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Featured Essays
Congress forbade living persons from appearing on paper currency in 1866, after an unpopular Treasury Department official put himself on the five-cent note.
The extravaganza celebrating the nation’s first century was the greatest cultural event of America’s Gilded Age.
At the nation’s pivotal moment — the Civil War — two seventeenth-century vessels kept sailing through the American mind: the Mayflower and the slaver White Lion. Their wakes still cut our waters.
Our Founders profoundly transformed the way people participate in government.
America 250!
American Rebels at Sea | Summer 2022, Vol 67, No 3
By Eric Jay DolinAn estimated 1500 privateering ships played a crucial role in winning the American Revolution, but their contributions are often forgotten.
Patriots or Terrorists? | Fall 2008, Vol 58, No 5
By Edwin G. BurrowsThe Lost Story of Revolutionary War POW’s
The Revolution Could Have Started Here | Summer 2024, Vol 69, No 3
By Bob ThompsonAt a curious stone tower in Somerville, Massachusetts, panic in 1774 could have sparked a war seven months before Lexington and Concord entered the history books.
Lafayette: A Hero Among Heroes | Summer 2021, Vol 65, No 5
By Harlow Giles UngerNo figure in the Revolutionary era inspired as much affection and reverence as Gilbert du Motier, the Marquis de Lafayette
America 50: The First Jubilee | Summer 2026, Vol 71, No 3
By Joseph Connor“And so old Mr. Adams is dead; on the 4th of July, too, just half a century after our Declaration of Independence...”
Classic Essays from the Archives
A Yankee Among The War Lords | October 1970, Vol 21, No 6
By Barbara W. TuchmanFirst of the Three Parts from STILWELL THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE IN CHINA 1911-1945
Range Practice | Februrary 1968, Summer 2025, Vol 19, No 2
By Dean AchesonOur former Secretary of State recalls his service fifty years ago in the Connecticut National Guard—asthmatic horses, a ubiquitous major, and a memorable shooting practice.
A Few Parchment Pages Two Hundred Years Later | May/June 1987, Summer 2025, Vol 70, No 3
By Richard B. MorrisThe framers of the Constitution were proud of what they had done but might be astonished that their words still carry so much weight. A distinguished scholar tells us how the great charter has survived and flourished.
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