United States History Commons^™

War On Drugs Legislation In The 1980s: Failed Policies That Created Racial Injustice, Shane Smith

2022 Awards for Excellence in Student Research and Creative Activity - Documents

For 40 years now, the War on Drugs has continued to damage millions of African American lives around the United States. As a result of failed drug control policies, not only have prisons become extremely overcrowded, but millions of people are still facing consequences such as massive poverty, broken family dynamics, violence, and tensions with law enforcement in their communities. Although this has become a contemporary issue, it is even more important to understand the origins of how this came to be. Digging to the source of the mess is the first step to understanding how we, as a society, …

Birmingham's Infrastructure Pioneers: The Elyton Land Company And Its Waterworks, 1871-1899, John West Battle Cheney

Theses

This paper examines the founding and development of the city of Birmingham, Alabama, focusing on the establishment and growth of its earliest, most vital infrastructure: railroads and waterworks. Early chapters explain how and why the city came to be carved from the wilderness, while later chapters describe how railroads and waterworks facilities made it possible for a set of frontier farms and villages- isolated, with no nearby river- to rapidly grow into a booming industrial metropolis. Analyzing the actions of Birmingham’s founder- the Elyton Land Company- and those of its subsidiaries- the Birmingham Water Works Company and the Highland Avenue …

Res Historica, Volume 1, Lynneth Miller Renberg Phd, Alpha Rho Epsilon Phi Alpha Theta

Res Historica

The inaugural journal of historical research by Anderson University students, Res Historica.

The editorial team for this edition of Res Historica was Dr. Lynneth Miller Renberg, Hunter Curlee, and Johnathan Sorce. Cover art for this volume is the Phi Alpha Theta: Alpha Rho Epsilon logo created by Dr. Lynneth Miller Renberg.

The History Of Uofsc's Gibbes Green, Lydia M. Brandt, Samantha Clark, Morgan Edlin, Lauren N. Eleazer, Francis Hampton, Mason Joiner, Hannah Macdonald, Ellis Mcclure, Emmah M. Muema, Madeline Owens, Graciela D. Perez, Noah Safari, Anna Spaschak, Sarah Helen Vandevender, David Walls, Grant Wong, Christian Anderson

Faculty Publications

The following report is a culmination of papers from the Spring 2022 students of Dr. Christian Anderson’s Evolution of Higher Education and Dr. Lydia Brandt’s History of American Architecture courses. The report contains research conducted on the creation of Gibbes Green on the University of South Carolina’s campus. Gibbes Green was the first major expansion made by the university, and signifies an era of development and growth for both the school and Higher Education as a whole.

"The Bottom Would Drop Out Of Everything": A Brief History Of The Battle For Blair Mountain, Brandon Neely

Student Publications

In the summer of 1921, thousands of Appalachian miners took up arms and marched in southwest West Virginia. Fighting back against attacks on miners' unions like the United Mine Workers of America, the conflict quickly turned violent. The Battle for Blair Mountain, as it came to be known, was one of the largest labor strikes in American history and impacted the history of the Coal Wars and the United States for decades to come. This analysis uses interviews with people who experienced the battle as well as the speeches of labor leaders Samuel Gompers and John Lewis to discuss the …

Redefining Gender Roles In Higher Education: Women At Gettysburg College During World War Ii, Addison E. Lomax

Student Publications

Throughout the early 20th century, the role of American women began to change. The U.S. entrance into World War II and resulting draft provided women at institutions of higher education the opportunity to develop their place on college campuses. Through analyzing yearbooks, student publications, and personal testimonies, the case of Gettysburg College provides a lens to better understand the changing dynamics on college campuses during the war years. Although men remained on the campus of Gettysburg College during the war years, the changing dynamics of the College, both academically and socially, allowed women the opportunity to increase not only their …

An Anatomy Of Disbelief: Discussions Of Slavery Before And After Rebellion And The Ways Power Reinforces Narratives Of Impossibility, Sarah Parker

Senior Theses

This paper is a historiographical exploration of freedom and the notion of thinkability through the lens of the Stono Revolt and Haitian Revolution. This paper builds upon extension scholarship of the thinkability of the Haitian Revolution and adds a transnational comparative element by looking for similarities with the earlier Stono Revolt. By exploring two historical events that are often ignored or misrepresented, this paper aims to analyze the ways in which slavery and enslaved individuals were viewed before and after such events. Such changes in perspective and rhetoric can aid in ascertaining the various ways these isolated moments of resistance …

