Season two of The Object of History podcast by the Massachusetts Historical Society continues with “A World War II Bomber Pilot’s Canine Companion,” the story of Thunderbolt, a dog who served as a companion to an American bomber pilot and POW Lt. Robert Payne during World War II. [Read more…] about A World War II Bomber Pilot’s Canine Companion
Massachusetts Historical Society
Nostalgia and the Miniature in Eighteenth-Century Women’s Work
Elite white women in the British Atlantic world commemorated transitions in their lives with shellwork grottos, shadow box scenes, dollhouses, and dolls. While these objects usually marked marriages or the births of children, they often did not depict these milestones. [Read more…] about Nostalgia and the Miniature in Eighteenth-Century Women’s Work
Early America & The Occult: Joshua Gordon’s Witchcraft Book
Among the best known yet least understood occult texts in early America, Joshua Gordon’s 22-page handwritten manual Witchcraft Book (1784) reveals a stunning culture of Scots-Irish folk medicine, cunning magic, and witch hunting that flourished in the backcountry settlements of the Carolinas at the turn of the nineteenth century. [Read more…] about Early America & The Occult: Joshua Gordon’s Witchcraft Book
King Philip’s War & American Political Thought
The Massachusetts Historical Society will host “The Influences of King Philip’s War on American Political Thought,” a program with Daniel Mandell of Truman State University, with additional comments by Owen Stanwood of Boston College. [Read more…] about King Philip’s War & American Political Thought
Boston’s Black Workers in the Civil War Era
In her book No Right to an Honest Living (Basic Books, 2023), Jacqueline Jones reveals how Boston was the United States writ small: a place where the soaring rhetoric of egalitarianism was easy, but justice in the workplace was elusive.
Before, during, and after the Civil War, white abolitionists and Republicans refused to secure equal employment opportunity for Black Bostonians, condemning many of them to poverty. [Read more…] about Boston’s Black Workers in the Civil War Era
James Bradley, Oberlin College’s ‘First’ Black Student
James Bradley was not the first African American to study at Oberlin College, but chroniclers and historians of abolition have long mistaken the facts of his life.
The Massachusetts Historical Society will host “If Wishes Were Sources: Speculation and the Saga of James Bradley, Oberlin’s ‘First’ Black Student,” a program with John Frederick Bell, Assumption University with comment by Julie Winch, University of Massachusetts Boston, set for Thursday, January 12th. [Read more…] about James Bradley, Oberlin College’s ‘First’ Black Student
Uniting America: FDR, Henry Stimson & World War Two
On June 20th, 1940, President Franklin D. Roosevelt shocked the country by announcing that two Republicans would take posts in his cabinet. Henry Stimson, former President Herbert Hoover’s secretary of state, became secretary of war, and Frank Knox, the Republican vice-presidential candidate in 1936, became secretary of the navy.
Roosevelt intended the appointments to build national unity. It also placed a bipartisan relationship at the center of America’s confrontation with global fascism. [Read more…] about Uniting America: FDR, Henry Stimson & World War Two
Chinese Tea in Early America
The Massachusetts Historical Society will host “Physicians advise the use of it: Chinese Tea in Early America,” a program with Yiyun Huang, University of Tennessee, Knoxville with comment by Rebecca Tannenbaum, Yale University, set for Tuesday, January 10th. [Read more…] about Chinese Tea in Early America
Earthquakes and End Times: Apocalyptic Predictions in the English Atlantic
Throughout early modern Europe and the Atlantic World, individuals recorded details of earthquakes in diaries and letters, contemplated meanings in sermons, and learned about distant disasters via broadsides and pamphlets. [Read more…] about Earthquakes and End Times: Apocalyptic Predictions in the English Atlantic
Boston Massacre: A History in Objects and Documents
The Massachusetts Historical Society (MHS) has announced “Boston Massacre: A History in Objects and Documents,” a program by Boston University students set for Monday, December 12th. [Read more…] about Boston Massacre: A History in Objects and Documents