On Abolition and Women's Rights (1840s/50s)

On Abolition and Women's Rights (1840s/50s): In the 1840s, multiple social movements gained momentum in American politics. From abolition (of slavery) to nativism (anti-immigration) to suffrage (women's rights), many Americans in the 1840s (especially those of the emerging middle class) were becoming aware of the changing cultural attitudes in society at large. Undoubtedly, the primary catalyst for these changing attitudes was industrialization, as increasing numbers of people were able to obtain employment in the growing economy. By the late 1840s, two of these movements started to develop concurrently. Abolition and women's rights saw their first major overlap in July 1848 at the Seneca Falls Convention in Upstate New York. At the Convention, there were three competing visions that needed to be reconciled. One vision was that of Susan B. Anthony, who (representing white women) advocated for voting rights over ending slavery. Another vision included Sojourner Truth, who (representing free black women) pushed for both abolition and suffrage at the same time. The final vision involved the likes of Frederick Douglass, who (representing free black men) encouraged abolition over women's rights.

On Thomas Nast's Political Cartoons

On Thomas Nast's Political Cartoons: In mid-19th-century America, when literacy rates of the general public were not particularly high, Nast's abilities as a cartoonist had a powerful effect on people. One of his first jobs after art school (as a teenager) was to illustrate news stories for a popular magazine (Harper's Weekly). It was clear at an early age that Nast had a knack for drawing. But when a friend encouraged him to caricature evil-doers (especially in the world of politics), it pushed Nast to create the modern political cartoon. And while residing in New York City during the age of Boss Tweed and corruption at Tammany Hall, he incessantly lampooned politicians for their unjust ways (embezzlement). It's stated that between the 1860s and 1880s, Nast's political cartoons even had a profound impact on presidential elections. Perhaps the two most lasting images of Nast were the Democratic donkey and the Republican elephant, which became the symbols for each political party.

On the Irish Diaspora

On the Irish Diaspora: Pictured above are statues of Irish emigrants along the River Liffey in Dublin. These statues depict not only emaciated adults, but also malnourished babies and pets. Collectively, they represent a vivid reminder of the trials and tribulations which many Irish folks underwent in the mid-to-late 1800s. For the most part, Ireland's population peaked at 8.5 million around the 1840s. But due to the Great Famine (1845-52), when potato blight decimated the nation's primary food supply, Ireland's population declined by as much as 25 percent. The two most popular international destinations for Irish emigrants at the time were Britain (Liverpool) and the U.S. (Boston, New York, & Philadelphia). By 1890, it is believed that as many as 40 percent of Irish-born people were living abroad. Cities like Boston and New York were quickly overwhelmed, as shortages in housing, employment, churches, and even schools all became major afflictions for these people. And yet today, nearly 40 million Americans claim Irish as their main ethnicity.

On Genteel Racism

On Genteel Racism: Ever since French aristocrat Arthur de Gobineau helped legitimize "scientific" racism in the 19th century (with his writings), there have been numerous cultural consequences. First in Europe, and later in the Americas, the idea that people could be categorically separated and classified according to certain genetic traits or physical features spread like wildfire. From anthropologists measuring skull sizes to psychologists recommending lobotomies (eugenics), "scientists" started to take racial theories to extreme lengths by the early 1900s. Yet what was particularly intriguing about the rise of scientific racism was how much it permeated Western culture in song, dance, art, advertising, and cuisine. Regarding song and dance, minstrel shows ("Jump Jim Crow") and blackface actors were widespread well into the 20th century. As for advertising, the creation of a character like Bibendum (by the Michelin tire company) has dubious origins at best (esp. since tires are generally black). Perhaps most controversial with cuisine is the nickname "jimmies" for chocolate sprinkles, which remains popular even today throughout the Northeastern region of the United States.

On Resisting Apartheid

On Resisting Apartheid: After WWII, when many European nations started to relinquish their colonial empires (Britain, France, etc.), decolonization pushed certain parts of the world into chaos. For a country like South Africa, that chaos came in the form of resisting governmental policies. Although South Africa originally gained its independence from Britain in 1910, it was not until the post-WWII era that resistance to racial segregation (apartheid) laws began to build momentum. The focal point behind much of this resistance was the African National Congress (ANC), which served as a center-left political party in South Africa. Key figures who led boycotts and other non-violent ANC campaigns included Albert Lutuli, Nelson Mandela, and Steve Biko. In the 1960s, Lutuli won the Nobel Peace Prize, while in the 1990s, Mandela became South Africa's first black president. But it was Biko's role in the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) during the 1970s which focused worldwide attention on the violence that apartheid policies caused (pictured above are people fleeing violent police clashes in the 1976 Soweto Uprising).

