Brown v. Board of Education: On This Day, May 17

Posted by Anna Khomina on

On May 17, 1954, the US Supreme Court handed down a landmark decision in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, unanimously ruling that racial segregation in schools was unconstitutional. The decision overturned the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson, which infamously permitted "separate but equal" facilities. Chief Justice Earl Warren responded directly to the 60-year-old case when he declared, "In the field of public education, the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’ has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal."

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Battle of Fredericksburg: On This Day, 1862

The first Battle of Fredericksburg, fought December 11–15, 1862, has the distinction of being the largest Civil War battle, with a staggering total of 173,000 combatants. On December 11, Union troops came under heavy fire as they built bridges across the Rappahannock River. They crossed into the town of Fredericksburg the next day and clashed with Confederate troops, making this the first urban battle of the war. On December 13, 1862, Union troops led by General Ambrose Burnside faced off against General Robert E.
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Jeff Forret Wins 18th Annual Frederick Douglass Book Prize

Congratulations to Lamar University history professor Jeff Forret, who has been selected as the winner of the 2016 Frederick Douglass Book Prize for his book Slave Against Slave: Plantation Violence in the Old South (Louisiana State University Press). Forret’s book explores the physical conflicts between enslaved people in the American South prior to the Civil War.
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Richard Henry Lee Meets John Adams: On This Day, 1775

On November 14, 1775, Richard Henry Lee, a Virginia delegate to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia, visited fellow delegate John Adams, and the two held a fruitful discussion on
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Congratulations to the Winners of the Military Monuments Student Photography Contest

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Columbus Reaches the Americas: On This Day, 1492

On October 12, 1492, after a two-month voyage, Christopher Columbus landed on an island in the Bahamas he called San Salvador—though the people of the island called it Guanahani. From there, Columbus and his men traveled around the Caribbean for five months, taking particular interest in the islands of Juana (now Cuba) and Hispaniola (the Dominican Republic and Haiti).
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Proclamation of 1763: On This Day, October 7, 1763

On October 7, 1763, King George III issued a Proclamation that would cause much resentment among American colonists.
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Recent Press Mentions

Graduation Ceremony Held for the Gettysburg College–Gilder Lehrman MA in American History

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On Saturday, July 15, Gettysburg College celebrated the achievements of graduates of the Gettysburg College–Gilder Lehrman MA in American History.
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International Press for GLI's Spanish-American Curriculum Partnership with the Queen Sofía Spanish Institute

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The Sentinel Interviews Kevin Weddle on Winning the Gilder Lehrman Prize for Military History

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"In today’s 5 Questions, The Sentinel gave Weddle the opportunity to delve deeper into the research and findings of his book that recently earned him the Gilder Lehrman Prize for Military History."
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