Lesson Plan Environmentalism, Love Canal, and Lois Gibbs, 1953-1997 Economics, Government and Civics, Science, Technology, Engineering and Math 9, 10, 11, 12 Click here to download this four-lesson unit
Lesson Plan How Hamilton Solved the Economic Problems Facing the United States Economics, Government and Civics 5, 6, 7, 8 Lesson Overview In this lesson students will develop an understanding of the economic challenges facing the newly independent United States. Those challenges included the lack of a national currency, the national government’s...
Essay The Human Toll of the Great Depression Steven Mintz Economics 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+ After more than half a century, images of the Great Depression remain firmly etched in the American psyche—breadlines, soup kitchens, tin-can shanties and tar paper shacks known as "Hoovervilles," penniless men and women selling...
Essay Lincoln Allen C. Guelzo 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+ No one seemed less well-cast for the role of reformer, in an age of reform, than Abraham Lincoln. To begin with, he was a stranger, emotionally and intellectually, to evangelical Christianity, the great engine of reform in the...
Essay The Road to War Chandra M. Manning Economics, Government and Civics 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+ ‘A house divided against itself can not stand’ I believe this government can not endure permanently, half slave, and half free . . . I do not expect the Union to be dissolved - I do not expect the house to fall; but I do expect it...
Essay Washington Encourages a Prospective Immigrant: The Economic Potential of the States in 1796 Mary-Jo Kline and Theodore J. Crackel Geography 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+ During his second presidential term, George Washington enjoyed a lively correspondence with Sir John Sinclair, member of Parliament and leader of Britain’s scientific agriculture movement, on matters of mutual interest to the two...
Essay The Gilded Age T. Jackson Lears When I was a college student in the late 1960s, the most popular US history courses were the ones that covered the Gilded Age. They promised to illuminate the origins of urgent contemporary problems. Their canvas was broad and filled...
Essay Religion and Eighteenth-Century Revivalism Jon Butler Religion and Philosophy Revivals and revivalists seem endemic to the broad sweep of American history—Billy Graham’s 1957 "crusade" appearance at New York City’s Yankee Stadium; Aimee Semple McPherson’s theatrical preaching and healing at her Angeles Temple...
Essay The Great Depression David M. Kennedy Economics, Government and Civics, World History Herbert Hoover got many things wrong about the great economic calamity that destroyed his presidency and his historical reputation, but he got one fundamental thing right. Much legend to the contrary, the Great Depression was not...
Essay The Development of the West Ned Blackhawk In the summer of 1876, two dramatically different places captured the American nation’s attention. As the summer began, fairgoers in Philadelphia teemed into the Centennial Exhibition held to commemorate the one hundredth anniversary...