Mary McCarthy attends a hearing of the Senate Watergate Committee in 1973.

The Novelists and the Warmongers

Reading Mary McCarthy on Vietnam in a new era of wartime illusions.
Communist figures.

The Magazine That Made the Right Anticommunist

With its first issue eighty years ago, "Plain Talk" led the resistance to Soviet Russia and Communist China.
George Templeton Strong

A Healthy, Vigorous National Life

George Templeton Strong’s Civil War diaries are a sobering object lesson for today’s reader.
Historical figures dressed as clowns and freaks, with bugs and flowers.

All of Us Yahoos

A new history of satire wants to limit the genre to its political ramifications, but satirists are often interested in the whole person.
Collage of hip-hop magazine covers.

Lost Recipes

Early hip-hop magazines shaped culture journalism, but poor archiving, legal issues, and neglect have left much of their history missing online.
This Day: A History Show
Podcast
This Day: A History Show

Lincoln's Second Inaugural

There are two speeches inscribed in the Lincoln Memorial - Gettysburg, of course, but also his second inaugural address. If people know they speech, they likely know the final words about “malice towards none; with charity for all” but in the first half of the speech, Lincoln offers a religiously-tinged reckoning for the causes and impact of the Civil War.
Collage of James Bernard and clips from his magazine.

How James Bernard and 'The Source' Defined 1990s Hip-Hop

A requiem for the man, the magazine, and the era.
Jesse Jackson Giving a Speech.

The Age of Jackson

Jesse Jackson's lost legacy.
Arturo Schomburg
partner

The Press Is Like the Safety Valve of a Boiler

A trove of letters-to-the-editor from the early 1900s show how Arturo Schomburg viewed newspapers as a bulwark against white supremacy throughout the Americas.
Civil War solders planting a U.S. flag atop a hill.

A 168-Year-Old Question Still Worth Asking

A forceful 19th-century essay on the rise of the slaveholding oligarchy asked: “Where will it end?”
Witnesses recording ICE agents on their phones.

A Thousand Words

Protestors have long understood the importance of securing photographic images of their activism.
A chart of battles, leaders, and congresses during the Revolutionary War, 1931-1932.

Ken Burns's Inevitable Revolution

Burns in his new documentary failed to ask the most important question: "Why?"
A woman turns down a dapper ‘snake’ in a ‘vinegar valentine’ from the 1870s.

Return to the 19th-Century Custom of the Spicy ‘Vinegar Valentine’

Victorians found a way to anonymously tell people they didn’t like exactly how they felt.
Nicolás Maduro.

When Did Everything Become Terrorism?

How actual terrorists like Trump and ICE have expanded the definition of terrorism to include everyone they don’t like.
Len Lye, A Colour Box (1935, colorized).

Commercial Break

On a century of avant-garde advertising.
Three identical photos of Thomas Jeffersonn, under blue, purple, and green backgrounds.

Thomas Jefferson Couldn’t Resist the Allure of Fame

The Founding Father desired to be remembered by history.
The Way of Improvement Leads Home
Podcast
The Way of Improvement Leads Home

Why Do People Hate White Liberals?

What is a “white liberal” and why do people hate them so much? Conservatives hate them for being so tolerant. Libertarians hate them for believing that the government might have a role to play in advancing a good society. Socialists and others on the left blame white liberalism for promoting capitalism. On this episode, Kevin Schultz dives into the issue as he discusses his book, "Why Everyone Hates White Liberals (Including White Liberals): A History."
Empty New York City subway car.

How the NY Post and the NY Daily News Turned Victims Into Criminals

The role of tabloid journalism in shaping the racist narrative of the 1984 Bernie Goetz subway shooting.
Madonna in 'Papa Don’t Preach’ (1986) music video

The Origins of Culture Wars

How the concept of culture wars rooted in the social and political struggles of nineteenth century Germany.
The Eureka machine

Inside the Long History of Technologically Assisted Writing

On the eternal tension between human creativity and mechanical efficiency.
Adam Tooze and a collage of photos of world leaders and news events.

How Adam Tooze Makes Sense of Our Bewildering Age

Throughout these puzzling times, historian Adam Tooze has become the go-to guide to the radical new world we’ve entered.
A collage of people speaking and listening.

The Last Days of the Southern Drawl

By the end of my life, there may be no one left who speaks like my father outside the hollers and the one-horse towns.
Seymour Hersh

"Cover-Up" Follows Seymour Hersh’s Life Uncovering Secrets

The documentary depicts the kind of maverick journalism we desperately need in our authoritarian times.
Police outside of the New York Times building.

The Genocides The New York Times Forgot

The paper’s Gaza coverage continues its pattern of downplaying US-backed atrocities in Bangladesh, East Timor, and Guatemala.
Benjamin Franklin reading a draft of the Declaration of Independence.

The Evolution of the American Declaration of Independence

The Declaration drew on Enlightenment ideas to assert equality, justify independence, and inspire lasting debates over rights and slavery.
Norman Podhoretz.

The ‘Filthy Little Slum Child’ Who Remade the American Right

The intellectual world that Norman Podhoretz created.
Men wearing Klan hoods, and a manuscript with a coded message.
partner

A Secret Cipher for the KKK

How did the Ku Klux Klan spread across the South? Part of its journey depended on a code for secret correspondence.
Photo of Norman Podhoretz

The Longest Journey Is Over

With the death of Norman Podhoretz at 95, the transition from New York’s intellectual golden age to the age of grievance and provocation is complete.
Vogue Magazine stand.

The Ghosts of Media Past

Whatever happened to journalism?
A flyer for a Pete Seeger concert in Pittsburgh.

Pete Seeger in Pittsburgh Town

In April 1962, Pete Seeger was abruptly banned from performing a scheduled set for children in Pittsburgh. The surrounding debate says a lot about the city.