Menu
Category

Found

On records, artifacts, and their preservation.
Mardi Gras float surrounded by a crowd.

The Oldest Footage of New Orleans Has Been Found

Previously only rumored to exist, the two-minute film depicts a Mardi Gras parade from 1898.
by Jane Recker via Smithsonian Magazine on July 5, 2022
T. rex jaws, lower left, 1909–30. Photographer unknown. Image No. 17533, AMNH Library.

He Was an All-Time Genius at Finding Tyrannosaurus Rexes. His Story Will Break Your Heart.

Why Barnum Brown could not stop collecting.
by David K. Randall via Slate
This publication restricts nonsubscriber access to some or all of its articles.
on July 4, 2022
Daguerrotype of Robert Cornelius.

Portraits of Brotherly Love

Philadelphia portrait studios in the Age of the Daguerreotype (1840-1849).
by Rachel Wetzel via Library of Congress on July 1, 2022
People walking around and looking for rocks in front of the entrance to a cavernous mine in the bedrock.

Could This Be The End of a Historic New Hampshire Rockhound Paradise?

When Ruggles Mine went up for auction, mineral collectors feared it would never reopen to the public. After a last-minute reprieve, its future is still uncertain.
by Sarah Durn via Atlas Obscura on July 1, 2022
A parrot and a monkey superimposed over a map of Northern California. Illustration by Emily Lankiewicz.

The Monkeys and Parrots Caught Up in the California Gold Rush

Researchers combed through 19th-century records and found evidence of the species, which joined a menagerie that included Galapagos tortoises and kangaroos.
by Bridget Alex via Smithsonian Magazine on June 16, 2022
The first discovered T-Rex skeleton, on display in the American Museum of Natural History.

On Discovering the First Fossil of a T. Rex

In Hell Creek, Montana, with a lot of dynamite.
by David K. Randall via Literary Hub on June 10, 2022
Actress Bobby Bradshaw is tempted by a pearl necklace, 1925.
partner

Pearl Jam

In the twentieth century, the mollusk-produced gem was a must have for members of WASP gentility. In the twenty-first century, its appeal is far more inclusive.
by Hillary Waterman via JSTOR Daily on June 8, 2022
19th-century pistol.

How 19th-Century Gun-Makers Helped Preserve the Union

As the gunmakers’ markets matured through the Civil War era, some began mastering the art of product promotion, following the lead set by Samuel Colt.
by John Bainbridge Jr. via Literary Hub on June 3, 2022
Gene Kemp and Mary ‘Teddie’ Kemp, at left, are seen with two friends, 1922.

Family Photos: A Vacation, a Wedding Anniversary and the Lynching of a Black Man in Texas

If Texas Gov. Greg Abbott had his way, the state’s past of lynching Blacks would be taught as an exception rather than the rule. History tells a different story.
by Jeffrey L. Littlejohn via The Conversation on May 30, 2022
Photograph of Rose Greenhow, right, with her daughter, Rose, at left. She was held in the Old Capitol Prison in Washington with her 8-year-old daughter, “Little Rose,” during the Civil War after repeatedly being caught spying for the Confederacy.

The Most Audacious Confederate Spies — and How They Got Away With It

These men, women and children betrayed the Union and spied for the Confederacy. They're featured in a new online exhibit from the Wall of Spies Experience.
by Gillian Brockell via Retropolis
This publication restricts nonsubscriber access to some or all of its articles.
on May 23, 2022
Sheet music cover for "My Old Kentucky Home."

Emily Bingham on the Material Culture of White America’s Song to Itself: “My Old Kentucky Home”

A haunting exploration of “My Old Kentucky Home” reveals how a minstrel song rooted in slavery became a nostalgic American icon embedded in consumer culture.
by Emily Bingham via Literary Hub on May 16, 2022
Illustration of Benjamin Franklin overlaid on textbook excerpt

Ben Franklin Put an Abortion Recipe in His Math Textbook

To colonial Americans, termination was as normal as the ABCs and 123s.
by Molly Farrell via Slate
This publication restricts nonsubscriber access to some or all of its articles.
on May 5, 2022
Census grid from 1950

Examining 1950 Census Records Reveals Traces of the Datafied State

What the traces left behind in “antique” US census records can tell us about the life of data and its official uses.
by Dan Bouk via Data & Society on May 4, 2022
"Slave Market of America," a broadside published by the American Anti-Slavery Society.
partner

Deep Zoom: 1836 Broadside “Slave Market of America”

Published by the American Anti-Slavery Society, this single 77 by 55 centimeter sheet tells multiple stories in both text and illustration.
by William G. Thomas III, Teresa A. Goddu, Dorothy Berry via JSTOR Daily on April 29, 2022
The Object of History
Podcast
The Object of History

The Many Lives of the Lusitania Medal

This episode examines several medals produced when a German U-boat torpedoed a civilian British ocean liner during the First World War. The medals became the center of a propaganda campaign that spanned the Atlantic. Originally created by a German artist, the medals quickly became tools for the Allied propaganda machine and a nightmare for the German government.
April 15, 2022
Thomas Edison posing by a phonograph.