On Peggy Shippen, Benedict Arnold, and Betrayal

On Peggy Shippen, Benedict Arnold, and Betrayal: The Shippens had become a well-known Philadelphia family by the late 1700s. As lawyers, judges, and politicians in the Pennsylvania Colony, the Shippens owed a great deal of their success to the British Crown. And when the American Revolution began in the 1770s, the family held mostly Loyalist beliefs. In effect, Loyalists like the Shippens believed the Revolution was nothing more than a movement to make the Colonists more British. Becoming independent, i.e., creating a new government and raising a new military, would not be not such a radical experiment, because so much of it would be modeled on British traditions. Nevertheless, when the Continental Army recaptured Philadelphia in 1778, Arnold and Shippen started a courtship. Despite being 20 years her senior, Arnold became exposed to a variety of British folks and folkways, mainly because the Shippens often entertained British guests. Over time, Arnold began to feel his services as a military commander would be more appreciated by the British, and thus, he defected soon after marrying Shippen. Arnold's name has since become a byword for betrayal in American English.

On the Austro-Hungarian Empire

On the Austro-Hungarian Empire: If there was ever an empire that embodied the imperial decadence of late-nineteenth-century Europe, it was Austria-Hungary. Formed in 1867 after a compromise between two quasi-independent lands of the former Holy Roman Empire (ruled by the Habsburgs), Austria needed to redefine itself in the wake of two embarrassing and expensive wars. In fact, the Franco-Austrian War of 1859 and the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 pushed Austria to the brink of financial collapse. On the other hand, the Kingdom of Hungary was looking to distinguish itself as a major player in European affairs (probably since the days of Attila the Hun). It also sought protection from potential incursions by the Ottoman Empire. Thus, the compromise that birthed the Austro-Hungarian Empire was rather ill-conceived. At its core, however, Austria-Hungary suffered from an identity crisis. Was it more Austrian or more Hungarian? And where was its primary seat of power, Vienna or Budapest? In short, the Empire struggled to recognize its vast diversity of Germanic, Slavic, and Muslim peoples, which ultimately helped spark World War I in 1914. Perhaps Franz Ferdinand was better off not assuming the throne.

On the Conestoga Wagon

On the Conestoga Wagon: For much of the 18th and 19th centuries in the United States (and Canada), a heavy, covered wagon known as the "Conestoga" was widely used, especially by farmers and travelers. Often drawn by horses, oxen, or mules, the wagon originated in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, with the area's German Mennonite settlers during the early 1700s. The wagon received its name from the Conestoga River, which it frequently crossed. If caulked properly, the Conestoga kept its contents dry, as "fording" shallow parts of the river became increasingly commonplace. Prior to the American Revolution, Conestoga wagons helped open the Appalachian Mountains to colonists. By the early 1800s, Pittsburgh and Ohio had been invaded by Conestoga wagons. As a result, the first installation of toll roads gained traction around this time. And for the most part, tolls depended on both tonnage and distance traveled. A typical Conestoga, which was around twenty feet long, could carry up to six tons of weight when fully loaded. With that kind of storage capacity, the Conestoga became an iconic symbol of American westward expansion in the mid-19th century (Oregon Trail??).

On the Eccentricities of John Wilkes Booth

On the Eccentricities of John Wilkes Booth: As far as his theatrical career went, J. W. Booth was the Brad Pitt or George Clooney of his day. By the end of the 1850s, he was earning around $20,000 per year (which would be over 500K per year in today's dollars). Growing up in Bel Air, Maryland, Booth was very competitive with his brothers and classmates. He always had to be the best or first at completing a task, whether it was reciting Cicero or riding horses. Having been baptized Episcopalian, which was the Booth family's traditional church, his childhood religious experience did not follow one particular path. Booth's father, according to Asia Booth Clarke's memoirs, was more of a "free spirit" than actual practitioner of the faith. And yet there were rumors that J. W. Booth himself had converted to Roman Catholicism. Although evidence of such a conversion was sparse, it nevertheless fueled conspiracy theories regarding a Catholic plot to overthrow the U.S. government (similar to Guy Fawkes in England). After the Civil War erupted in April 1861, Booth became an outspoken supporter of the Confederacy. At some performances in the North, he even feuded with audience members who wished to have him arrested for treason. But when Abe Lincoln won reelection to a second term in late 1864, Booth believed it was time for Lincoln's "tyranny" and "aggression" toward the South to end.

