Historians/History

The Unmaking of a President: Rethinking Watergate at Forty [VIDEO]

It has been forty years since the Watergate scandal and Richard Nixon's resignation from the presidency. To mark the occasion, the AHA Annual Meeting in January hosted a dedicated Watergate panel.

How JFK Slammed the Door on Che Guevara's Offer to Improve U.S.-Cuban Relations

by Jack Colhoun

Che's backdoor "cigar diplomacy" was returned in kind by the Kennedy brothers with Operation Mongoose, the plan to overthrow Castro.

In Defense of the American Studies Association

by Alan Wald

The ASA's support of the BDS movement seeks to enhance the academic freedom of Palestinians.

Why Do Conservative Southerners Loudly Insist That Kids Be Taught Lies about the Civil War?

by Adam Laats

Texas activist Bill Ames is proposing new revisions to the state's school curriculum, including teaching that slavery was not the leading cause of the Civil War.

Presenting History Camp, The Unconference for Local Historians

by Lee Wright

Building on the barcamp model (also used as the basis for THATcamp), the History Camp conference takes place March 8 in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Remembering H. Wayne Morgan, Pioneer of Gilded Age Studies

by Lewis L. Gould

Morgan, who passed away in January, almost single-handedly rescued the study of the late nineteenth century from history's proverbial ash heap.

What the Left and Right Still Get Wrong About Ronald Reagan

by James Graham Wilson

Newly-discovered documents show both sides missed important aspects of Reagan's legacy.

Grover Cleveland, Lover? Read the Love Letter He Wrote to His 21-Year-Old Bride

by The Shapell Manuscript Foundation

Read the never-before-publishd love letter Cleveland wrote to Frances Folsom.

Pete Seeger: The Red Warbler

by Ronald Radosh

A great folk singer who contributed much to the American story, he was fatally flawed by the leftism he imbibed with his mother’s milk.

Do We Ever Actually Learn Anything from History?

by William J. Astore

The problem is our decision makers have no respect for the lessons of history.

"There Was No Barrier Between [Seeger] and All of His Friends and Supporters"

by Robin Lindley

Pete Seeger's friend, historian Michael Honey, says Seeger was the rare celebrity who picked up his own phone.

Why I Despise @HistoryInPics

by Sarah Werner

@HistoryInPics and similar Twitter streams post “old” pictures and little tidbits of captions for them. That's it. No attribution, no link, no context, and a casual relationship to the truth.

Doris Kearns Goodwin Tackles the “Irrepressible Conflict” of 1912

by Sheldon M. Stern

William Howard Taft and Theodore Roosevelt used to be the closest of intimates... until the election of 1912.

It Looks Like Mark Hanna’s Biographer Invented Quotes

by Kristie Miller and Robert H. McGinnis

"Does a dog hesitate for a marriage license?"

We Need to Include Reparations in the Story of Solomon Northup

by Roy E. Finkenbine

The protagonist of "12 Years a Slave" was also a leader in the slavery reparations movement.

The Forgotten Healers of World War I [INTERVIEW]

by Robin Lindley

Historian Emily Mayhew on the development of the British Army's medical corps in World War I.

Revisiting the FBI's War on the American Left

by Jeremy Kuzmarov

Betty Medsger's new book "The Burglary" again shines light on the controversial (and illegal) FBI program COINTELPRO.

What Really Caused the Reichstag Fire

by Benjamin Carter Hett

Historians have accepted the Nazi version of the story for years. But there's considerable evidence pointing to a Nazi conspiracy.

The American Studies Association Needs to Hit Rewind/Erase

by Thomas Doherty

The horrible decision by the ASA to endorse an academic boycott of Israel is destroying the credibility not just of the organization, but the credibility of American studies itself.

Living History

by Robert E. Wright

Some historians aren't afraid of making history with their scholarship. Historians Against Slavery is one such group.