For well over a century, many American leaders have prioritized efficiency over values like stability, fairness, security, and responsible stewardship of the world we’ve inherited. This tradition reflects a fundamentally extractive approach to government. www.hnn.us/article/how-...

“As long as college leaders — especially those representing the most prestigious and resourced campuses — rely on old habits of reflexive acquiescence, they invite further retribution against us all.” www.hnn.us/article/whos...

Before the embassy was seized, demands for student deportation targeted rioters. But the White House was soon inundated with letters from elected officials, as well members of the public, demanding deportation as retaliation against all Iranians studying in the U.S. www.hnn.us/article/indi...

I wrote about Thaddeus Stevens and the power of the purse for @myhnn.bsky.social. www.historynewsnetwork.org/article/thad...

I’ve been editing features at @myhnn.bsky.social for a year now. It’s such a privilege to work with the wonderful writers we’ve been able to publish. Sign up for our newsletter, send me a pitch, and check out some of the pieces we’ve published in the past year.

“The sexuality of historical figures is, indeed, quite meaningful insofar as perceptions of it shape political understanding and historical interpretation.” www.historynewsnetwork.org/article/linc...

“At a moment like this, eschewing political controversy could prove to be the most divisive position of all.” Read Barbara Weinstein on the Gaza scholasticide resolution and the role of the historian. www.hnn.us/article/what...

“If the Dillwyns have taught me anything, it’s about just how powerful history can be for identity formation of all kinds: for entrenching a status quo and imagining beyond it.” This piece by novelist Nat Reeve is very good, please read it! www.historynewsnetwork.org/article/at-a...

The first and last queen of Haiti outlived most of her family, yet her story about the revolution and its aftermath was rarely consulted by those writing the era’s history. An excerpt from Marlene Daut’s The First and Last King of Haiti. www.hnn.us/article/i-ha...

The latest in @emmagarman.bsky.social’s series on found documents and fiction, on Pale Fire as a dynamic historical organism: “We, too, must apply almost Kinbote-levels of literary divination if we’re to appreciate the historical framework of Pale Fire.” www.hnn.us/article/secr...

“When the company in which he had shares was liquidated in 1885, Burton was among those who lost everything they had invested. He had placed trust in his own underestimation of African capabilities.” www.historynewsnetwork.org/article/nugg...

A couple of colleagues suggested I organize my scattered comments of this year's fires in the Northeast into a short (!) narrative. History News Network has graciously published it: www.historynewsnetwork.org/article/the-...

“The Day of Judgment is either approaching, or it is not. If it is not, there is no cause for an adjournment; if it is, I choose to be found doing my duty. I wish therefore that candles may be brought.” www.hnn.us/article/the-...

“From then on, the administration announced, the U.S. would only recognize the ICJ’s jurisdiction when it chose to do so, in effect pre-rejecting any ruling that was unfavorable to American prerogatives.” www.hnn.us/article/lett...

“For novelists like Viña Delmar, being ‘banned in Boston’ for her 1928 book Bad Girl — the heavily Catholic city objected to the book’s references to extramarital sex — was practically a literary badge of honor.” www.hnn.us/article/keep...

Journalists dubbed him the “Ohio icicle.” If his name had not become attached to the 1890 anti-monopoly law that would come to define the playing field for U. S. business large and small, he might today be altogether forgotten. www.historynewsnetwork.org/article/the-...

How a local prosecutor protected white supremacists and went on to a career in Washington, DC. www.historynewsnetwork.org/article/ohio...

Have something you’ve wanted to write about history that you’ve never found the right moment or news peg to pitch? Send it to me at HNN! I enjoy working with academics and students who want to try general-interest writing for the first time, so don’t be shy. www.hnn.us/submission-g...

Rather than cherchez la femme, the imperative is cherchez le texte, as the literary device of sought-after documents sparks an investigative plot and readerly engagement, our curiosity piqued by tales within tales. www.historynewsnetwork.org/article/book...

Wrote about JD Vance and his predecessors:

“In some of the most exquisite works of English poetry ever written, canonical medieval literary writers — Chaucer, Gower, Hoccleve — all insisted that they were inept, inane, and subpar.” www.hnn.us/article/an-e...

“The American Review was not a particularly well-run magazine, and Collins not a particularly good publisher. His failure to pay writers promptly nearly severed the Agrarians’ relationship with the magazine several times.” www.hnn.us/article/the-...

Read @carolinewazer.bsky.social on the history of pepysdiary.com, the giant decades-long book club that provided a fascinating early example of how to make history fun on the internet. www.historynewsnetwork.org/article/peep...

Read @michaelwaters.bsky.social on his “The Other Olympians” research process — and why institutional archives really should start saving 20th century gossip rags. www.historynewsnetwork.org/article/why-...

Always read @emmagarman.bsky.social! The history of reading fiction as history — the first piece in a new series on found documents in literature. www.hnn.us/article/a-ki...

in the 1960s, Disney was going to build in st. louis - all that's left are blueprints, which show a parallel universe, where a Manifest Destiny theme park would have been stuck between Busch Stadium and the Arch ⤵️ historynewsnetwork.org/article/walt... #disney #history #stlouis

Read @devintoshea.bsky.social on Walt Disney, St. Louis, and a very weird and thankfully nonexistent theme park. historynewsnetwork.org/article/walt...

“A party can start out good and change … The ballot box is no place to make a vote of thanks for past favors.” Read Marc Blanc on the third-party activism of Peter H. Clark and Sutton E. Griggs. historynewsnetwork.org/article/no-p...

“There are more tunnels in the mind than in the earth; no matter what structures or people we might find underground, there are always more in our imagination.” historynewsnetwork.org/article/tunn...

A reading list on borders and nostalgia, from @laurenmarkham.bsky.social. historynewsnetwork.org/article/bord...

Tench Coxe argued that the age threshold for the presidency ensured that the president “cannot be an idiot, probably not a knave or a tyrant, for those whom nature makes so, discover it before the age of thirty-five, until which period he cannot be elected.” historynewsnetwork.org/article/age-...

“a newspaper noted in 1918 that the worst offenders tended to cover their plates in grease and dust, deface them, and place them in remote areas of the vehicle so far from the car’s taillights that identifying the plate at night was impossible.” historynewsnetwork.org/article/the-...

“Bats have never exported cash crops. Cormorants hold no joint stock.” Read @wbarlowrobles.bsky.social! historynewsnetwork.org/article/185927

Ever wonder why we call certain creatures “colonies”? As with too many things, we can blame colonialism. Here’s my two cents, as a historian. Honored this piece can kick off the tenure of @jaimefuller.bsky.social as the new editor of HNN's newsletter! historynewsnetwork.org/article/185927

Excited to get back to editing! I love working with young historians and writers eager to start writing for the public, so please pitch or get in touch if you want to brainstorm ideas. (jaime at hnn dot org)

we’ll know that journalism is healthy again when far-flung upstate New York correspondents with a taste for dramatic copy are allowed to file at length about county fairs.

this quiz from the back of Paul Fussell’s Class is a funny time capsule of the aesthetic anxieties of 1983.