Why James K. Polk Mattered BIG TIME

Why James K. Polk Mattered BIG TIME: As perhaps one of the most overlooked and/or underrated Presidents in American history, Polk presided over the admission of two vitally important states into the Union: Florida and Texas. Elected in 1844, he served when the idea of "Manifest Destiny" (white America's God-given right to conquer the West) hit a fever pitch. With members of Congress such as David Wilmot (Pro-Free Soil) and John C. Calhoun (Pro-Slavery) choosing sides over how westward expansion should proceed, Polk remarkably managed to maintain a pragmatic, down-the-middle approach. He (intentionally) provoked a war with Mexico in 1846 by stationing/quartering troops along the Rio Grande, which permitted Texas to consolidate its newly acquired statehood. And when the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the Mexican-American War in 1848, Polk had expanded U.S. territory by two-fifths (from Texas to what would eventually become California). Indeed, it would be another half-century before much of this territory achieved statehood, but Polk clearly left his mark.

On the Jazz Age

On the Jazz Age: Although the term "Jazz Age" can be credited to F. Scott Fitzgerald, who wrote a 1922 book called Tales of the Jazz Age, the birth of jazz music can be attributed to the African-American community in New Orleans, Louisiana, during the early 1900s. Given New Orleans' diverse urban history, jazz can be considered the product of various cultural heritages, especially Creole and French. After World War I, however, when the United States was attempting a "return to normalcy," jazz came to symbolize a laid-back and almost-whimsical attitude toward major events of the period such as prohibition (1919), women's suffrage (1920), and even immigration restriction (1924). But by the mid-1920s, jazz's popularity began to stretch across both ethno-racial and social-class lines, as upper-class whites like Cole Porter and lower-class blacks like Louis Armstrong each produced their own versions of "jazz" music. As a genre of musical fusion (drums, pianos, trumpets, etc.), jazz became particularly popular in underground "speakeasies," which served alcohol during prohibition. These speakeasies were generally patronized by artists, intellectuals, and mobsters alike. Perhaps the greatest congregation of speakeasies occurred in New York City during the 1920s, when alcohol, jazz, poetry, and painting went hand-in-hand to help fashion the Harlem Renaissance.

On the Golden Age of Caribbean Piracy

On the Golden Age of Caribbean Piracy: Pictured above is a version of the Jolly Roger (flag) flown by pirates (mostly English privateers) during the early eighteenth century. A more traditional Jolly Roger would contain crossbones instead of crossed swords. This specific version was actually invented by Calico Jack, who was perhaps the most notorious pirate to operate from New Providence Island in the Bahamas during the early 1700s. What made Calico Jack particularly intriguing was the fact that he allowed two female pirates in his crew, Mary Read and Anne Bonny. For the most part, the presence of female pirates on ships was extremely rare throughout the Caribbean, as eighteenth-century seafaring occupations were almost entirely male-dominated. In fact, Read often had to dress like a man in order to be taken seriously as a privateer. Although Read was born in England and Bonny in Ireland, they both ended up in the Bahamas by the late 1710s. Read was originally part of the British military (dressed as a man), but left after realizing that her prospects for promotion were severely limited in peacetime. Bonny, on the other hand, had married a small-time pirate named James Bonny, who eventually became an informant for the Bahamian Governor (Woodes Rogers). Yet Anne decided to join forces with Calico Jack, becoming his mistress and "baby mama" in 1720.

