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Featured Essays

Recent rehabilitation of this important site at the Gettysburg battlefield provides a much improved experience for visitors.

Dickinson played a pivotal role in our Nation’s founding, from the Stamp Act to ratifying the Constitution, but his contributions are largely forgotten by history.

Some delegates at the Constitutional Convention wanted a strong executive, while others feared the American president might become a king.

In the Age of Discovery, maps held closely guarded secrets for the kings, adventurers, and merchants who first acquired them.

America 250!

Drama at the Old North Bridge | Spring 2025, Vol 70, No 2

By Rick Atkinson

“Now the war has begun and no one knows when it will end,” said one minuteman after the fight.

drama at old north bridge

The Revolution Could Have Started Here | Summer 2024, Vol 69, No 3

By Bob Thompson

At 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.

boston map

Why Is the American Revolution So Important? | Spring 2024, Vol 69, No 2

By Jack D. Warren

Our nation is free because, 250 years ago, brave men and women fought a war to establish the independence of the United States and created a system of government to protect the freedom of its citizens.

congress

The Forgotten Battle of Menotomy | Spring 2025, Vol 70, No 2

By Michael Ruderman

Overshadowed in memory by Lexington and Concord, the Massachusetts town of Menotomy saw the most violent and deadly fighting on April 19, 1775.

menotomy

Discovered: First Maps of the American Revolution  | Spring 2025, Vol 70, No 2

By Edwin S. Grosvenor

Previously unknown, a map drawn by Lord Percy, the British commander at Lexington, sheds new light on the perilous retreat to Boston 250 years ago this month.

first maps

Classic Essays from the Archives

"The Sparck of Rebellion" | Winter 2010, Summer 2025, Vol 70, No 3

By Douglas Brinkley

Badly disguised as Indians, a rowdy group of patriotic vandals kicked a revolution into motion.

boston tea party

Growing Up Colored | Summer 2012, Summer 2025, Vol 70, No 3

By Henry Louis Gates Jr.

The noted writer and educator tells of his boyhood in the West Virginia town of Piedmont, where African Americans were second-class citizens, but family pride ran deep.

Henry Louis Gates and family

Lincoln and Presidential Character | October 2020, Vol 65, No 6

By David S. Reynolds

Abraham Lincoln learned much of what made him a great president — honesty, sincerity, toughness, and humility — from his early reading and from studying the lives of Washington and Franklin.

lincoln

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