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A group of women textile workers outside of their boarding house.

Lowell’s Forgotten House Mothers

As vital to the success of industrial New England as the mill girls who toiled in the factories were the women who oversaw their lodging.
Painting of George Washington among enslaved laborers working in a field.

What Florida Gets Wrong about George Washington and the Benefits He Received from Enslaving Black People

Florida’s new standards for teaching social studies include throwbacks to an interpretation of slavery as benign or inconsequential.
Sculpture of Thinking Woman, by Louis Fleckenstein, 20th century.

The Birth of Brainstorming

Meet the self-help author who wanted to teach corporate America how to think.
Vince McMahon

Vince McMahon Controls Wrestling History in Order to Control All of Wrestling

How the WWE chairman warped pro wrestling all the way to WrestleMania 39.
White students, including Jerry Jones, at Arkansas' North Little Rock High blocked the doors of the school Sept. 9, 1957, denying access to six Black students.

Jerry Jones Helped Transform the NFL, Except When It Comes To Race

Decades after the segregation battles of his youth, Jerry Jones has modernized the NFL’s revenue model but hasn’t hired a Black head coach.
Collection of photographs ranging including shareholders' meeting protests, the city of Rochester, and Kodak founder George Eastman.

The Rise and Fall of an American Tech Giant

Kodak changed the way Americans saw themselves and their country. But it struggled to reinvent itself for the digital age.
Comic with Donald Trump at the head of a White House conference room.

The End of the Businessman President

Donald Trump’s catastrophic tenure will be the nail in the coffin of the worst idea in politics: that the government can be run like a corporation.
Abandoned Howard Johnson's restaurant overgrown with vegetation.

Howard Johnson’s, Host of the Bygone Ways

For more than seven decades American roads were dotted with the familiar orange roof and blue cupola of the ubiquitous Howard Johnson’s restaurants and Motor Lodges.

The Square Deal

Some people called it "Welfare Capitalism." George F. Johnson called it "The Square Deal."
African American sharecropping children in a field with bags of cotton.
partner

The Perils of Big Data: How Crunching Numbers Can Lead to Moral Blunders

As history shows, efficiency without ethics can be catastrophic.

Make Ford Great Again

For now, yesterday is where the money is.

The Factory That Oreos Built

A new owner for the New York City landmark offers a tasty opportunity to recap a crème-filled history.

The Small Business Myth

Small businesses enjoy an iconic status in modern capitalism, but what do they really contribute to the economy?

Memo to Trump: This Is Why You're Losing

Why the president, who appears allergic to the logic of bureaucracy, keeps getting defeated by that humblest of technologies, the office memorandum.
Cubicles

The Moral Life of Cubicles

On the utopian origins of Dilbert's workspace.
Workmen clearing cobwebs from exterior of the White House, c. 1920.
partner

How to Succeed in Government Without Really Trying

The long history of promising an “efficient” federal government. 
Magazine ad of raccoons playing computer games.

The Raccoons Who Made Computer Magazine Ads Great

In the 1980s and 1990s, PC Connection built its brand on a campaign starring folksy small-town critters. They’ll still charm your socks off.
Collage of magazine text and outdoor images.

The Decline of Outside Magazine Is Also the End of a Vision of the Mountain West

After its purchase by a tech entrepreneur, the publication is now a shadow of itself.
Donald Trump and Roy Cohn at a press conference.

Donald Trump’s Long Con

Trump’s “Art of” trilogy may be full of willful exaggeration, but the books also reveal how the 1980s and 90s formed his dog-eat-dog worldview.
Collage of shattered photos of Bear Stearns, George W. Bush, and law enforcement officers.

The Weekend That Shook the World

Lessons from Bear Stearns's collapse 17 years ago.

How Business Metrics Broke the University

The push to make students into customers incentivizes faculty to seek visibility through controversy rather than through traditional scholarly achievement.
Graydon Carter sitting next to stacks of ornate, empty chairs.

Vanity Fair’s Heyday

I was once paid six figures to write an article—now what?

George Washington Knew the Difference Between Running a Business and Running the Government

The first businessman president realized that working with Congress – not alone or against it – was the best way to create an efficient federal government.
Cartoon of well-dressed arm holding a lit match

The Gilded Age Never Ended

Plutocrats, anarchists, and what Henry James grasped about the romance of revolution.
Actor Maurice Chevalier signing his MGM contract

In the Lions’ Studio

A new dual biography turns the lens on the towering architects of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

Farmer George

The connections between the first president’s commitment to agricultural innovation and his evolving attitudes toward his enslaved laborers at Mount Vernon.
Farm for sale in Kansas, 1938.
partner

The Early History of “Selling America to Americans”

Using film and advertising to sell capitalism and nationalism to immigrants in the early 20th century.
Portrait of Ena and Betty Wertheimer by John Singer Sargent, 1901.

Friend of the Family

Jean Strouse explores the relationship between the Anglo-Jewish Wertheimers and John Singer Sargent, who painted twelve portraits of them.
Bookcover of Golden States, of people in bathing suits doing yoga.

How Dr. Bronner’s Spiritual Messaging Became a Global Brand

Dr. Bronner blends spirituality, ethical consumerism, and social activism, aiming to support both community and environmental causes through “All-One” values.
Portrait of Julius Rosenwald hanging on a wall.

Finding Philanthropy’s Forgotten Founder

Julius Rosenwald understood that charity is not just about giving, but about fixing the inequalities that make giving necessary.

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