Ursinus Magazine, Spring 2022, Tom Yencho, Ed Moorhouse, Robyn E. Hannigan, Jennifer Meininger Wolfe, Tommy Armstrong, Doron Taussig, Anthony Nadler

Ursinus Magazine, 1995–Present

Thank you, Jill • Best Bears among us • Assisting students in need • A pledge for PhDs • Building on a legacy • BOD POD research • Getting to know: Lauren McCardel • Brew master • New Bear in the den • Bear bites: A Q&A with incoming President Hannigan • Here to help: Combatting a mental health crisis • Welcome Home: A historic partnership • Commencement 2022 • In memoriam • Class notes • Births • Burning question: Do conservatives feel shamed by the media?

Archives And Literary History: English House, Christina Rose Walcott, Justin Shaw

English

This presentation is part of a Directed Study project and was given at Clark FEST 2022. It is also associated with the longer paper, "The Malleability of Home: A Genealogy of Clark University's English House," composed collaboratively by the authors. It is about the history of Clark's English Department and, particularly, about the House it occupies. This presentation was presented orally by Christina Rose Walcott for a public audience as a culminating project in the Directed Study, and includes visual and interactive educational components. It also utilizes and showcases the project's extensive use of Open Access Resources from various digital …

Terrible Terrell: Black Women’S Activism The Forgotten Story Of Carolyn Daniels, Olivia Moll

History & Classics Undergraduate Theses

More often than not, when individuals think of the Civil Rights Movement, idolized individuals like that of Martin Luther King, Ella Baker, and Malcom X, come to mind. While their activism was heroic, their contributions do not and should not represent the entire success of the Civil Rights Movement. The real fuel of the Civil Rights Movement was in the hands of the people, ordinary individuals, more specifically black women. My thesis explores the participation of black women in the movement in a particular region, that of Terrell County, Georgia. In the first chapter, the reader studies the racist and …

Let Us March On: Lavilla, Florida, And The History Of The Harlem Of The South, Christine Sullivan

History & Classics Undergraduate Theses

Jacksonville, Florida, is a city that defies most expectations of an American city. Its massive size covers a vast array of people, cultures, and traditions. Jacksonville’s colorful history encompasses stories of success, failure, and control by three different nations. This diversity of people and backgrounds overwhelms Jacksonville’s narrative, leaving stories and memories forgotten. No more groups have been forgotten or overlooked in Jacksonville’s story more than the Black natives and residents. LaVilla, a neighborhood in downtown Jacksonville, is the historically Black community that has been consistently left out of Jacksonville’s story. LaVilla, known as the ‘Harlem of the South’, was …

Emotions In Work And War: Comparisons Of Emotional-Cultures Of New Deal Ccc Enrollees And Wwii U.S. Army Enlistees, 1933-1945, Maeve Losen

Master's Theses

Though the Great Depression and Second World War were consecutive eras and overlapped in numerous aspects, scholarship often overlooks the commonalities between these periods. To demonstrate these eras’ shared qualities, this thesis examines the relationship in emotional-cultures—the cultural norms that dictated how individuals felt and demonstrated their emotions—among Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) enrollees and U.S. Army enlistees during WWII.

The broad intent of this undertaking is to place the cultural history of the Great Depression and WWII in conversation and to show the advantage of inter- and multidisciplinary work by applying anthropological and historical theories of emotion. Though the historical …

Rebranding The Native: Selling The ‘Ideal’ Indigenous Worker At The Carlisle Indian Industrial School, 1879-1918, Luke Prior

History & Classics Undergraduate Theses

Brigadier General Richard Henry Pratt of the United States Army established the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in 1879, which was the foundation the United States federal government used to establish over twenty-five similar schools. From its founding to its closure in 1918, every aspect of the Carlisle School, whether curriculum or even football, sought to create an ‘ideal’ Indigenous worker that was sold to America as the new stereotypical Native American. To reach this goal, Carlisle stripped its students of their cultures by cutting their hair, changing their dress, restricting their use of native languages, and teaching from an American …

2nd Place Contest Entry: Student Governance During The Free Speech Movement, Philip Goodrich

Kevin and Tam Ross Undergraduate Research Prize

This is Philip Goodrich's submission for the 2022 Kevin and Tam Ross Undergraduate Research Prize, which won second place. It contains their essay on using library resources, their bibliography, and a summary of their research project on student governance during the free speech movement.

