Archive for the ‘Historians’ Category

This looks like a great event, and as most of you know. I am a student at American Public Univsersity and Dr. Woodworth is current one of my instructors. Well they have a great event coming up: Discovering the Civil War Online - Live Webcast. From their website: Have you ever ... Full story

Brigham Young University sent me the following results of a study that analyzed pension and medical records from a random sample of the 179,000 black soldiers enlisted in the Union Army during the Civil War and found some interesting, though not surprising results. The study was performed by Sven E. Wilson ... Full story

Here's an interesting question: "If a piece of the presidential record remains stowed in a drawer, is it history or history waiting to happen?" The discovery of a previously unknown personal letter by Thomas Jefferson this past December, written sometime in 1808 towards the end of his presidency, was the impetuous for such ... Full story

A Time Capsule was unearthed that was buried about 1850, from the news piece: Athol (Massachusetts) Historical Society President Susannah Whipps-Lee said the time capsule — which has yet to be opened — was made from an old glass container that looked like a pickle jar with a rusted metal screw top. It ... Full story

I mean this sincerely. I am saddened by the passing of Howard Zinn. From the Associated Press: Howard Zinn, the leftist academic whose alternative history of the United States became required reading for millions of ordinary people, as well as a following of celebrities, has died. He was 87. Zinn's death was confirmed by his website, ... Full story

How do I connect the title of the post... Henry A. Kissinger was sworn in on September 22, 1973, as the 56th Secretary of State, and since that moment was one of those politicians whom people have loved to hate. Just do a Google search and there are all kinds of interesting websites; one even shows ... Full story

I guess I am implying that some see him as not a "Disaster" and I think that to be the case, he has defenders does he not? I am in the middle of a course on American Civil War Command and Leadership, and specifically the Joseph T. Glatthaar book Partners In Command. ... Full story

This week was the beginning of our second semester here in Colorado, and in my A.P. United States history class we changed from a block (95 min) class last semester to a skinny (45 min) class. We are up to the Progressive Movement and have found our numbers shrink from 26 to 12, due to the ... Full story

I took the week off to get some things accomplished that I needed to, so my apologies for a lack of posting, but I have been taking daily assessments of the blogosphere and noted a few things which I will comment on now. There has been some controversy over the History Channel’s upcoming Sunday evening program, ... Full story

I received a few days ago my advanced review copy of Wayne Wei-Siang Hsieh's West Pointers and the Civil War: The Old Army in War and Peace (Civil War America). Hsieh challenges studies that claim field fortifications and defensive positions were to make the decisive difference in battle during the Civil War. Instead, Hsieh argues, there ... Full story

I got a chance to look through my recently arrived copy of John Keegan's book and I am already enjoying it. Some interesting comments just in his introduction alone he writes, "Had the battle gone the other way, as it might so easily have done, the war might have been concluded more quickly and ... Full story

I will be clear.  I don't know John Latschar and don't care. However, he recently won some award concerning his work with the Gettysburg Battlefield and that's great. But what heated it up was the news about his alleged use of a work computer for something, well, controversial. According to the news report, "Federal investigators found more than 3,400 sexually-explicit images on a ... Full story

The period after the War of 1812 is a challenging time as an educator; at least it is for me. The excitement of the late 18th Century creates a lull that is hard to get out of and even the anticipation of the upcoming Civil War does not always help to generate ... Full story

Levin, uh, well, thanks for that (I guess I am McCarthy, interesting) and whatever I can do to help you out man! I have no idea why you would put my name in that post? But whatever. Anyway, do please give me a specific link where I call you a "radical"? Just because I do not agree with you does not mean that I think you ... Full story

Since the mid-1960s young historians tabbed "New Left Historians" entered the scene with an eye toward reshaping history. They saw all around them serious issues within the teaching of history. They favored an interpretation of the past that placed its emphasis in such a way as to, in the words of Warren Susman, "remake the present and the future." What is also clear, is that ... Full story

Levin writes : I don’t mind admitting that I am an enemy of the notion of ‘American Exceptionalism.’ It’s not simply that I fail to see how it applies to American history, but that it has nothing to do with my role as an instructor of history. I’ve said before that I do not consider it my responsibility to influence students in how they ... Full story

The latest issue of the Gilder Lehrman Institute's online magazine History Now centers on the studying and teaching of the American Revolution. Here's a list of those articles: Teaching the Revolution, by Carol Berkin Inventing American Diplomacy, by R.B. Bernstein Lockean Liberalism and the American Revolution, by Isaac Kramnick Unruly Americans in the Revolution, by Woody Holton The Righteous Revolution of Mercy Otis ... Full story

A reader posted that he believed every society to be "exceptional" and I have to say that this is the issue with declaring something exceptional. This entire issue is about cultural relativism. Which is fine if we do not "judge" any culture, but that's not the case. Do we simply shrug off the continual treatment of women in most Muslim countries and say well, that's ... Full story

Boon's Lick Missouri was named after Daniel Boon and is yet another example of American Exceptionalism. In 1815, the area was a rich and fertile land that was soon occupied by massive migration by whites. One chronicler noted that the  "men were all heroes and the women heroines." The expansion of America during the early 19th century was uniquely American both in its evolution and ... Full story

I am just getting into an excellent book by Harry L. Watson titled, Liberty and Power: The Politics of Jacksonian America. In the introduction of the book, Watson recalls a story by a young Frenchman who visited America in 1834 and witnessed, among many things, a Democratic Party Parade. The event amazed the visiting European. ... Full story