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American Flag with Stars replaced with atoms and stripes replaced by syringes and graduated cylinders

The Rise (and Fall?) of the National Science Foundation

In the ’50s, America declared science an ‘endless frontier.’ We may be reaching the end of it.
by Carly Anne York via The Chronicle of Higher Education on February 21, 2025
The entrance of Fischer Bros, a Jewish grocery store, with a line of people going out the door.

The Rise of the Jewish Grocer

From kosher butchers, fruit peddlers, and herring dealers on the Lower East Side to supermarket innovators across the country
by Jenna Weissman Joselit via Tablet on February 3, 2025
David Montgomery in a picket line during a 1955 UE strike.

The People in the Shop

A new collection of essays by David Montgomery shows how he used labor history as a means of grappling with the largest questions in American history.
by Kim Phillips-Fein via The Nation on December 17, 2024
Korean War U.S Army helicopter and soldiers about to board.

The Korean War and Mismanaging Protracted Conflict

History can make the U.S. better prepared for the specter of protracted large-scale ground combat, which has grown more real in the wake of the ongoing war in Ukraine.
by Andrew J. Forney via Texas National Security Review on October 14, 2024
Two 1950s cars in front of a diner

You Can’t Go Home Again

Our thinking about nostalgia is badly flawed because it relies on defective assumptions about progress and time.
by Charlie Tyson via The Hedgehog Review on March 19, 2024
Mirror images of General James Longstreet.

How a Die-Hard Confederate General Became a Civil Rights–Supporting Republican

James Longstreet became an apostate for supporting black civil rights during Reconstruction.
by Matthew E. Stanley via Jacobin on January 5, 2024
J. Edgar Hoover

J. Edgar Hoover Shaped US History for the Worse

As director of the FBI for decades, J. Edgar Hoover helped build a massive, professionalized national security state and hounded leftists out of public life.
by Beverly Gage, Micah Uetricht via Jacobin on December 30, 2023
A photograph of the back of a woman's head, superimposed over a photograph of a body of water as if looking out over it.

What if Nostalgia Isn’t What It Used to Be?

As our faith in the future plummets and the present blends with the past, we feel certain that we’ve reached the point where history has fallen apart.
by Thomas Mallon via The New Yorker on November 20, 2023
A hand reaches for stacks of coins and bills, superimposed on photos of factory smokestacks.

Profit, Power, and Purpose

The greatest challenge presented by modern corporations, small as well as large, involves purpose.
by Michael Lind via The Hedgehog Review on November 1, 2023
A flower.

A Structural History of American Public Health Narratives

Rereading Priscilla Wald’s "Contagious" and Nancy Tomes’ "Gospel of Germs" amidst a 21st-century pandemic.
by Amy Mackin via Assay Journal on March 25, 2023
Six frames of a rider on his horse going through the motions of trotting.

Palo Alto’s First Tech Giant Was a Horse Farm

The region has been in the disruption business for nearly 150 years.
by Malcolm Harris via The Atlantic on February 8, 2023
Detail of atlas of the city of Boston, Boston Proper and Back Bay, Plate 9.

Building Blocks

An exhibition exploring the connections between the environment and social justice, using maps and visual materials.
by Laura Lee Schmidt via Norman B. Leventhal Map & Education Center on January 13, 2023
1849 sketch of Pittsburgh from Coal Hill
original

Time for a Revolution

The economic transformations wrought by industrial capitalism in the 1820s and 30s look different when viewed up close.
by Ed Ayers on November 28, 2022
Drawing by Thomas Rowlandson, of the "Inside View of the Public Library," Cambridge, 1809.

A Library by the Book

For its ubiquity and richness, the American library building stands as a reflection of the country’s enlightened calling.
by James Panero via The New Criterion on November 11, 2022
Book cover for Captives: How Rikers Island Took New York City Hostage," showing a photo of incarcerated men speaking to the media.

How Rikers Island Made New York

In “Captives,” former Rikers detainee Jarrod Shanahan traces the history of New York City’s sprawling jail complex, and its centrality to brutal class struggle.
by Jarrod Shanahan, Alana Mohamed via Hell Gate on May 16, 2022
Scene from from 'The Gilded Age' in which a wealthy white woman and an African American woman walk in the street, with a stagecoach behind them.

The True History Behind HBO's 'The Gilded Age'

Julian Fellowes' new series dramatizes the late 19th-century clash between New York City's old and new monied elite.
by Kimberly A. Hamlin via Smithsonian on January 20, 2022
Group of child laborers

The Age of the Birth Certificate

When states began restricting labor by children, verifying a person's age became an important means of enforcement.
by Matthew Wills, Susan J. Pearson via JSTOR Daily on January 12, 2022
Art sculpture "House" by Rachael Whiteread, 1993 (a concrete casting of the inside of a Victorian house).

Monuments for the Interim Twenty-Four Thousand Years.

An account of the long-lasting effects of nuclear energy in the US.
by Annie Simpson via Southern Cultures on August 23, 2021
Animated scene from One Hundred and One Dalmatians

How 'One Hundred and One Dalmatians' Saved Disney

Sixty years ago, the company modernized animation when it used Xerox technology on the classic film.
by Gia Yetikyel via Smithsonian on June 2, 2021
Illustration of a Lancasterian school building

A History of Technological Hype

When it comes to education technology, school leaders have often leaped before they looked.
by Adam Laats, Victoria E. M. Cain via Phi Delta Kappan on February 22, 2021
A nose smelling.

What Smells Can Teach Us About History

How we perceive the senses changes in different historical, political, and cultural contexts. Sensory historians ask what people smelled, touched and tasted.
by Shayla Love via Vice on September 16, 2020

What Richard Hofstadter Got Wrong

The late historian and author of “The Paranoid Style in American Politics” misdiagnosed the fate of modern conservatism.
by Chris Lehmann via The New Republic on April 16, 2020
Four people looking at a latrine

The Paradise of the Latrine

American toilet-building and the continuities of colonial and postcolonial development.
by Simon Toner via Modern American History on November 29, 2019
Prison cells

The Economic Origins of Mass Incarceration

Everything you knew about mass incarceration is wrong.
by John Clegg, Adaner Usmani via Catalyst on September 1, 2019
multicolor illustration of Gmail icons, iMessage text boxes, reply arrows, and refresh arrows.

Was E-mail a Mistake?

Digital messaging was supposed to make our work lives easier and more efficient, but the math suggests that meetings might be better.
by Cal Newport via The New Yorker on August 6, 2019

A Social—and Personal—History of Silence

Its meaning can change over time, and over the course of a life.
by Jane Brox via The New Yorker on April 3, 2019
Trump looks at border wall construction prototypes.
partner

The Hole in Donald Trump’s Wall

As long as Americans continue to flood into Mexico, the wall will do little to deter crossings.
by Tore C. Olsson via Made By History on January 9, 2019

A History of Noise

Whether we consider the sounds of nature to be pleasant or menacing depends largely on our ideologies.
by Livia Gershon via JSTOR Daily on June 1, 2018

Why New York City Stopped Building Subways

Nearly 80 years ago, a construction standstill derailed the subway into its present crisis.
by Jonathan English via CityLab on April 16, 2018
Willa Cather

Willa Cather, Pioneer

Willa Cather's life and work broke with the standards of her time.
by Jane Smiley via The Paris Review on February 27, 2018
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