“Iowa nice” was in short supply during the Civil War. Local politics reached new lows as Iowa Republicans demonized Peace Democrats (also known as Copperheads). A colleague asked historian Hubert…
Mass imprisonment and poor supplies at Andersonville led to horrible cases of starvation. The War Department publicized photos of emaciated soldiers, giving Andersonville an infamous and enduring reputation. Historian Arch…
It’s not often that a Supreme Court Chief Justice writes a book of history. But when he does, it’s a book worth reading. This is true for William H. Rehnquist’s…
Winchester Miller and his wife, Melinda Young, started married life as farmers in Van Buren County, southeast Iowa, in 1857. Melinda bore two sons, and Winchester eyed the lingering California…
A parable: Joke-telling Abraham Lincoln (Republican) in a stovepipe hat; sober-minded Jefferson Davis (Ultra-secessionist Democrat); and diminutive Stephen A. Douglas (national Democrat) stood at the top of a cliff. Davis…
Many Americans named children Napoleon Bonaparte in homage to the great French general. One of those children had a shadowy journey into the Confederate service. Napoleon Bonaparte Morgan was a…
“Death and life are in the power of the tongue,” an ancient writer tells us. In a sense, words inflamed the country and, in 1861, flared up into Civil War.…
On their wedding day, Nancy and John Shipley had great hopes and dreams. They married amidst the gloomy financial Panic of 1857. Twenty-five-year-old John and 19-year-old Nancy thought the best…
In Part One, Huck Finn and abolition-minded Christians agonized over slavery and the state of their own souls. They were torn between heart/conscience and Bible verses that seemed to support…
Loyalty, love, and sin come to life in Mark Twain’s novel, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Set in the shadow of the Fugitive Slave Act, Huck Finn helps his friend,…