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President Warren G. Harding throws out the first ball to open the Washington Senators' baseball season on April 13, 1921.

A Century Before Trump’s Term, a President Paid a Mistress to Stay Silent

President Warren G. Harding paid not one, but two women to remain quiet about their affairs with him.
by James D. Robenalt via Retropolis on April 2, 2023
A photo of William Faulkner

The Road to Glory: Faulkner’s Hollywood Years, 1932–1936

Lisa C. Hickman reconstructs William Faulkner’s tumultuous Hollywood sojourn of 1932–1936.
by Lisa C. Hickman via Los Angeles Review of Books on February 27, 2020
Henry Ward Beecher.

When Preachers Were Rock Stars

A classic New Yorker account of the Henry Ward Beecher adultery trial recalls a time in America that seems both incomprehensible and familiar.
by Louis Menand via The New Yorker on April 14, 2024
The crime scene. A woman's body lies in the middle of a clearning next to the river, surrounded by coroners and police

Bad Shot, Mary

The mistress of JFK, there was a lot more than wealth, whiteness, and femininity to make Mary Pinchot Meyer a target of murder.
by Devin Thomas O’Shea via Apocalypse Confidential on November 22, 2023
Cartoon animation of Beecher with his hand up with a man next to him holding a Holy Bible

When Forgiveness Enables Tyranny: The Unbearable Lightness of Henry Ward Beecher

The most influential preacher in the country, Beecher aggressively agitated for the Union to extend complete forgiveness to Confederates.
by Kari J. Winter via Commonplace on February 1, 2022
Lithograph of two men shooting one man on the ground

The Young America Movement and the Crisis of Household Politics

In the 19th century, freedom from government interference mapped onto opposition of women's rights.
by Mark Power Smith via The Panorama on July 7, 2021
Photograph of Mabel Loomis Todd with a child

Bitchy Little Spinster

Emily Dickinson and the woman in her orbit.
by Joanne O'Leary via London Review of Books on June 3, 2021

Lovers Under an Apple Tree

Why did the priest and the choir singer die, and what was the nature of their love?
by Audrey Clare Farley via Contingent on March 8, 2020
Ann Lohman – also known as Madame Restell – in an 1847 edition of the National Police Gazette.

“Immoderate Menses” or Abortion? Bodily Knowledge and Illicit Intimacy in an 1851 Divorce Trial

Edwin Forrest’s 1851 divorce trial.
by Sara Lampert via Nursing Clio on September 23, 2019

The Civil Rights Activist So Close to Martin Luther King Jr. She Was Thought of as His ‘Other Wife'

According to the recent discoveries, civil rights activist, Dorothy Cotton, and King had a close romantic relationship.
by Jason Miller via The Conversation on June 24, 2019
Monica Lewinsky surrounded by men in suits.

Why I Participated in a New Docuseries on The Clinton Affair

Reliving the events of 1998 was traumatic, yes—but also worth it, if it helps another young person avoid being “That Woman”-ed.
by Monica Lewinsky via The Hive on November 13, 2018

Was Gary Hart Set Up?

On his deathbed, GOP strategist Lee Atwater admitted he staged the events that brought down a Democratic presidential candidate.
by James Fallows via The Atlantic on October 16, 2018

The Invention of Monogamy

For most of its history, monogamy was a rule only applied to married women.
by Sarah Mirk, Isabella Rotman via The Nib on October 20, 2017
Illustration of Daniel Sickles in front of the White House.

In 1859, a Murderous Congressman Pioneered the Insanity Defense

After gunning down his wife's lover in broad daylight, Daniel Sickles tried to escape the gallows by claiming he was out of his mind.
by Betsy Golden Kellem via Narratively on September 12, 2017

The Original Attack Dog

James Callender spread scurrilous rumors about Alexander Hamilton and John Adams. Then he turned on Thomas Jefferson, too.
by John Dickerson via Slate on August 9, 2016

“Sodomy is not Adultery”: The Clinton Sex Scandal as Queer History

Until fairly recently, President Clinton's narrow definition of adultery would have been backed up by the courts.
by Alison Lefkovitz via NOTCHES on April 7, 2016
C. L. Franklin and his daughter Aretha.

The Man with the Million Dollar Voice

The mighty but divided soul of C.L. Franklin.
by Tony Scherman via The Believer on July 1, 2013
George Kennan

The Enigma of George Kennan

An exploration of the contrast between the supreme confidence of Kennan's policy prescriptions and the perpetual turbulence of his inner life.
by Benjamin Nathans via New York Review of Books on April 3, 2025
A painting of a group of Puritans walking through a snowy forest, with the men carrying rifles.

The Puritans Were Book Banners, But They Weren’t Sexless Sourpusses

From early New England to the present day, censors have acted out of fear, not prudishness.
by Peter C. Mancall via Zócalo Public Square on November 25, 2024
Spielberg and Henry Thomas in a scene on the set of E.T.

The Auteur of Fatherhood: How Steven Spielberg Recast American Masculinity

Steven Spielberg’s early films conjure all of his moviemaking magic to repair a world of lost dads.
by Phillip Maciak via The Yale Review on March 4, 2024
Martin Luther King Jr.

Defanged

A journalistic view of Martin Luther King Jr.'s life, work, and representation in American society.
by Eric Foner via London Review of Books on September 28, 2023
Martin Luther King Jr. with other activists and children.

Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Perilous Power of Respectability

We revere the man and revile the strategy, but King knew what he was doing.
by Kelefa Sanneh via The New Yorker on May 8, 2023
The women of the Source Family pose on a Rolls-Royce for an ad for the release of a recording of the cult's band, Ya Ho Wha 13.

The Cult Roots of Health Food in America

How the Source Family, a radical 1970s utopian commune, still impacts what we eat today.
by Diana Hubbell via Atlas Obscura on April 19, 2023
Map of John Proctor's 15 acres of property in Ipswich, MA

"The Crucible" and John and Elizabeth Proctor of Salem

It is worth digging a bit deeper into the family matters between John and Elizabeth.
by Benjamin Ray via Commonplace on February 7, 2023
"Mademoiselle V...in the Costume of an Espada," by Edouard Manet, a painting of a woman dressed as a matador holding sword and cloth.

A Private Matter

Abortion and "The Scarlet Letter."
by Dana Medoro via Lapham’s Quarterly on August 3, 2022
“The Marriage of Convenience,” 1883, by William Quiller Orchardson, depicting a bored young woman and an older man at opposite ends of a long dining room table.

How To Lose a Guy in the Gilded Age

Uncovering the resort where rich women sought the elusive right to divorce
by Jennifer Wilson via The New Republic on June 28, 2022
A drawing of Blanche Chesebrough with her husband standing out of frame, his hand on her shoulder.

Escape From the Gilded Cage

Even if her husband was a murderer, a woman in a bad marriage once had few options. Unless she fled to South Dakota.
by April White via Smithsonian on May 24, 2022
Illustration of a mid-life crisis by Ruth Basagoitia. A man looking into the mirror imagining a cooler version of himself.

Climacteric!

Taking seriously the midlife crisis.
by Trevor Quirk via The Hedgehog Review on March 1, 2022
John F. Kennedy giving a speech.

Shamalot

Jack Kennedy, we hardly know ye—and to know ye is not to love ye.
by P. J. O'Rourke via Commentary on November 18, 2020
Black women, oil painting

Rebellious History

Saidiya Hartman’s "Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments" is a strike against the archives’ silence regarding the lives of Black women in the shadow of slavery.
by Annette Gordon-Reed via New York Review of Books on October 1, 2020
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