Excerpts

How urban planners and suburban shoppers responded when “the storage of dead vehicles on roadways” became a nuisance to street users.

Oliver North and his cronies in the Contra support operations put in motion a clandestine counter-intelligence apparatus to disrupt the flow of information.

An immigrant born to working-class activism stands up to an NYPD reborn in the CIA's image.

Black femininity was always considered a hard sell in Hollywood, but Hattie McDaniels and Dorothy became the perfect women to peddle racist stereotypes.

A conversation with historian David Hollinger about the rise of evangelicalism, the decline of mainline Protestantism, and the nature of America's secularism.

The turn-of-the-century literary canon, using data from college syllabi.

Gary Gerstle’s new book tackles important questions of the last century about democracy, economy, and war. But it fails to answer a basic question.

The Great Epizootic, an equine flu in 1872-1873, infected most U.S. horses. Streetcars and mail delivery stopped across the country while fires raged.

A new book tells the definitive history of an Alabama community founded by survivors of the slave trade.

The Atlantic Monthly reported on newly found love letters between Lincoln and Ann Rutledge, his supposed sweetheart. Even biographers fell for the hoax.

Major League Soccer – which starts the 2023 season on Feb. 25 – is deemed the most diverse league in the US. Its predecessor, the NASL, led the way.

Native farming practices and settler-colonial imaginations in the video game "Empire: Total War."

There is an illusion at the centre of British history that conceals the role of slavery in building the nation. Here’s how I fell for it.

From birthright freedom to birthright citizenship.

Why the first prizefight at Dodger's Stadium would become its last (outside of fiction).

On 50 years of Thomas Pynchon’s “Gravity’s Rainbow.”

Women’s economic labor was essential to state function.

And historians aren't exactly helping in the Harvard case currently before the Supreme Court.

Two new books ask us to shift our attention away from the white vigilantes of Jim Crow and instead focus on what it meant for the survivors.

Spurred by the pandemic, new groups of workers are pushing to form unions in activism not seen since the 1930s.

Raising awareness helped turn cancer from a stigmatized disease into a treatable one. But it hasn’t made affording that treatment any easier.

The death of mystery writer Edgar Allan Poe is its own mystery. But new research suggests election fraud may have contributed to his demise in Baltimore.

It's a myth that the Founders opposed the regulation of deadly weapons.

Even after Wong Kim Ark successfully took his case to the Supreme Court 125 years ago, Asian Americans struggled to receive recognition as U.S. citizens.

International arms dealer Samuel Cummings blanketed the Western Hemisphere with guns.

What we fight about when we fight about schools.

How the WWE chairman warped pro wrestling all the way to WrestleMania 39.

The AR-15 thrives in times of tension and tragedy. This is how it came to dominate the marketplace – and loom so large in the American psyche.

Scott Trust to invest in decade-long programme of restorative justice after academic research into newspaper’s origins.

The sudden push to rename a historic school that educated scores of Black students reeks of revenge.

The author of a new book, The Underwater Eye, discusses how film enables audiences "to connect to the most remote environment on the planet: the ocean."

The plight of Poland and the limits of America's revolutionary legacy in Jacksonian foreign policy.

America’s utopian communities have traditionally promoted egalitarianism and alternatives to capitalism. Company towns do the opposite.

Notions of women during the Civil War center on self-sacrificing nurses, romantic spies, or the home front. However, women charged into battle, too.

Decades of failed promises have left voters apathetic or pessimistic.

From the Triangle Factory Fire to Shein, fast fashion can’t escape ethical quandaries.

She risked everything to escape a life of poverty and become one of the nation's most read columnists, while advocating for the advancement of women.

The impact of Black ball players' fight for higher compensation and labor protections in the ‘70s is felt today.

Sha-Rock claims her place as the first female MC in hip-hop history.

The 2003 invasion of Iraq was no turning point. It was a slow-burning tale of how Britain and the US armed a nation, and then betrayed it.

These scientists spent weeks underwater doing research—and convincing NASA women could also go into space.

An investigation identified hundreds of artifacts linked to indicted or convicted traffickers. What does this mean for the future of museums?

In his final book, David Graeber looks at an experiment in radical democracy and piratical justice in Madagascar.

We've heard about Rosa Parks and her crucial role, but Parks was just one of many women involved.

A new book offers the first full-length biography of newspaper editor, labor leader and minister Samuel Ringgold Ward.

African American church graveyards are disappearing. Can they be saved before it’s too late?

The Nixon White House Tapes tell a different story.

Most Americans now grasp that violence was essential to the functioning of slavery, but a new book excavates the brutality of everyday Black life in the Jim Crow South.

In his history of the John Birch Society, Matthew Dallek says Republicans allowed the extreme fringe to “eventually cannibalize the entire party.”

When ranchers began reporting incidents of mutilated cattle, the ensuring panic fed both conspiracy theories and a growing cynicism about the government.