128 items
No American document has had a greater global impact than the Declaration of Independence. It has been fundamental to American history longer than any other text because it was the first to use the name "the United States of America":...
President Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address, 1865
Just 701 words long, Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address took only six or seven minutes to deliver, yet contains many of the most memorable phrases in American political oratory. The speech contained neither gloating nor rejoicing....
Jim Crow Wisdom: Memory and Identity in Black America since 1940
Yale University historian Jonathan Holloway discusses his 2013 work, Jim Crow Wisdom: Memory and Identity in Black America since 1940, with James Basker, President of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History. Professor...
Ken Burns - "Our America: A Photographic History"
Ken Burns, the producer and director of numerous film series, including The Roosevelts: An Intimate History and Country Music , founded his own documentary film company, Florentine Films, in 1976. His landmark film, The Civil War ,...
Revolutionary Propaganda: Persuasion and Colonial Support
Background Many students misconstrue the American Revolution as a period of unanimous support for independence from Great Britain. However, colonists generally considered themselves loyal British citizens, asserting rightful...
Patriotic Postal Covers: "Lincoln & Davis in 5 Rounds," 1861
Patriotic postal covers are an important part of the material culture of the Civil War era. People often collected these covers in special keepsake albums. Such decorative envelopes were used as advertisements and to promote various...
Frederick Douglass’s tribute to Abraham Lincoln, 1880
Despite initial differences, Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln forged a relationship over the course of the Civil War based on a shared vision. Fifteen years after Lincoln’s death, Douglass described him as "one of the noblest...
Inside the Vault: A Summary View of the Rights of British America
On April 7, 2022, our curators were joined by Professor Andrew Robertson to discuss A Summary View of the Rights of British America . Written in 1774 by Thomas Jefferson, this document laid out the principal point that he would argue...
Dinner with the nuclear family, 1950
The threat of invasion and subversion in the Cold War era led Americans to seek consensus and conformity, in politics and in culture. The rise of consumer culture in the same period, driven by an economic boom, a population surge, and...
Inside the Vault: British Troops Landing in Boston Harbor
Explore just one of the fascinating items from the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History collection!
The Great West Illustrated, 1869
The exploration and settlement of the American West coincided with the development of the medium of photography. Photographic images, reproduced in books and newspapers and available for purchase on their own, helped shape Americans’...
What’s That Sound? Teaching the 1960s through Popular Music
There’s Something Happening Here . . . The 1960s was one of the most dramatic and controversial decades in American history. Opinions about its achievements and failures continue to be divided between those who condemn the decade as...
A Look at Slavery through Posters and Broadsides
Overview Students will examine posters and broadsides from the 1800s to examine attitudes about slavery in the United States at that time. Materials Overhead or copies for all students of the poster packet (PDF) Poster Inquiry Sheet...
A political cartoon of Grant and Lee, 1864
During the first three years of the Civil War, a series of Union generals led the Army of the Potomac against Confederate General Robert E. Lee with little success. In March 1864, Abraham Lincoln appointed General Ulysses S. Grant...
John F. Kennedy’s Inaugural Address, 1961
On January 20, 1961, John F. Kennedy was sworn in as the thirty-fifth President of the United States. His short, fourteen-minute inaugural address is best remembered for a single line: "My fellow Americans: ask not what your country...
"Barbed Wire Baseball: How One Man Brought Hope to the Japanese Internment Camps of WWII"
As a boy, Kenichi “Zeni” Zenimura dreams of playing professional baseball, but everyone tells him he is too small. Yet he grows up to be a successful player, playing with Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig! When the Japanese attack Pearl...
"Harlem's Little Blackbird: The Story of Florence Mills"
Born to parents who were both former slaves, Florence Mills knew at an early age that she loved to sing and that her sweet, bird-like voice, resonated with those who heard her. Performing catapulted her all the way to the stages of...
Immigration in the Gilded Age: Using Photographs as Primary Sources
Aim / Essential Question How successful were photographs in demonstrating the conditions of immigrants during the Gilded Age? Background The latter portion of the nineteenth century and the early twentieth century witnessed the start...
De Soto's discovery of the Mississippi, 1541
In 1539, Hernando de Soto led the first major European expedition into the interior of the southeastern North America, an area then known as La Florida. De Soto landed near Tampa Bay, Florida, with more than 600 men, and hoped to find...
My Country, ’Tis of Thee
Samuel Francis Smith was a twenty-four-year-old Baptist seminary student in Massachusetts when he wrote the lyrics of "America (My Country, ’Tis of Thee)," the patriotic song that would serve as an unofficial national anthem for...
Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" Speech
Unit Overview This unit is part of the Gilder Lehrman Institute’s Teaching Literacy through History resources, designed to align to the Common Core State Standards. These units were developed to enable students to understand,...
Bruce Springsteen and the Promise of Rock ’n’ Roll
Marc Dolan, an English and American Studies scholar at John Jay College, City University of New York (CUNY), discusses his new book, Bruce Springsteen and the Promise of Rock 'n' Roll (W.W. Norton, 2012).
...
The Bondwoman’s Narrative
Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the W.E.B. Du Bois Professor of the Humanities, chair of Afro-American Studies, director of the Du Bois Institute at Harvard University, and author of seminal works on African American literary criticism and...
"Grandfather's Journey"
When he was a young man, Allen Say’s grandfather left his home in Japan to explore the world. He began his journey by crossing the Pacific Ocean on a steamship, then wandered the deserts, farmlands, and cities of North America. Allen...
