Filter by:

Filter by published date

Viewing 31–60 of 70 results. Go to first page
A swamp in Southampton County, Virginia.

An Extraordinary Historical Collaboration Sees Nat Turner's Rebellion in a Prophetic Light

A new book argues that we misunderstand the forces that drove the notorious slave rebel.
A Christian cross in an open field, with a sunset in the background.

Jesus Freaks: On the Free Spirited Evangelicals of the 1970s and 80s

Chronicling the emergence of a unique blend of counterculture and Christianity.
Yellow amaryllis flower in its bulb.

The American Colony of Jerusalem’s “Wild Flowers of Palestine” (ca. 1900–20)

Photographs of wild flowers taken by photographers from a Christian utopian community that settled in East Jerusalem at the turn of the 20th century.
Harriet Tubman.

How a Young Harriet Tubman Found Solace in Syncretic Religion

Childhood trauma led Minty Ross (Harriet Tubman) to seek divine intervention.
President Ronald Reagan is applauded by Beverly LaHaye, President of Concerned Women for America, right, shortly before he addressed a group in Arlington, Va., Sept. 25, 1987.
partner

The Woman Who Helped Build the Christian Right

How one activist helped turn evangelical women into the backbone of right-wing conservatism.
Prehistoric people seen through a pair of glasses.

The Abuses of Prehistory

Beware of theories about human nature based on the study of our earliest ancestors.
A drawing of Noah Webster over drawings of the Webster dictionary, his notes, and a quill and ink.

Webster’s Dictionary 1828: Annotated

Noah Webster’s American Dictionary of the English Language declared Americans free from the tyranny of British institutions and their vocabularies.
The Branch Davidian compound, Mount Carmel, Waco, Texas.

I Will Give Thee Madonna

Kevin Cook and Jeff Guinn on David Koresh, the Branch Davidians, and the 1993 siege of Waco.
Fr. Daniel Berrigan, left, and his brother, Fr. Philip Berrigan, outside the Montgomery County Court House in Norristown, Pennsylvania, 1981 (AP Photo/Paul Shane).

When the FBI Feared the Catholic Left

Even if today's anti-war protestors couldn’t tell you who the Berrigan brothers were, the Catholic Left’s shadow looms large.
Abraham Lincoln.

Lincoln’s Faith

The President's spiritual journey transformed him and the nation.
Peter Waddell's "A Vision Unfolds" imaginatively depicts Benjamin Banneker advising President Washington and fellow surveyor Andrew Ellicott on the layout of the proposed federal capital.

Banneker’s Answer to Jefferson: “I Am an American”

The black naturalist, astronomer, surveyor, and almanac-writer Benjamin Banneker took issue with Thomas Jefferson’s attitude toward “those of my complexion.”
James Baldwin

Reading Baldwin After Kanye

A conversation about James Baldwin’s 1967 essay, “Negroes are Anti-Semitic Because They are Anti-White.”
Painting of a young boy working as an apprentice, wearing an apron

How Long Did the School Year Last in Early America?

Even throwing off of a colonial power, representative institutions, Protestantism, and local autonomy in school decisions did not produce an egalitarian system.
Illustration of a book reading "A-Z" with a laptop features as the pages.

Life Is Short. Indexes Are Necessary.

In 1941 an ambitious Philadelphia pediatrician, the wonderfully named Waldo Emerson Nelson, became the editor of America’s leading textbook of pediatrics.
Detail of faces on a family tree.

The Pocahontas Exception: America’s Ancestor Obsession

The ‘methods and collections’ of genealogists are political because they have a great deal in common with genealogy as a way of doing history.
A sign in Alabama reading "Thank God We Are Deplorable", 2018.

Christianity's Place in the Left and the Right

A conversation with historian David Hollinger about the rise of evangelicalism, the decline of mainline Protestantism, and the nature of America's secularism.
The angel Moroni delivering the plates of the Book of Mormon to Joseph Smith.
original

Sacred Places

A visit to the site of Joseph Smith’s divine revelation makes for a different kind of public history experience.
Artwork of trees with multicolored roots.

Yearning for Roots

We're born with a hunger for connection with our ancestors – both biological and spiritual.

Liquor on Sundays

A new book sets out to discover how Americans became such creatures of the seven-day week.
Johnathan Edwards.

How Jonathan Edwards Influenced Southern Baptists

Southern Baptists were seeking a religion of the heart, and in Edwards they discovered a trove of treatises, biographies, and sermons on Christian spirituality.
Collage of a hand raised up toward major conservative Christian figures throughout American history.

The Evangelical Question in the History of American Religion

The disturbing conclusion might just be that evangelicalism does not exist.
The First Presbyterian Church at 48 Fifth Avenue, Greenwich Village, New York City.

The Sermon That Divided America

Harry Emerson Fosdick's ‘Shall the Fundamentalists Win?’
Painting of a Dutch merchant with his wife and an enslaved servants, standing on the shore with Dutch ships sailing in the background

The Legacies of Calvinism in the Dutch Empire

In the 17th century, Dutch proselytisers set out for Asia, Africa and the Americas. The legacy of their travels endures.
The evolution of man figures, redacted, crossed out.

The Conservative War on Education That Failed

A century ago, the most effective school-ban campaign in American history set the pattern: noise and fear, but not much change in what schools actually teach.
Anti-evolution books for sale in Dayton, Tenn.

Why the Culture Wars in Schools Are Worse Than Ever Before

The history of education battles — from fights over evolution to critical race theory — shows why the country’s divisions are growing sharper.
Newspaper article titled 'Novel-reading a cause of female depravity'

Why Novels Will Destroy Your Mind

Back in the 18th and 19th centuries, novels were regarded as the video games or TikTok of their age — shallow, addictive, and dangerous.
An image of the diary of John Claypoole, third husband of Betsy Ross.

Betsy Ross’s Husband’s Diary Turned Up in a Garage. Here’s What it Tells Us About The Flagmaker.

The 240-year-old journal of John Claypoole, a Revolutionary War POW and later the third husband of Betsy Ross, sheds light on the flagmaker.
Newspaper with "Join or Die" slogan

Join, Or Die: Why Did It Have To Be Snakes?

Revolutionary Americans adopted native snakes as symbols for their cause. Why?
Embarkation of the Pilgrims.

Puritanism as a State of Mind

Whatever the “City on a Hill” is, the phrase was not discovered by Kennedy or Reagan.
Camp meeting

The Long Road to White Christians' Trumpism

Any effective soul-searching must take into account the history of white American Christian support for white supremacist power.

Filter Results:

Suggested Filters:

Idea

Person