Ulysses Obscenity Decision: Annotated
In December 1933, Judge John Woolsey issued what would become one of the best known legal decisions on obscenity in United States history.
The Zulu Prince Scam
In the 1890s, self-proclaimed Zulu princes toured the United States, performing a con game on Americans eager to know Africa and Christianize its peoples.
The Alcott Anarchist Experiment
The failures at Fruitlands showed that anarchist and vegetarian ideals weren’t enough to sustain a community—spiritually or nutritionally.
When Enslaved Virginians Demanded the Right to Read
In 1723, a group of enslaved African Americans petitioned the Bishop of London to ensure that their children could attend school and learn to read the Bible.
Subversive Student Writing at Carlisle Indian School
In the early twentieth century, some Anishinaabe students turned writing assignments meant to showcase assimilation into celebrations of resistance.
The High-Flying Life of Mary Riddle
One of the first Native American women aviators, Riddle leaned into stereotypes to earn a name for herself in the male-dominated world of American aviation.
Slavery and the Modern-Day Prison Plantation
"Except as punishment for a crime," reads the constitutional exception to abolition. In prison plantations across the United States, slavery thrives.
Boom, Bust, and the “World’s Littlest Skyscraper”
The discovery of oil near Wichita Falls in 1911 not only brought money to the Texas town, it brought a swindler who promised the sky(scraper).
The Riches of Poverty Point
Earthworks built around 3,700 years ago in Louisiana centered an exchange system that stretched up the Mississippi and into the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys.