Arts and Humanities Commons^™

"The Property Of The Nation": Democracy And The Memory Of George Washington, 1799-1865, Matthew Ryan Costello

Dissertations (1934 -)

This dissertation explores how Americans personally experienced George Washington’s legacy in the nineteenth century through visits to his estate and tomb at Mount Vernon. By the 1820s many Americans had conflicting memories of the American Revolution and its most iconic figure, George Washington. As America grew more divided, so too did the memory of Washington. On multiple occasions, government factions and organizations attempted to claim his remains for political reasons. At the same time, Americans and foreign travelers journeyed to Mount Vernon to experience his tomb and forge a deeper personal connection with the man. These visitors collected objects such …

Long Journeys To A Middle Ground: Indians, Catholics, And The Origins Of A New Deal In Montana And Idaho, 1855-1945, Aaron David Hyams

Dissertations (1934 -)

This study focuses on the experiences of individuals and families, on the Blackfeet, Flathead, and Nez Perce reservations of Montana and Idaho, who converted to Catholicism, adapted to agricultural living, accepted American education, and otherwise sought to find their places in a rapidly changing world. At the same time, this project follows local Catholic leaders from the missions and surrounding parishes who struggled with their contradictory roles as shepherds of their native flocks and agents of colonialism. I argue that Indians and Catholics on the reservations carved out often overlapping communities and identities as they negotiated the changes introduced by …

"Breaking Up, And Moving Westward": The Search For Identity In Post-Colonial America, 1787-1828, Bethany Harding

Dissertations (1934 -)

This dissertation approaches the early national United States as a post-colonial state, and draws new connections between the country’s westward development and Americans’ ability to detach from their colonial past. At the conclusion of the American Revolution in 1783, the new United States became the first nation built on the ruins of a British colonial foundation; its citizens faced the colossal task of forging an independent national consciousness without being able to draw clear racial or ethnic lines of distinction between themselves and the former mother country. White Americans of the founding generation occupied a unique and tenuous position: in …

Mass Consumption In Milwaukee: 1920-1970, Christopher Chan

Dissertations (1934 -)

This study focuses on mass consumption's role in the development of the city of Milwaukee. This study's main focus is on the mid-twentieth century, though this case study will look at mass consumption's role in Milwaukee from its founding to the present. Mass consumption focuses on the actions of buying and selling and how consumer options reflected the city's general development. After studying the composition of Milwaukee's population and income levels, the story of mass consumption in Milwaukee will be told through studying how automobiles and food were bought and sold, as well as how other assorted shopping venues affected …

Brides, Department Stores, Westerns, And Scrapbooks--The Everyday Lives Of Teenage Girls In The 1940s, Carly Anger

Dissertations (1934 -)

This study establishes a more nuanced look at fictional teenage girls of the 1940s. With the beginning of World War II many teenage girls took on jobs that were left vacant by men. With these new jobs came the opportunity to gain financial independence. However, teenage girls, along with their mothers, were expected to leave their jobs once soldiers returned from war. Thus, there was a gap between the actual experiences of teenage girls and what they were expected to be--Rosie the Riveters who were willing to become housewives at the end of the war.

This gap between actual experiences …

Lack Of Oversight: The Relationship Between Congress And The Fbi, 1907-1975, Aaron Stockham

Dissertations (1934 -)

This study fills a hole left in research about the Federal Bureau of Investigation. While previous authors have examined the Bureau's relationship to the executive branch, especially under its long-time Director, J. Edgar Hoover, comparatively little has been written about the Bureau's relationship with the United States Congress. Using their investigatory and appropriations powers, members of Congress could have maintained stringent oversight of Bureau officials' activities. Instead, members of Congress either deferred to the executive branch, especially presidents and attorneys general, or developed close relationships with Bureau officials based on a shared politics, mainly anti-communism during the Cold War. Examining …

Joseph Smith's Doctrine Of The Holy Spirit Contrasted With Cartwright, Campbell, Hodge, And Finney, Lynne Wilson

Dissertations (1934 -)

The dissertation is an historical–critical examination of Joseph Smith’s (1805–1844) sermons and writings from 1830 to 1844 to determine the scope of his doctrine on the Holy Ghost. Many biographers dismiss Joseph Smith as a product of his environment. Superficially, his thoughts on the Holy Ghost appear to fall within the mainstream of the enthusiastic outbursts of the Second Great Awakening, but a closer look shows that they are an abrupt and radical departure from the pneumatology of his day. To clarify the unique parameters of Smith’s pneumatology, it is necessary to place Smith’s views in a historical context by …

"Justice Without Partiality": Women And The Law In Colonial Maryland, 1648-1715, Monica C. Witkowski

Dissertations (1934 -)

What was the legal status of women in early colonial Maryland? This is the central question answered by this dissertation. Women, as exemplified through a series of case studies, understood the law and interacted with the nascent Maryland legal system. Each of the cases in the following chapters is slightly different. Each case examined in this dissertation illustrates how much independent legal agency women in the colony demonstrated.

Throughout the seventeenth century, Maryland women appeared before the colony's Provincial and county courts as witnesses, plaintiffs, defendants, and attorneys in criminal and civil trials. Women further entered their personal cattle marks, …

The Development Of The Constitution Of The United States To 1789, Roy R. Niemi

Bachelors’ Theses

Immediately after the discovery of America by Columbus, King Henry VII of England sent John Cabot out in 1496 to discover regions then unknown to Christian people and take possession of them in the name of the English king. Cabot made two voyages , and by 1498 had sailed along the east coast of what is now the United States and claimed it for England. The European sovereigns by tacit agreement rested their claims upon priority of discovery. Besides this agreement the British de good their claims by sword and by treaty, so that ultimately the title to all the …

Woodrow Wilson And His Fourteen Points, Allen W. Bathke

Bachelors’ Theses

It is the purpose of the author to show the origin of President Woodrow Wilson's fourteen Points; from the initial drafts to the completed draft, as given in the President's speech before the Congress of the United States on January 8, 1918.

First, let us visualize the conditions present in Europe and the United States, which made peace proposals necessary, and which resulted in the Fourteen Points. Three long years of fierce and bloody fighting had called into the trenches tens of millions of men. Over four mil­lion had already been compelled to lay down their lives, and other millions …

The Alabama Claims, Chester John Niebler

Bachelors’ Theses

It is now almost three-quarters of a century since the nation was bathed in the blood of its youth during the Civil War. To the casual observer the contest. was wholly a domestic one, with domestic interests and currents only. To the slight reader, the nation was placed above the individual states, the South was crushed, Slavery was abolished by force and law, and the Confederacy had to be reconstructed. These were primarily the problems of the United States during the period.