On the "Lost Cause" Mythology

On the "Lost Cause" Mythology: The North may have won the Civil War, but the South won Reconstruction. Ever since that Palm Sunday in April 1865, when Robert E. Lee surrendered the Confederate Army to Ulysses S. Grant at the Old Appomattox Court House in Virginia, the South has been concerned with rewriting history while the North has been concerned with industrial/monetary gain. For many Southerners, the war was over before it even began. Yet the South fought valiantly, regardless. That is essentially the "Lost Cause" mythology in a nutshell. If you examine maps of American railroad lines in the 1860s, they illuminate the North's distinct industrial advantage over the South. The sheer capacity of the North to outproduce the South in terms of guns and ammunition was vastly superior. Nevertheless, Southerners persisted against all odds to preserve their "way of life," which included slavery and "states' rights" at its core. Perhaps one of biggest "Lost Cause" myths that emerged in the postbellum era was the idea of blacks not being suited for self-government (i.e. voting). In fact, an entire school of historiography (Dunning School) centered largely on this single myth. Historians who belonged to the Dunning School, most notably William A. Dunning, believed the 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was the worst affront to Southern life than any other Reconstruction effort.

On the Pennsylvania Railroad

On the Pennsylvania Railroad: A little more than a decade after the first steam locomotive (Tom Thumb) made its debut in the United States, the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) received a business charter from Harrisburg in 1846. For most of the 1830s, Pennsylvania spent millions of dollars on canal construction, effectively trying to replicate New York's Erie Canal success. But the state's bankruptcy in 1841 (due to excessive spending on the canals) forced Pennsylvania to embrace railroads as an emerging transportation technology. Although the PRR's initial strategy was to model itself after the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, it quickly became the B&O's biggest competitor for both passenger and freight traffic between the Northeast and Midwest. By the mid-1850s, the PRR had reduced travel times between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh from 3.5 days to just 13 hours. In the 1860s, the PRR was the first American railway to use domestically-produced steel rails and install air brakes on its train cars. These decisions helped the PRR become the world's largest corporation in the 1880s. With approximately 30,000 employees and revenues in the hundreds of millions, the "Pennsy" had outgrown even the federal government. However, its growth became stunted by the simultaneous emergence of air travel and interstate highways in the mid-20th century. The PRR went bankrupt in 1968.

On the Boston Manufacturing Company

On the Boston Manufacturing Company: When Francis Cabot Lowell returned from England in 1812, he set out to establish the first integrated textile mill in the United States. An integrated mill meant one which contained power looms alongside power carding and spinning machines (Samuel Slater's Pawtucket mill only had power spinning capabilities). The power, of course, came from a waterfall's gravitational force, such as the Moody Street Dam on the Charles River in Waltham, Massachusetts (pictured above). For Lowell, the Boston Manufacturing Company's primary goal was to produce a low-cost, coarse-fiber cotton fabric. The ideal market for this cotton fabric included farmers, factory workers, and slaves. But the real genius of Lowell's business model centered on its vertical integration of the textile industry. To integrate vertically, Lowell saw the need to convert raw cotton directly into a usable fiber. The only "X" factors in the integration process resided in the production of raw cotton (Southern slaves) and the demand for textiles (advertising). By 1815, Nathan Appleton and others had convinced Lowell of the need to create demand through marketing. They also believed the entire company hinged on the effectiveness of its power looms, because that was where the highest fixed costs existed. Workers could be hired and fired, but debt repayments for the power looms had to be consistent.

On Catholicism and Polish Solidarity

On Catholicism and Polish Solidarity: In October 1984, three members of the Polish secret police bludgeoned Catholic priest Jerzy Popiełuszko to death. It was the half-way point of what seemed like a ten-year strategy by the Catholic Church to put pressure on the Communist regime in Poland. In June 1979, Pope John Paul II visited his homeland for the first time since becoming the Bishop of Rome one year prior. And like Fr. Popiełuszko's funeral, hundreds of thousands of Polish citizens greeted the Pope in the streets. The Communist regime had planned to crush any riots that developed as a result of the Pope's visit, but no such action was necessary. Instead, the Pope's visit helped spark the Solidarity (trade union) movement in the shipyards of Gdańsk. In August 1980, future President of Poland, Lech Wałęsa, organized the first non-communist-party-controlled trade union in a Warsaw Pact country. At its peak, Solidarity had nearly 10 million members and represented about one-third of the entire Polish workforce. By the late 1980s, after enduring years of martial law and political repression, Solidarity succeeded in negotiating semi-free elections with the Communist regime, which resulted in a partial coalition government.