Philip is a fourth-year student at Chapman University, majoring in History and Political Science. Their faculty mentor is Dr. Alexander Bay.

The Making Of Everyday Hollywood: 1930s Film Influence On Everyday Women’S Fashion In Nebraska, Anna Naomi Kuhlman

Department of Textiles, Merchandising and Fashion Design: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This research examines the influence of film fashions on middle-class, Nebraskan women’s dress during the Great Depression (1932-1940). The Great Depression challenged the middle class: while standards of living remained high, the economic means to achieve those standards diminished. Despite the crisis, women strove to keep up with current fashion trends. While previous literature has examined how Hollywood directly affected trends and styles of the 1930s in major American metropolitan contexts, the manifestation of trends in the dress of middle to lower socio-economic classes in Middle America remains under-examined. Against the backdrop of Depression-era hardships specific to Nebraska’s agricultural economy, …

Fair Construction To Living Constitution: Analyzing Constitutional Interpretation Throughout United States History, Joshua Lloyd

Senior Honors Theses

The proper method of constitutional interpretation has been debated throughout the history of the Supreme Court. This debate has been defined by the tension between the originalist and living constitution jurisprudences. Each has been dominant at one point in United States history. A fair construction jurisprudence was almost universally utilized by the Supreme Court to interpret the Constitution according to its original meaning until Plessy v. Ferguson. Then, due to an alliance between evangelicals and progressive scholars, a broader, more lenient living constitution jurisprudence developed which allowed justices to interpret the Constitution in light of changing social norms. Finally, …

The Rise Of An Eco-Spiritual Imaginary: Ecology And Spirituality As Decolonial Protest In Contemporary Multi-Ethnic American Literature, Andrew Michael Spencer

English Theses and Dissertations

The Rise of an Eco-Spiritual Imaginary reveals a shared ecological aesthetic among contemporary U.S. ethnic writers whose novels communicate a decolonial spiritual reverence for the earth. This shared narrative focus challenges white settler colonial mythologies of manifest destiny and American exceptionalism to instantiate new ways of imagining community across socially constructed boundaries of time, space, nation, race, and species. The eco-spiritual imaginary—by which I mean a shared reverence for the ecological interconnection between all living beings—articulates a common biological origin and sacredness of all life that transcends racial difference while remaining grounded in local ethnicities and bioregions. The novelists representing …

The Cornbread Country: Cornbread And The Development Of Southern Identity, Ashton Doar

Senior Theses

Following the chronological development of the American South from the pre-colonial era to the present day, this thesis analyzes the importance of cornbread in relation to historical circumstances. Native Americans, British settlers, early Americans, and self-identifying Southerners all related to the land and to its food in unique ways. Narrowing the scope of this broad topic to the specific point of cornbread allows for an analysis of the continuity and change of people's circumstances and life experience, as well as the ways in which people define themselves by their food.

Revival Today: America’S History Of Biblical Revival And Its Modern Application, Matthew Musser

Senior Honors Theses

There is a need for revival within the church today. Christian revivals are becoming less and less popular in the current times. Is this due to a subtle shift in America’s culture? Or is this decline of religious revival the result of something deeper? This thesis will seek to discover the biblical foundations of revival in American history. First, it will analyze some of the biblical revivals that took place in the Old Testament, Gospels, and Book of Acts. Then it will transition into how these biblical principles have been the cornerstone for many of the great revivals in American …

"A House Falleth": The Civil War Mixed Loyalties Of The Garland Family, Simeon Newton

Senior Honors Theses

The Civil War was a conflict that pitted father against son and brother against brother. Specifically, the family ties between James Longstreet and John Garland illustrate the complexities of the decision to fight for either side. The factors that motivated these men can give valuable insights into the reasons for the Civil War, and understanding these perspectives in a divided world can help Americans avoid a similar conflict today.