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Alexander Hamilton, with superimposed map of Atlantic world.

The Return of Hamiltonian Statecraft

A grand strategy for a turbulent world.
by Walter Russell Mead via Foreign Affairs on August 20, 2024
Marketplace in New Orleans, 1936.

New Orleans as a Nexus of Power

American empire, bananas, and the Crescent City.
by Glenn Chambers Jr. via 64 Parishes on June 1, 2024
Sam Bankman-Fried of FTX at a House hearing in 2021.
partner

‘Effective Altruism’ Isn’t As Newfangled As It Seems

Times have changed since the days of Carnegie and Rockefeller, but much in philanthropy has remained the same.
by John R. Thelin, Richard W. Trollinger via Made By History on February 6, 2023
Mitch McConnell
partner

The Fissure Between Republicans and Business is Less Surprising Than it Seems

Business groups have always worked with both parties to support globalization and free trade.
by Jennifer Delton via Made By History on June 7, 2021
Handcuffs with chain of $

The Men Who Turned Slavery Into Big Business

The domestic slave trade was no sideshow in our history, and slave traders were not bit players on the stage.
by Joshua D. Rothman via The Atlantic on April 20, 2021
A magnifying glass on C. Wright Mills's book "The Power Elite."

Whatever Happened to the Power Elite?

The trio of interests atop business, military, and government depicted in C. Wright Mills’s postwar critique is no longer united in setting the national agenda.
by Peter Dreier via The New Republic on May 5, 2025
A drawing of human eyes behind a variety of consumer goods, including milk, shoes, and toothpaste.

The Surprising History of the Ideology of Choice

How endless options became our only option.
by Andrew Lanham via The New Republic on April 11, 2025
An illustration of a government building holding up an American home with a stylized hand.

The Good Society Department

Once upon a time, there was a federal government department that helped design and distribute tools for living the good life. What happened to that vision?
by John Last via Noema on April 3, 2025
The title card of George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead.

George Romero’s Pittsburgh

City of the living dead.
by Victoria Timpanaro via The Metropole on February 20, 2025
A man in a suit with angel wings clipped to his back, tipping a hat with six different arms.

The Cult of the Entrepreneur

Why do Americans idealize people who found businesses?
by Robin Kaiser-Schatzlein via The New Republic on February 17, 2025
A drawing of a man riding a train and laying down train tracks in front of him.

The Insidious Charms of the Entrepreneurial Work Ethic

You’re passionate. Purpose-driven. Dreaming big, working hard, making it happen. And now they’ve got you where they want you.
by Anna Wiener via The New Yorker on January 27, 2025
A painting of a large camera on a film set, surrounded by green screens.

Casual Viewing

Why Netflix looks like that.
by Will Tavlin via n+1 on December 16, 2024

How Jukeboxes Made Memphis Music

When R.E. Buster Williams ruled jukeboxes and jukeboxes ruled music.
by Robert Gordon via Oxford American on December 10, 2024
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.
by Caroline Jack via HNN on November 26, 2024
A masked man with a sword waves an American flag at the face of a masked man with a stick on the anniversary of the January 6 riot.

Hyperpolitics In America

When polarization lacks clear consequences, Americans are left with "a grin without a cat: a politics with only weak policy influence or institutional ties."
by Anton Jäger via New Left Review on October 31, 2024
A still from the Apprentice of Sebastian Stan as Donald Trump and Jeremy Strong as Roy Cohn inside a car.

The Apprenticeship of Donald Trump

A new film examines Trump's formative years under the tutelage of Roy Cohn.
by David Klion via The Nation on October 21, 2024
Black and white photo of Boston’s Old Corner bookstore (1900).

Bookselling Out

“The Bookshop” tells the story of American bookstores in thirteen types. Its true subject is not how bookstore can survive, but how they should be.
by Dan Sinykin via The Baffler on October 16, 2024
A boy sitting inside of an enclosed porch while his mother looks in from outside the door.

Inside Out

The magical in-betweenness—and surprising epidemiological history—of the porch.
by David Owen via The New Yorker on July 27, 2024
Jason Epstein.

The Man Who Created the Trade Paperback

On the life and times of Jason Epstein, cofounder of “The New York Review of Books.”
by Michael Castleman via Literary Hub on July 18, 2024
Edward Blum superimposed on the Supreme Court building.

The People Who Dismantled Affirmative Action Have a New Strategy to Crush Racial Justice

In throwing up new roadblocks to the use of private money to redress racial and economic inequality, the Fearless Fund ruling is antihistorical.
by David H. Gans via Slate on June 11, 2024
Whitehall, designed by Carrère & Hastings for Henry Morrison Flagler, 1902.

Building Palm Beach

On the town’s history & architecture.
by Benjamin Riley via The New Criterion on May 22, 2024
Star-Herb Medicines and Teas for all Diseases, 1923.

How Government Helped Birth the Advertising Industry

Advertising went from being an embarrassing activity to a legitimate part of every company’s business plans—despite scant evidence that it worked.
by Livia Gershon, Daniel Navon via JSTOR Daily on May 17, 2024
Illustration of a man typing on his laptop on a rollercoaster ride.

Work Sucks. What Could Salvage It?

New books examine the place of work in our lives—and how people throughout history have tried to change it.
by Erik Baker via The New Yorker on May 1, 2024
Bishop Desmond Tutu speaks at an International Conference Against Apartheid held in Atlanta, Georgia in 1986.

US Worker Movements and Direct Links Against Apartheid

Today's pro-Palestinian activists are utilizing anti-apartheid tactics from thirty years ago.
by Mattie Christine Webb via Black Perspectives on April 26, 2024
Franklin D. Roosevelt’s 1933 presidential inauguration.

The First New Deal

Planning, market coordination, and the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933.
by Sanjukta Paul via Phenomenal World on March 28, 2024
Illustration of a literary rejection letter.

There Is No Point in My Being Other Than Honest with You: On Toni Morrison’s Rejection Letters

Autopsies of a changing publishing industry; frustrations with readers' tastes; and sympathies for poets and authors drawn to commercially hopeless genres.
by Melina Moe via Los Angeles Review of Books on March 26, 2024
An assortment of Girl Scout cookies.

The Truth Behind the Girl Scout Cookie Graveyard

Even popular cookies can end up permanently cut from the roster.
by Anne Ewbank via Atlas Obscura on March 18, 2024
Continental Congress voting for independence.

Mother’s Milk of the Revolution

Right from the beginning, a commercial spirit and the wealth it generated were essential to creating and constituting America.
by John O. McGinnis via Law & Liberty on March 7, 2024
A photograph of Anne Morrissy next to the cover of her book, "Street Fight."

The Chicago Taxi Wars of the 1920s

The turbulent history of an often forgotten moment that would leave blood in the streets and shape the modern landscape of Chicago.
by Anne Morrissy, Michael Welch via Chicago Review of Books on March 6, 2024
A top hat with poppies and the words "Merchants of Addiction", and pictures of wealthy American opium smugglers.

The Blue-Blood Families That Made Fortunes in the Opium Trade

Long before the Sacklers appeared on the scene, families like the Astors and the Delanos cemented their upper-crust status through the global trade in opium.
by Amitav Ghosh via The Nation on January 23, 2024
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