203 items
The First Age of Reform
"In the history of the world," Ralph Waldo Emerson declared in 1841, "the doctrine of Reform had never such scope as at the present hour." [1] Not much a joiner of causes himself, Emerson had in mind a remarkable flowering of reform...
The Great Depression
Herbert Hoover got many things wrong about the great economic calamity that destroyed his presidency and his historical reputation, but he got one fundamental thing right. Much legend to the contrary, the Great Depression was not...
Statistics: Agriculture in America
Farm Production Year Number of Farms* Bales of Cotton* Bushels of Corn* Bushels of Wheat* Price Index 1860=100 1860 2 3.8 839 173 100 1870 2.7 4.4 760 254 140 1880 4 6.6 1,706 502 100 1890 4.6 8.7 2,125 449 90 1900 5.7 10.1 2,662 599...
The Monroe Doctrine, 1823
President James Monroe’s 1823 annual message to Congress included a warning to European powers not to interfere in the affairs of the Western Hemisphere. This portion of the address is known as the Monroe Doctrine. The United States...
Lincoln
No one seemed less well-cast for the role of reformer, in an age of reform, than Abraham Lincoln. To begin with, he was a stranger, emotionally and intellectually, to evangelical Christianity, the great engine of reform in the...
The Rise of Industrial America, 1877-1900
When in 1873 Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner entitled their co-authored novel The Gilded Age , they gave the late nineteenth century its popular name. The term reflected the combination of outward wealth and dazzle with inner...
Historical Context: The Economics of Slavery
Like other slave societies, the South did not produce urban centers on a scale equal with those in the North. Virginia's largest city, Richmond, had a population of just 15,274 in 1850. That same year, Wilmington, North Carolina's...
The Post-Revolutionary Generation
Joyce Appleby, Professor Emerita, University of California, Los Angeles, explores how the men and women born after the American Revolution experienced and developed the theoretical ideas of liberty and independence put in place by...
Ken Burns - "Our America: A Photographic History"
Ken Burns, the producer and director of numerous film series, including The Roosevelts: An Intimate History and Country Music , founded his own documentary film company, Florentine Films, in 1976. His landmark film, The Civil War ,...
Study Aid: Great Society Legislation
President Lyndon Johnson announced his Great Society program during his State of the Union address in 1964. He outlined a series of domestic programs that he promised would eliminate poverty and inequality in the United States. By the...
Railroads: The "Engine" to Promote National Unity and Economic Growth
Objectives Students will examine, explain, and evaluate a variety of literary and visual primary sources that describe and depict the development and impact of railroads on sectional relationships, national unity, and economic growth...
Historical Context: The Confederacy Begins to Collapse
By early 1863, the Civil War had begun to cause severe hardship on the southern home front. Not only was most of the fighting taking place in the South, but also as the Union blockade grew more effective and the South's railroad...
Statistics: Slaves and Slaveholdings
Slaveholding, 1860 Non-slaveholders 76.1 percent 1-9 slaves 17.2 percent 10-99 6.6 percent over 100 0.1 percent Distribution of Slaves Number of slaves held 0 1-6 7-39 40+ Percent of white families 75 15 9 1 Percent of slaves held 0...
William Cullen Bryant opposes the protective tariff, 1876
During the Civil War, the United States needed to raise funds urgently. It did so by raising the tariff, which taxed goods imported from other countries. In the days before the national income tax, the United States depended on the...
Mass Production, Suburbia & Conformity in the 1950s
Essential Question How did conformity apply as a value to the living choices of Americans during the 1950’s? Materials Postwar Society Data and Questions (PDF) Little Boxes , written by Malvina Reynolds (1962) (Lyrics) Two Photos &...
Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation
Joseph J. Ellis, Professor of History at Mount Holyoke College, discusses his Pulitzer Prize–winning book Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation, explains the emergence of the men who led the Revolutionary War and created...
Rise of the Populists and William Jennings Bryan
Historical Background As the United States evolved into an industrial powerhouse in the decades following the Civil War, the growing strength of the railroads and the banks particularly, coupled with the impact of mechanization on...
Historical Context: Why Do People Migrate?
In trying to understand why people migrate, some scholars emphasize individual decision-making, while others stress broader structural forces. Many early scholars of migration emphasized the importance of "push" and "pull" factors....
Populism and Agrarian Discontent
Today, the Gilded Age evokes thoughts of “robber baron” industrialists, immigrants toiling long hours in factories for little pay, massive strikes that were often put down by force, and political corruption in both big cities and the...
The Gilded Age
When I was a college student in the late 1960s, the most popular US history courses were the ones that covered the Gilded Age. They promised to illuminate the origins of urgent contemporary problems. Their canvas was broad and filled...
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