The framers of the Constitution battled over it. Lawmakers have tried to amend or abolish it more than 700 times. We sat down with Jesse Wegman, author of Let the People Pick the President, to discuss a little bit about … Read the article
The fateful news traveled swiftly on the post road from Philadelphia, covering more than ninety miles and crossing five rivers in just a couple of days. Precise copies were then made of the thirteen-hundred-word broadside, titled “A … Read the article
Updated for 2019 with a new foreword from the author, Doris Kearns Goodwin’s Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream is an extraordinary and insightful biography of the former president. This book traces the 36th president’s life … Read the article
2019 marks the 150th anniversary of the completion of the first transcontinental railroad. When builders pounded the golden spike at Promontory Point, Utah, on May 10, 1869, they opened a new era in transportation. But long train … Read the article
Around the age of 14, I started to fall in love with Italian men. I fell hard for 70s actors like Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro. I adored New York’s governor Mario Cuomo. I was mad for … Read the article
With Major League Baseball emerging from its winter slumber, fans tend to acknowledge what anniversaries the new season brings us. The 2019 season is the centennial of the infamous Black Sox scandal, when gangsters fixed the outcome … Read the article
In 1776, an elite group of soldiers were handpicked to serve as George Washington’s bodyguards. Washington trusted them; relied on them. But unbeknownst to Washington, some of them were part of a treasonous plan. In the … Read the article
“Well. At least we weren’t coal miners.”
I heard that many a time, at family reunions or other gatherings, as I grew up.
On the surface, it sounds, well. snooty. Or worse—condescending.
In 1921, Frances Lester Warner described a Christmas Eve scene in Boston with “red and white crystal” in shop windows, “lights gleaming on the slippery cross-streets, throngs of last-minute shoppers” and “bright posters still cheerfully advising us … Read the article
On March 14, 1889, Susan La Flesche Picotte received her medical degree—becoming the first Native American doctor in U.S. history. She earned her degree thirty-one years before women could vote and thirty-five years before Indians could become … Read the article