Secotan, an Algonquian village, ca. 1585
In the 1570s and 1580s, John White served as an artist and mapmaker to several expeditions around the Carolinas. White made numerous watercolor sketches depicting the Algonquian people and stunning American landscapes. This engraving...
Understanding Slavery via Narratives
James Oliver Horton speaks about slave narratives as an important resource for understanding American history.
"Before She Was Harriet"
This lush, lyrical biography in verse begins with a glimpse of Harriet Tubman as an old woman, and travels back in time through the many roles she played through her life: spy, liberator, suffragist, and more. Illustrated by James...
Building Mount Rushmore, 1926
This September 1926 report by the sculptor Gutzon Borglum to the Harney Peak Memorial Association anticipates the construction of the Mount Rushmore National Memorial in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Borglum’s report offers a look...
Guided Readings: Using Primary and Secondary Sources: Slavery in the Founding Era
Primary and secondary sources can provide different kinds of information about the past. In the context of slavery, Phillis Wheatley is considered the most important figure of the eighteenth century. Two accounts of her experience...
Judy Tzu-Chun Wu and Gwendolyn Mink - "Fierce and Fearless: Patsy Takemoto Mink, First Woman of Color in Congress"
Judy Tzu-Chun Wu is a professor of history and Asian American studies at the University of California, Irvine. Gwendolyn Mink is the daughter of the late Congresswoman Patsy Takemoto Mink of Hawaii. Order Fierce and Fearless at the...
My Brother Sam Is Dead
Unit Objective This unit is part of Gilder Lehrman’s series of Common Core State Standards–based teaching resources. These units were developed to enable students to understand, summarize, and analyze original texts of historical...
New Amsterdam: The Center of the Dutch Settlement
Teaching with Russell Shorto’s book Island at the Center of the World Objectives Students will examine primary documents and secondary sources to analyze the effects of the Dutch West India Company settlement in North America....
Landing of Henrick Hudson, 1609
In 1609, Henry Hudson was chosen by the Dutch East India Company to search for a passage to Asia. In September of that year, Hudson landed on the shores of the river that would be named for him and claimed the lands along it for the...
Civilian defense on the home front, 1942
In the early days of World War II, air raids and other attacks on populated areas in Europe generated fears that similar attacks could happen in the United States. On May 20, 1941, more than six months before the United States entered...
"i see the rhythm"
Beginning with the roots of Black music in Africa and continuing on to contemporary hip hop, i see the rhythm takes us on a musical journey through time. We are invited to feel the rhythm of work songs on a southern plantation, to...
The Story of America: Essays on Origins
Historian Jill Lepore (David Woods Kemper ’41 Professor of American History at Harvard and a staff writer at the New Yorker ) discusses her 2012 book, The Story of America: Essays on Origins (Princeton University Press).
...
The First Inaugural Address of George Washington
Unit Objectives This lesson on the First Inaugural Address of George Washington is part of the Gilder Lehrman Institute’s series of Common Core–based units. These units were written to enable students to understand, summarize, and...
"Paper Son: The Inspiring Story of Tyrus Wong, Immigrant and Artist"
Before he became an artist named Tyrus Wong, he was a boy named Wong Geng Yeo. He traveled across a vast ocean from China to America with only a suitcase and a few papers. Not papers for drawing–which he loved to do–but immigration...
Debating Chinese Immigration and Naturalization, 1869-1898
Click to download this three-lesson unit.
Official photograph from the "Golden Spike" Ceremony, 1869
This iconic photograph records the celebration marking the completion of the first transcontinental railroad lines at Promontory Summit, Utah, on May 10, 1869, when Leland Stanford, co-founder of the Central Pacific Railroad,...
Gordon Chang - "The Ghosts of Gold Mountain: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad"
Order The Ghosts of Gold Mountain at the Gilder Lehrman Book Shop We receive an affiliate commission from every purchase through the link provided. Thank you for supporting our programs!
...
Examining Women’s Roles through Primary Sources and Literature
Essential Question: How were the ever-changing roles of women in American society chronicled? Background Joseph Heller writes in his book The Feminization of Quest-Romance that "American Literature equates the very essence of what it...
James Reese Europe
James Reese Europe World War I James Reese Europe, a bandleader in New York City, was an advocate for uniquely Black music. Europe enlisted during World War I and became a lieutenant in the 369th Regiment, known as the Harlem Hellfighters. Image...
Ilisa Barbas and Molly Rogers - "To Make Their Own Way in the World: The Enduring Legacy of the Zealy Daguerreotypes"
Order To Make Their Own Way in the World at the Gilder Lehrman Book Shop We receive an affiliate commission from every purchase through the link provided. Thank you for supporting our programs!
...
James G. Basker - "Black Writers of the Founding Era"
James G. Basker is president and CEO of the Gilder Lehrman Institute and Richard Gilder Professor of Literary History at Barnard College, Columbia University. Order Black Writers of the Founding Era at the Gilder Lehrman Book Shop We...
Inside the Vault: Thomas Paine's "Common Sense"
On July 7, 2022, our curators discussed Thomas Paine’s pamphlet Common Sense . They were joined by Eric Slauter, Associate Professor of English at the University of Chicago, who provided an overview of the pamphlet’s publication...
All Aboard: Making Connections with the Transcontinental Railroad
LESSON 1 Objectives Students will Read and understand primary source writings from two key documents that encouraged settlers to go west and that established congressional support of what would eventually become the transcontinental...
Showing results 51 - 100