Saving the Sounds of the Early 20th Century

Some recordings in the New York Public Library’s wax cylinder collection haven’t been heard in generations—until now.
by Sarah Durn via Atlas Obscura on April 14, 2022
Etching of a very tall Charles Byrne, with three companions

The Careless Display of Ill-Gotten Human Remains

Museums that harbor unethically obtained human remains are undergoing a reckoning. It’s about time.
by Ian Halim via UnDark on April 7, 2022
Excerpt from 1950 Census form
partner

The 1950 Census, a Treasure Trove of Data, Was the Last of its Kind

Unveiling the 1950 Census reveals the value of these types of records.
by Dan Bouk via Made By History on April 1, 2022
Three versions of quote from "Appeal"
partner

Comparing Editions of David Walker's Abolitionist Appeal

Digitization allows researchers to trace editorial and authorial changes in archival content. Both are central to the study of this famous abolitionist pamphlet.
by Dorothy Berry via JSTOR Daily on March 31, 2022
Portraits of African American men revealed under torn copy of the Dred Scott Case.

The Painful, Cutting and Brilliant Letters Black People Wrote To Their Former Enslavers

The letters show a desire for freedom and a desperate longing to be reunited with their families.
by Jourdon Anderson, Vilet Lester, Gillian Brockell, Annie Davis, Jermain Wesley Loguen, Frederick Douglass via Retropolis
This publication restricts nonsubscriber access to some or all of its articles.
on March 13, 2022
Tintype photograph of a child supported by it's mothers arm.

The Hidden Mothers of Family Photos

The female image is ubiquitous on social media, yet when it comes to pictures of parents with their children many moms feel disappeared.
by Lauren Collins via The New Yorker
This publication restricts nonsubscriber access to some or all of its articles.
on February 12, 2022

American Revolutionary Geographies Online

Discover the stories, spaces, and people of the American Revolutionary War era through maps, interpretive essays, and interactives.
via American Revolutionary Geographies Online on February 8, 2022
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump tosses a paper with polling statistics during a town hall event on Oct. 6, 2016, in Sandown, N.H.

‘He Never Stopped Ripping Things Up’: Inside Trump’s Relentless Document Destruction Habits

Trump’s shredding of paper in the White House was far more widespread and indiscriminate than previously known.
by Ashley Parker, Josh Dawsey, Tom Hamburger, Jacqueline Alemany via Washington Post
This publication restricts nonsubscriber access to some or all of its articles.
on February 5, 2022
Finger pointing to a writ of habeas corpus filed on behalf of Sojourner Truth

State Archives Find Sojourner Truth’s Historic Court Case

A document thought lost to history shows how Sojourner Truth became the first Black woman to successfully sue white men to get her son released from slavery.
by Kenneth C. Crowe II via Times Union on February 1, 2022
Photograph of Chinese man in Sierra County with his name and description next to him.

The Dark Purpose Behind a Town Constable’s Journal

Why did a local official, at the turn of the twentieth century, maintain a ledger tracking Chinese residents?
by Michael Luo via The New Yorker
This publication restricts nonsubscriber access to some or all of its articles.
on January 28, 2022
Photo of a man lying face down on a bed under a coat, and a sad woman sitting in a chair next to him. There is a hole punched out of the center of the photo.

The Kept and the Killed

Of the 270,000 photos commissioned to document the Great Depression, more than a third were “killed.” Explore the hole-punched archive and the void at its center.
by Erica X. Eisen via The Public Domain Review on January 26, 2022
Portrait photograph of John B. Cade.
partner

John B. Cade's Project to Document the Stories of the Formerly Enslaved

There are revelations in a newly digitized collection of slave narratives compiled by a professor and his students during the Great Depression.
by Susanna Ashton via JSTOR Daily on January 26, 2022
Vintage photograph of black cowboy George McJunkin on a horse in New Mexico.

A Hidden Figure in North American Archaeology

A Black cowboy named George McJunkin found a site that would transform views about the history of Native Americans in North America.
by Stephen E. Nash via Sapiens on January 20, 2022
Side-by-side portraits of Lincoln, Rockwell, and Garfield

This Man Was the Only Eyewitness to the Deaths of Both Lincoln and Garfield

Almon F. Rockwell's newly resurfaced journals, excerpted exclusively here, offer an incisive account of the assassinated presidents' final moments.
by Jason Emerson via Smithsonian Magazine on January 7, 2022
Photograph of President Ulysses S. Grant's memorial flower arrangements.

President Grant’s Memorial Flowers Have Survived for 136 Years

They’ve just been sitting in the dining room all this time.
by Jessica Andreone via Atlas Obscura on January 6, 2022
brought to you by
© Bunk History