Let’s honor the remarkable Black Americans throughout history with our favorite books. From the 19th century to the Civil Rights Movement to present day, our reading list for Black History Month is one you don’t want to miss. Bending Toward Justice The story of the...
History
Aggregated news feed for history lovers.
Featured Excerpt: A Matter of Complexion by Tess Chakkalakal
Leaving Fayetteville Charles W. Chesnutt. (Public domain, Wikimedia Images.) On October 7, 1880, The Raleigh Signal, a Republican newspaper published by the Republican State Committee of North Carolina, introduced Chesnutt to the public. Hailing Chesnutt’s “rare...
Featured Excerpt: Realm of Ice and Sky
View of Smeerenberg, Spitzbergen, Norway. A photomechanical print taken between 1890 and 1900. Public Domain. Realm of Ice and Sky by two-time National Outdoor Book Award-winning author Buddy Levy is a thrilling narrative of polar exploration via airship―and the men...
Featured Excerpt: A Rage to Conquer
The Battle of Actium from The Story of Caesar and Cleopatra by Justus van Egmont. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. In A Rage to Conquer, award-winning author Michael Walsh brings history to life as he considers a group of courageous commanders and the battles they waged...
Adventure Research at the Top of the World
Author Buddy Levy shares his chilly experience in Ny Ålesund, Norway, where he gathered research materials for his book, Realm of Ice and Sky: Triumph, Tragedy, and History’s Greatest Arctic Rescue. Author Buddy Levy at the top of the world. Wind whips my face as I...
Featured Excerpt: The JFK Conspiracy by Brad Meltzer and Josh Mensch
by Brad Meltzer and Josh Mensch Belmont, New HampshireSeptember 1960 New York Daily News Archive/New York Daily News via Getty Images Richard Pavlick of Belmont, New Hampshire, really cares about flags. American flags, that is. When they’re hung, where they’re...
Introduction to Eliot Stein’s Custodians of Wonder
In Custodians of Wonder, Eliot Stein takes a vivid look at 10 astonishing people who are maintaining some of the world’s oldest and rarest cultural traditions. Read on for an introductory excerpt from the book. A late 19th century example of Burano lace. Courtesty of...
The Island Behind the Island: Real Life Inspiration for Trouble Island
Suspense author Sharon Short shares the rich history behind Middle Island, the real-life location that inspired her new novel, Trouble Island. Middle Island, Lake Eerie, Ontario, Canada. Photo courtesy Wikipedia Commons. Years ago, I accompanied one of my daughters on...
Call for Papers: Sensory History
Process invites proposals and submissions for an upcoming series on sensory history. We are open to a variety of themes relating to sensory history as both a methodology and a field and its intersections with various subfields of U.S. history, including histories of...
Silver Wedding
by Lydia Reeder Harriot Kezia Hunt, from a 1910 publication. (Public domain, Wikimedia Images.) For two days, on June 27 and 28, 1860, Dr. Harriot Kezia Hunt’s Boston home teemed with activity. Housemaids arranged dozens of flowers—roses, lilies, chrysanthemums,...
The History Reader: 2024 Holiday Gift Guide
by The History Reader Shopping for any history-loving friends? Below is our holiday gift guide with our favorite books of 2024! The Cold Crematorium by József Debreczeni First published in Hungarian in 1950, The Cold Crematorium was never translated into a world...
Featured Excerpt: Four Against the West
Four Against the West by Joe Pappalardo is a thrilling true saga of legendary Texas figure Judge Roy Bean and his brothers―and their violent adventures in Wild West America. Read on for a chapter excerpt from Four Against the West that focuses on the legendary...
Featured Excerpt: Her Lotus Year
The Duchess of Windsor. Attributed to Angela Laviosa. Courtesy of Wikipedia. In Her Lotus Year: China, the Roaring Twenties, and the Making of Wallis Simpson, New York Times bestselling author Paul French examines a controversial and revealing period in the early life...
Featured Excerpt: Resist
AUGUST 31, 2006. JENA, LOUISIANA. Example of a hanging tree in Dallas, Texas. Photo taken by Phoebe L. Friedman. In the morning light, three nooses hung ominously from a giant oak tree’s leafy branches outside Jena High School. There had been an unspoken rule. A...
On âThe Environmental Protection Agency, Sewer Infrastructure, and the Racialized Geography of the United Statesâ
Nothing motivates me to write as much as anger. My June 2024 Journal of American History article, ââBring Moneyâ: The Environmental Protection Agency, Sewer Infrastructure, and the Racialized Geography of the United States,â is a case in point. For quite some...
Who Was the Real Socrates?
Illustration of Socrates, in a basket, based on Aristophanes’s The Clouds. Was Socrates a real person? is one of the most googled questions about perhaps the most important philosopher in history. Socrates’s existence as a historical figure is, however, universally...
Call for Papers: Histories of Aging and Elderly Lives
Process invites proposals and submissions for an upcoming series on the elderly in U.S. history. While there is a vast array of histories relating to youth culture, children, and young adults in the United States, there are fewer comparable studies on the history of...
Featured Excerpt: “Second Life” from Cabinet of Curiosities
Boundaries of the lost state of Franklin. Wikimedia Public Domain. It’s one of many tales of the founding of America. Settlers from England were exploring more and more of the New World, and as they did, they set up new communities far from the comfort of home. We...