On Early Industrial Unionism in America

On Early Industrial Unionism in America: In 1935, when Congress passed the National Labor Relations Act (or Wagner Act) as part of Franklin Roosevelt's "Second" New Deal, union membership in the United States grew quickly compared to past decades. Prior to the Wagner Act, unions such as the American Federation of Labor (AFL), mainly focused on crafts such as cigar making or woodworking. Given the rise of large-scale industries like railroads, steel, mining, and automobiles, in the decades prior to the 1930s, it was clear that craft unionism did not meet the needs of industrial workers. One man who demanded fundamental change in the AFL was John L. Lewis, a representative of the (coal) mining industry. By 1938, AFL leaders had had enough of Lewis' calls for reform, so they expelled him. He then founded the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO), which focused on organizing mass production workers on an industry-wide basis. The CIO marked the first major not-so-radical industrial union in America, and thus, it rapidly gained credibility and membership. Before the CIO, however, industrial unions such as the American Railway Union (ARU) were too radical to affect change at the federal level, as its leader, Eugene V. Debs, became a self-identified socialist in the 1890s (after the Pullman Strike), and thus, he was the subject of frequent police surveillance.

On Early Progressivism in America

On Early Progressivism in America: Progressivism, as a political ideology which developed at the turn of the twentieth century, contained both liberal and conservative elements. Aside from its formal connection to Theodore Roosevelt and the short-lived Progressive Party in the 1912 presidential election, progressivism can be defined as a political ideology of reform that intended to make American society more economically and politically fair. At times, however, there were a variety of unintended consequences which emanated from certain progressive reforms. For example, prohibiting the manufacture and sale of alcohol with the Eighteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1920 gave rise to a massive black market controlled by mafiosos like Enoch Johnson and Al Capone. Such a reform, while deemed progressive at the time, was quite regressive in hindsight, as it instigated a high degree of violence. This regressive instinct was also present in the 1916 legislation that created the National Park Service (NPS), which like other environmental initiatives, was partly driven by an underlying elitism. What good were the aesthetics of NPS conservation lands for the urban working classes and underprivileged racial minorities who had limited opportunities to enjoy them?

On the New Industrial Designers

On the New Industrial Designers: In the 1930s, there was a belief among many American artists and architects that they could essentially design the United States out of the Depression. According to cultural historian Jeffrey Meikle, by melding art and industry, these new industrial designers felt they could "reverse the Depression's plummeting sales and create a harmonious environment unknown since the Industrial Revolution." This kind of blind optimism about the possibilities of industrial design was very much in line with the idea that "social change follows technological innovation." If the Depression's fundamental economic problem was an over-saturated market caused by mass production, then industrial designers such as Henry Dreyfuss, Norman Bel Geddes, and Raymond Loewy believed they could incite mass consumption by designing streamlined household products. But on the whole, mass produced objects were considered too plain and ugly for mass appeal, so it would take the introduction of new industrial materials like plastics for designers to create their new streamlined objects. The cultural effects stemming from these new designs and materials were two-fold. First, it became O.K. to consume in America, and second, consumption became a necessary prerequisite for being considered modern. And perhaps there was no better demonstration of this modern consumerist mentality than the 1939 World's Fair in New York.

On Jane Addams and Hull House

On Jane Addams and Hull House: When Jane Addams co-founded Hull House in 1889 on Chicago's Near West Side, she intended to reduce the ethnoracial isolation of the city's growing immigrant population. Addams was a firm believer in the philosophy of pragmatism, which cherished America's growing pluralistic culture, and which emphasized practical solutions to societal problems. In effect, she viewed urban immigrants as a valuable asset to American society, especially if they acquired a basic understanding of Christianity and English. Just as the upper class cannot exist without first building on the lower and middle classes, Addams understood the American democratic tradition to be a reciprocal relationship among the social classes. Since immigrants generally belonged to the lower classes, she strove to offer them opportunities for socioeconomic advancement through her efforts at Hull House. And even at the turn of the twentieth century, Addams felt that for all of its economic and technological achievements, American democracy had seldom made definitive headway at improving the social affairs of its immigrants. Her philosophy was part of larger shifting trends in modern liberalism, which increasingly saw the government as a potential tool for backstopping the nation's poor and underprivileged.