystery is Solved, and a Historic Portrait Goes on Display

The painting of Mary Ann Tritt Cassell is likely the first known portrait commissioned by an American born into slavery.
by James Johnston via Retropolis on June 24, 2024
The Jersey Devil, a winged creature with horns and a goat-like head, amidst trees wrapped with vines.
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Birthing the Jersey Devil

A mythical creature that lurks in the pinelands of New Jersey has served as a reminder of the horrors that result when reproductive freedoms are destroyed.
by Katherine Churchill via JSTOR Daily on July 3, 2024
"Just Say No" memorabilia at the Reagan Presidential Library.

White Suburbs and Drug Wars

To understand the racism of the drug war, we must look to the ways policymakers sought to protect white suburban youth.
by Max Felker-Kantor via Public Books on July 3, 2024
Norman Mailer in front of Brooklyn skyline.

The New York Intellectuals’ Battle of the Sexes

Norman Mailer’s generation learned to “write like men.” But their female contemporaries from Mary McCarthy to Diana Trilling pioneered a more enduring style.
by Michael Kimmage via The New Republic on July 5, 2024
Donald Trump walking onstage, next to four American flags.

‘The Dred Scott of Our Time’

The Supreme Court has invested the presidency with quasi-monarchial powers, repudiating the foundational principle of the rule of law.
by Sean Wilentz via New York Review of Books on July 4, 2024
Still from 'Chinatown' showing Jack Nicholson taking photo.

“Chinatown” at 50, or Seeing Oil Through Cinema

On the 50th anniversary of “Chinatown” and the beginning of the end of petromodernity.
by Michael Rubenstein via Los Angeles Review of Books on July 8, 2024
Collage of American events in the 1990s.

The Nutty Nineties

What was in the water circa 1992?
by Katrina Gulliver via Law & Liberty on July 9, 2024
President Joe Biden speaking at campaign event.

The Arguments for Biden 2024 Keep Getting Worse

No, "history" does not tell us that the Democrats shouldn't change their nominee.
by Eric Levitz via Vox on July 9, 2024
People swimming and standing in water.

On the Time Benjamin Franklin, American Show-Off, Jumped Naked Into the Thames

On our millennia-long love-hate relationship with getting in the water.
by Vicki Valosik via Literary Hub on June 27, 2024
Illustration of soldiers fighting in the Battle of the Cowpens.

Did the South Win the Revolutionary War?

A new book brings to life the war in the South.
by Dan McLaughlin via National Review on July 4, 2024
Chief Justice John Roberts attending the State of the Union.

J. Roberts et al. v. A. Lincoln

As the Supreme Court invents a law to negate all others, Chief Justice John Roberts now ranks just below Roger Taney.
by Harold Meyerson via The American Prospect on July 8, 2024
A painting of Boston harbor, where women in dresses stand on a hill, watching ships
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Invisible Cities, Continued

The 19th century recovery of John Winthrop's sermon, "A City on a Hill."
via BackStory on January 22, 2016
John Winthrop
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Invisible Cities

On John Winthrop’s oft-misunderstood use of the phrase “a city upon a hill” to describe the New World.
via BackStory on January 22, 2016
Reconstruction of Mt. Malady hospital at Henricus Historical Park, Virginia.
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Health Care in the New World

Reporter Catherine Moore visits the first hospital in the New World and finds out why the “public plan” in the Virginia colony may have had its drawbacks.
via BackStory on October 1, 2009
Interior of a Kitchen, by Eliphalet Fraser Andrews.
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Mastering the Art of Reading an Old Recipe

For every moment of historical significance, there is a figure — often hidden — who fed the figures we do remember.
by Avery Blankenship via HNN on July 9, 2024
Human figures colored either blue or green.

Mortality Wars

Estimating life and death in Iraq and Gaza.
by Shaan Sachdev via The Drift on July 8, 2024
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