640 items
In the July 1, 2021 session of Inside the Vault, 2020 Idaho Teacher of the Year Stacie Christensen and Hamilton ’s Simon Longnight join us as we learn the history behind the William J. Stone printing of the Declaration of...
Inside the Vault: Massachusetts 54th
On July 18, 1863, the Massachusetts 54th Volunteer Infantry led an assault against Battery Wagner on Morris Island, South Carolina. The battle demonstrated the bravery and fierce determination of African American soldiers even though...
Inside the Vault: Chinese Exclusion Act
In 1882, the US government passed legislation that prohibited Chinese immigration for ten years and declared Chinese immigrants ineligible for naturalization. It was the first act in American history to place broad restrictions on...
Inside the Vault: Robert F. Kennedy's Report on Civil Rights
At the end of 1962, President John F. Kennedy asked his brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, to compile a report on the civil rights enforcement activities of the Justice Department over the previous year. In this report,...
Using Historical Content to Ground Difficult Conversations
A follow-up conversation to a 2021 Teacher Seminar program on Using Historical Content to Ground Difficult Conversations led by 2016 Ohio History Teacher of the Year Justin Emrich and 2020 Illinois History Teacher of the Year Corey...
Breaking Diplomatic Ties with Iran during the Hostage Crisis, 1980
On April 7, 1980, President Jimmy Carter announced the breaking of diplomatic ties with Iran as a result of the Iran hostage crisis of 1979–1981. The US had first become actively involved in Iran in 1953, when the CIA helped overthrow...
Inside the Vault: Maps of Colonial America
While colonial era maps of North America are often inaccurate representations of the geography, they do give us insight into how Europeans viewed the Western Hemisphere. Early Dutch, French, and Spanish maps record waterways, land...
Inside the Vault: Treason in the American Revolution: Benedict Arnold and John André
In September 1780, the discovery of General Benedict Arnold’s plot to surrender West Point to the British was a deeply shocking revelation. Arnold, whose name is now synonymous with the word “traitor,” was once a well-respected...
Inside the Vault: World War II Propaganda
On the October 7, 2021 session of Inside the Vault, Professor Michael Neiberg from the United States Army War College and Stacie Christensen, 2020 Idaho History Teacher of the Year, join us as we discuss World War II propaganda...
“Columbia’s Noblest Sons”: George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, 1865
Abraham Lincoln’s death on April 14, 1865, stunned the nation. He was the first US president to be assassinated and the third to die in office. As Americans mourned, they also began to see him as a martyr and the savior of the Union....
Japanese announcement of the attack at Pearl Harbor, 1941
In January 1941, Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto began developing a plan to attack the American base in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. For eleven months, the Japanese continued to refine their plans while at the same time working diplomatically to...
A brawl between Federalists and anti-Federalists, 1788
In 1787 and 1788, debates over the ratification of the Constitution took place in towns and villages across the country. To gain support, both Federalists and anti-Federalists held meetings and marches that sometimes became violent....
Map of the Foreign-Born Population of the United States, 1900
According to the 1900 census, the population of the United States was then 76.3 million. Nearly 14 percent of the population—approximately 10.4 million people—was born outside of the United States. Drawn by America’s labor...
A frightening mission over Iwo Jima, 1945
Lieutenant Bob Stone served as a bombardier in the 431st Bomb Squadron (Heavy), 7th United States Army Air Force in the Pacific. This Spotlight is part of a series of documents detailing the experience of airmen in World War II. Click...
A soldier’s reaction to the death of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1945
Lieutenant Bob Stone served as a bombardier in the 431st Bomb Squadron (Heavy), 7th United States Army Air Force in the Pacific. This Spotlight is part of a series of documents detailing the experience of airmen in World War II. Click...
The World War II experience of Robert L. Stone, 1942–1945
Lieutenant Robert “Bob” Stone served as a bombardier in the 431st Bomb Squadron (Heavy), 7th United States Army Air Force in the Pacific during World War II. Born on December 19, 1921 in New York City, Bob was a nineteen-year-old...
The Battle of Iwo Jima: A family waits for news, 1945
Lieutenant Bob Stone served as a bombardier in the 431st Bomb Squadron (Heavy), 7th United States Army Air Force in the Pacific. This Spotlight is part of a series of documents detailing the experience of airmen in World War II. Click...
“Defence of Fort McHenry” or “The Star-Spangled Banner,” 1814
In September 1814, Francis Scott Key, an attorney and DC insider, watched the American flag rise over Baltimore, Maryland’s Fort McHenry from a British ship in the harbor. Key had been negotiating the release of an American captive...
Bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, 1963
On the morning of September 15, 1963, Denise McNair (age 11), Addie Mae Collins (age 14), Cynthia Wesley (age 14), and Carole Robertson (age 14) were killed when nineteen sticks of dynamite exploded at the Sixteenth Street Baptist...
Anti-Communist Trading Cards, 1951
On June 25, 1950, war broke out on the Korean peninsula when the Soviet-backed Communist forces in North Korea invaded the recently founded democratic republic of South Korea. Following a unanimous UN resolution condemning the...
Late 19th- and Early 20th-Century Immigration and Migration: Pairing Text and Visual Materials
Click to download this five-lesson unit.
Inside the Vault: Destruction of the King George III Statue in 1776
How did New Yorkers react to the Declaration of Independence? Learn more about the destruction of the King George statue and the reception of the Declaration of Independence in New York City with Dr. Benjamin Carp of the CUNY...
Inside the Vault: Baseball during World War II
How did World War II impact baseball? How did baseball affect wartime morale? Over the course of the war, Americans witnessed beloved players like Jackie Robinson and Joe DiMaggio serve overseas. However, the nation’s pastime...
Latino and Latina Civil Rights, 1930-1970
About This Lesson Plan Unit The objective of the unit is to have students recognize the economic, social, and political challenges faced by Latinas and Latinos throughout the United States from the 1930s through the 1960s, as...
Prominent Latinos and Latinas in the Twentieth- and Twenty-First-Century United States
About This Lesson Plan Unit The objective of the unit is to have students recognize the economic, social, and political challenges faced by Latinas and Latinos throughout the United States from the 1930s through the 1960s, as...
Latino Immigration to the United States in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries
About This Lesson Plan Unit The five lessons in this unit explore Latino and Latina immigration to the United States in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, emphasizing how immigrants understood and experienced this...
Bartolomé de Las Casas debates the subjugation of the Indians, 1550
This tract, a summary of a debate concerning the subjugation of Indians, contains the arguments of Bartolomé de Las Casas, the Bishop of Chiapas, Mexico, and Juan Gines Sepulveda, an influential Spanish philosopher, concerning the...
Pilgrims, the Plymouth Colony, and Thanksgiving, 1608-1621
About this Lesson Plan Unit The five lessons in this unit explore the Pilgrims’ journey to the British colonies and their early settlement. Students will read primary sources, including excerpts from William Bradford’s “Of...
Spain and the American Revolution: Contributions to the Patriot Cause
About This Lesson Plan Unit The five lessons in this unit explore Spain’s contributions to the American Revolution. Students will read and examine correspondence, a royal order, a map, and a combat diary. You will assess the...
Debating Chinese Immigration and Naturalization, 1869-1898
Click to download this three-lesson unit.
Inside the Vault: The Salem Witch Trials
In 1693, Puritan preacher Cotton Mather published The Wonders of the Invisible World , providing a detailed account of each Salem witch trial case. Over time, the witch hunts have become heavily mythologized and embedded in our...
The Chinese Exclusion Act, 1882
Signed into law on May 6, 1882, the Chinese Exclusion Act barred most Chinese immigration to the United States by placing a 10-year ban on the entry of Chinese laborers. Chinese merchants, diplomats, scholars, and students were exempt...
Colonial Pennsylvania and the Paxton Massacre, 1763
About this Lesson Plan Unit The four lessons in this unit explore a massacre in colonial Pennsylvania in which the Paxton Boys—immigrants from Ulster, Northern Ireland—murdered twenty Conestoga people. Students will examine...
The Mexican-American War: Arguments for and against Going to War
Click here to download this three-lesson unit.
Theodore Roosevelt and the Trusts
Background Thick dark smoke billowing out of smokestacks several stories high proliferated across city skylines, heralding America's rise to world prominence and industrial supremacy. After the Civil War, Americans embraced the smog...
"Citizen 13660" by Miné Okubo, an illustrated memoir of Japanese incarceration during World War II, 1946
Click the images to enlarge them. On February 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066, resulting in the incarceration of all people of Japanese ancestry from the West Coast. The order was issued in...
“A City Upon a Hill” from John Winthrop’s “A Modell of Christian Charity,” 1630
About This Lesson Plan Unit This four-lesson unit focuses on the “city upon a hill” passage from John Winthrop’s “A Modell of Christian Charity” lay sermon, delivered in 1630 as the Puritans arrived in Massachusetts Bay. The...
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