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Revisiting the Founding Era

The Gilder Lerhman Institute of American History has been awarded a $400,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) for Revisiting the Founding Era, a three-year project that will support programs at 97 public...

News

The Gilder Lehrman History Shop Offers Mugs, Bags, Posters, and Apparel with Collection Images

The Gilder Lehrman Institute’s new History Shop features favorites from the Gilder Lehrman Collection that we hope will be of interest to our friends and supporters. Start your morning with American history with these and many other...

History Now Issue

American Poets, American History

#39 Spring 2014

Video: Inside The Vault

Inside the Vault: Lucy Knox

6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

During the siege of Boston in 1775, 19-year-old Lucy Knox gave up everything she knew and left Boston with her husband’s sword hidden in her clothes. She would never see her parents or siblings again. Lucy’s letters to her husband,...

Spotlight on: Primary Source

A family torn apart by war, 1777

The Revolutionary War divided families. In 1774, eighteen-year-old Lucy Flucker married twenty-four-year-old Henry Knox. Lucy’s parents were powerful, wealthy Tories, and they were not happy with the match. Henry Knox was the son of...

Video

Susan B. Anthony on Her Work and Life: Document in a Minute

Gilder Lehrman curator Beth Huffer discusses Susan B. Anthony's contribution to an autograph album. "The one purpose of my life has been the establishment of perfect equality of rights for women – civil and political – industrial and...

Video: Read Along

"Dancing Hands: How Teresa Carreno Played the Piano for President Lincoln"

Government and Civics

As a little girl, Teresa Carreño loved to let her hands dance across the beautiful keys of the piano. If she felt sad, music cheered her up, and when she was happy, the piano helped her share that joy. Soon she was writing her own...

Video: Inside The Vault

Inside The Vault: Eleanor Roosevelt, “Four Basic Rights,” and Desegregation

Government and Civics

6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Originally broadcast on August 21, 2020, this session of Inside the Vault: Highlights from the Gilder Lehrman Collection explores a 1944 letter by Eleanor Roosevelt defending the four basic rights of all Americans and desegregation...

News

Are We in a New Gilded Age?

The question of whether the United States has entered a new Gilded Age pops up quite frequently in magazines, op-eds, and newscasts these days. Here, historian Edward O’Donnell, author of Henry George and the Crisis of Inequality ,...

Video

Killing for Coal: America’s Deadliest Labor War

Economics, Science, Technology, Engineering and Math

5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Thomas G. Andrews, an associate professor of history at the University of Colorado Boulder, discusses his Bancroft Prize–winning book, Killing for Coal: America’s Deadliest Labor War, and the interconnection between railroads, coal,...

Video

Chat with the Curator: Amelia Earhart and Neta Snook

Science, Technology, Engineering and Math

6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12

Curator of the Gilder Lehrman Collection, Sandra Trenholm, describes documents in the Neta Snook Collection, including letters and photographs of Amelia Earhart. Biographer Susan Butler (East to the Dawn: The Life of Amelia Earhart)...

Video

New Spirits: Americans in the Gilded Age

Government and Civics

9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Vassar College historian Rebecca Edwards discusses some of the complexities of the Gilded Age with Gilder Lehrman President James Basker. Professor Edwards's 2006 study, New Spirits: Americans in the Gilded Age, offers a nuanced view...

News

Common Sense Published: On This Day, January 10

Did you know that the most popular written work in American history was published before America was an actual nation of its own? On January 10, 1776, six months before the adoption of the Declaration of Independence by the...

News

Submit Your Hamilton Education Program Online Videos for Spring 2021!

The Gilder Lehrman Institute is pleased to announce that the national competition and lottery are now open for spring 2021 submissions for the Hamilton Education Program Online. EduHam Online is an easily adaptable, fully online...

Video: Read Along

"Gittel's Journey: An Ellis Island Story"

World History

Gittel and her mother were supposed to immigrate to America together, but when her mother is stopped by the health inspector, Gittel must make the journey alone. Her mother writes her cousin’s address in New York on a piece of paper....

News

Counting Down to Hamilton: Week 4

There’s less than one month left until the Hamilton student matinee on April 13! This week, discover Alexander Hamilton in the American Imagination , the newest issue of History Now , Gilder Lehrman’s online journal . In five essays,...

News

Ulysses S. Grant Dies: On This Day, July 23, 1885

On July 23, 1885, Ulysses S. Grant, a Union general in the Civil War and the 18th president of the United States, died at the age of 63. He had struggled with throat cancer for a year while rushing to finish his memoirs, the proceeds...

Video: Inside The Vault

Inside the Vault: "Your future rests… in your hands!”

6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Keisha Rembert, Assistant Professor of Teacher Preparation, National Louis University, and Nate McAlister, History Educator at Seaman High School in Topeka, Kansas, joined the Gilder Lehrman Collection curators in this session of...

Video

Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation

Government and Civics

8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Joseph J. Ellis, Professor of History at Mount Holyoke College, discusses his Pulitzer Prize–winning book Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation, explains the emergence of the men who led the Revolutionary War and created...

Video

Taxation and Representation: The Imperial Debate between Britain and the Americans

Government and Civics

6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Brown University historian Gordon Wood describes the British and American conceptions of representation during the eighteenth century, widely diverging points of view that were forged by radically different experiences with...

P&E Home

Programs & Events

The Gilder Lehrman Institute promotes the study and love of American history through a wide array of programs and exhibitions for teachers, students, historians, and the general public. From weeklong seminars and other professional...

Video

"Let the Word Go Forth": Symbols and Images in JFK’s Inaugural Address

Government and Civics

6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

University of Virginia historian Barbara Perry describes John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address, including background information on the President’s life and family, the writing of the speech, and major accomplishments of his...

Spotlight on: Primary Source

The Cold War in the classroom, 1952

Government and Civics, World History

As the Cold War pervaded domestic as well as international spheres, Duck and Cover , an educational film produced by the Federal Civil Defense Administration and Archer Productions Inc., showed children how to react in case of a...

Program/Event

Civil War Essay Contest Winners 2013

High School Division Click on the title to view a pdf of a winning essay. First Prize Clarissa Aaron , Kelso High School, Kelso, Washington "Uncle Tom’s Failure" Second Prize Farukh Saidmuratov , New Dorp High School, Staten Island,...

Video: Read Along

"Bread for Words: A Frederick Douglass Story"

Government and Civics

Frederick Douglass knew where he was born but not when. He knew his grandmother but not his father. And as a young child, there were other questions, such as Why am I a slave? Answers to those questions might have eluded him but...

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