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Our Commemoration of the Civil War’s End Celebrates a Myth

The emancipation of black Americans has been written out of our celebration of the Civil War's end.
by Jamelle Bouie via Slate on April 14, 2015
Black-and-white illustration of conquistadores with a Native American kneeling before them.
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Making a Myth

A time before “everyone” knew the story of Christopher Columbus, and the role of Washington Irving’s massive biography in creating the heroic Columbus myth.
via BackStory on October 10, 2014
Columbus and crew landing boat at San Salvador
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1492: Columbus in American Memory

Columbus Day is here again -- along with the controversy over its namesake. How have earlier generations understood him?
via BackStory on October 10, 2014

The Self-Made Man

The story of America’s most pliable, pernicious, irrepressible myth.
by John Swansburg via Slate on September 29, 2014

In Living Color: The Forgotten 19th-Century Photo Technology That Romanticized America

People without the means to visit America's wonders could finally picture it for themselves.
by Ben Marks via Collectors Weekly on May 23, 2014

The True Story of Phineas Gage Is Much More Fascinating Than the Mythical Textbook Accounts

Each generation revises his myth. Here’s the true story.
by Sam Kean via Slate on May 7, 2014
The house of Alfred Iverson Jr. behind a white curtain.

My Civil War

A southerner discovers the inaccuracy of the the myths he grew up with, and slowly comes to terms with his connection to the Civil War.
by John T. Edge via Oxford American on April 8, 2014

The Myth of the War of the Worlds Panic

Orson Welles’ infamous 1938 radio program did not touch off nationwide hysteria. Why does the legend persist?
by Michael J. Socolow, Jefferson Pooley via Slate on October 28, 2013
Black family sitting around log cabin, possibly in Florida, 1892.

Plantations Practiced Modern Management

Slaveholding plantations of the 19th century used scientific management techniques—and some applied them more extensively than factories.
by Caitlin C. Rosenthal, Scott Berinato via Harvard Business Review on September 1, 2013
Poster for Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show.
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Where the Buffalo Roam

How Buffalo Bill’s Wild West brought scenes from the American West to audiences around the globe.
via BackStory on March 1, 2013
A photograph of a Pony Express employee riding a horse.
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Cowboys and Mailmen

Debunking myths about the Pony Express.
via BackStory on December 7, 2012
An illustration depicting the size of the Titanic in comparison to world wonders.

The Unsinkable Myth

Reflections on the various legends surrounding the world's most famous ship.
by Richard Howells via The Public Domain Review on April 11, 2012

Thanks a Lot, Ken Burns

Because of you, my Civil War lecture is always packed with students raised on your romantic, deeply misleading portrait of the conflict.
by James M. Lundberg via Slate on June 7, 2011
Police car.

The Orchestra

What are the origins of the mechanical siren?
by George Prochnik via Cabinet on March 1, 2011
Illustration depicting Betsy Ross presenting the flag to George Washington.

How Betsy Ross Became Famous

Oral tradition, nationalism, and the invention of history.
by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich via Commonplace on October 1, 2007
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The Truth About Thanksgiving Is that the Debunkers Are Wrong

A response to claims that the First Thanksgiving was not a "thanksgiving" as the Pilgrims understood it.
by Jeremy Bangs via HNN on September 1, 2005
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The Myth of the Media's Role in Watergate

Journalists' role in uncovering the scandal may not have been as significant as we think.
by Mark Feldstein via HNN on August 30, 2004
Painting of Woody Guthrie smoking a cigarette while playing a guitar.

Woody Guthrie: Folk Hero

Guthrie challenged the commercial aesthetic of the pre-rock era through a performance style that was almost combatively anti-musical.
by David Hajdu via The New Yorker on March 21, 2004
Caricature of Martin Luther King's head

The House of the Prophet

Martin Luther King Jr. was the galvanizing voice of the civil rights struggle, an uncompromising, complicated figure who soared in the pulpit.
by Kwame Anthony Appiah via New York Review of Books on April 11, 2002

1491

Before it became the New World, the Western Hemisphere was an altogether more salubrious place to live at the time than, say, Europe.
by Charles C. Mann via The Atlantic on March 1, 2002
Martin Luther King, Jr. being arrested in Montgomery, 1958.

Martin Luther King Was a Law Breaker

On the second anniversary of MLK's assassination, political prisoner Martin Sostre wrote a tribute emphasizing his radical disobedience.
by Austin McCoy, Martin Sostre via Martin Sostre Institute on April 1, 1970
Irving Thalberg and his wife, with Louis Mayer.

The Wizard Behind Hollywood’s Golden Age

How Irving Thalberg helped turn M-G-M into the world’s most famous movie studio—and gave the film business a new sense of artistry and scale.
by Adam Gopnik via The New Yorker on June 9, 2025
Scene of prehistoric game hunters.

Prehistory’s Original Sin

We need more than genealogies to know who we are, and who we ought to become.
by Connor Grubaugh via The Hedgehog Review on May 6, 2025
Helicopter, soldiers, and civilians at the fall of Saigon.
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How We Oversimplified the History of the Vietnam War

Popular memory of the war in both the U.S. and Vietnam tends to cast the fall of Saigon as inevitable.
by Andrew Bellisari via Made By History on April 30, 2025
Filmmaker Oliver Stone speaks to journalists following a hearing with the House Oversight Committee at the US Capitol on April 1, 2025, in Washington, DC.

Oliver Stone Goes to Washington

Legendary filmmaker Oliver Stone says we’re closer than ever to finally piecing together the mystery of November 22, 1963.
by Oliver Stone, Ed Rampell via Jacobin on April 18, 2025
A woman holding her head in distress, and a naked woman sitting on an illustration of a toy car pulled by string.

Frog-Free

The demystification of pregnancy.
by Erin Maglaque via London Review of Books on April 17, 2025
Miami's skyline with high-rises under construction.

How Dreams of Buried Pirate Treasure Enticed Americans to Flock to Florida

1925 marked the peak of the Florida land boom. But false advertising and natural disasters thwarted many settlers’ visions of striking it rich.
by Greg Daugherty via Smithsonian on April 15, 2025
Donald Trump and the presidential seal in an empty theater.

The Hoax that Spawned an Age of American Conspiracism

Donald Trump and Elon Musk are just the latest populists to weaponise fears of a sinister “deep state”.
by Phil Tinline via New Statesman on April 2, 2025
An aerial view of houses in Jersey City, United States on July 13, 2024.

Is The ‘Predatory’ Property Tax An Instrument Of Oppression?

According to Andrew Kahrl, the property tax has been used to disposs black homeowners since the 19th century.
by Joseph J. Thorndike via Forbes on March 24, 2025
Painting of Casimir Pulaski on a horse in battle.

Discover the Short Life and Long Legacy of Casimir Pulaski

On the first Monday in March, Pulaski Day festivities at Chicago’s Polish Museum of America honored the “Father of American Cavalry,” 280 years after his birth.
by Eli Wizevich via Smithsonian on March 6, 2025
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