United States History Commons^™

Garner, Thomas A., 1930-1984 - Letters To (Sc 3209), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Manuscripts Small Collection 3209. Letters and photographs sent to Thomas A. Garner while he served in the Korean War. The letters are from his mother and sisters of Morrisonville, Illinois, and from Kay Louise Edwards, Taylorsville, Illinois. They provide information about the family farm and local happenings. The photographs are unidentified but include images of servicemen and barracks as well as farm equipment.

Korean War, 1950-1953 - Relating To (Sc 3222), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid and scan of letters (click on "Additional Files" below) for Manuscripts Small Collection 3222. Letters addressed to “Mr. U.N. Soldier” containing encouraging notes from Seoul, South Korea, high school students.

Monumental Questions: 1860s Civil War Monument Vandalization At Manassas, Ryan Bilger

The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History

On October 4, 2017, I awoke to the news that the Stonewall Jackson equestrian monument at Manassas National Battlefield Park had been vandalized. Having worked there as a Pohanka intern during the summer of 2016, I was saddened to hear this. Now, I have no great love for the Jackson monument. It makes the Southern general look like Superman atop a horse that appears to have had a good amount of steroids mixed with its oats and hay. Yet, I believed then, as I do now, that covering the monument in colored paint was an extremely inappropriate act of vandalism. …

Toward A Theology Of Transformation: Destroying The Sycamore Tree Of White Supremacy, Hannah Kathleen Griggs

Celebration of Learning

Black liberation theologians come to terms with white supremacy by collectively remembering the story of the Exodus and Jesus' crucifixion--affirming God's preference for freedom and in-the-world salvation. The particular history of white American Christianity requires a different story to provide the foundation for our social memory. As white American Christians, we have certain blind spots—blind spots created by historical and social privileges that have given white people unequal access to power and resources. The story of Zacchaeus has the potential to help reframe white Christianity’s conception of race relations in the United States, shifting from a reconciliation paradigm to a …

Making A German-American Place: Davenport, Iowa, 1836-1918, Benjamin E. Bruster

Celebration of Learning

This study examines the impact of German-Americans in the creation of Davenport and Scott County, Iowa from 1836 through 1918. Like cities many other 19^th century places in the American interior, Davenport and Scott County direly needed people to settle it, build its infrastructure, develop its economy, and contribute to growing social and political life. Conveniently, Davenport and Scott County boosters’ desires occurred simultaneously with rampant pauperism, political, ideological, and religious revolutions, economic redundancy, and widespread dreams of rebirth in Germany. These conditions produced an unprecedented migration from Germany to Davenport and Scott County in the second-half of the …

A Place Of Gemütlichkeit: The Holden Village Of Augustana German Professor Erwin Weber, Julia Meyer

Celebration of Learning

Lying in Augustana’s Special Collections are three insignificant looking items. Two three-inch black binders with white labels which read “Holden I Copy” and Holden II Copy” in red ink. These two binders along with a plastic spiral-bound paper compilation are photographs and memories of former Augustana German professor Erwin Weber’s summer at Holden Village in 1977. Titled “My Days at Holden,” this compilation is an unpublished photo-book detailing the wilderness and the people of the community of Holden Village. This isolated village situated in the Cascade Mountains of Washington State draws many individuals, including Erwin Weber who in the summer …

The Relationship Between The Methodist Church, Slavery And Politics, 1784-1844, Brian D. Lawrence

Theses and Dissertations

The Methodist church split in 1844 was a cumulative result of decades of regional instability within the governing structure of the church. Although John Wesley had a strict anti-slavery belief as the leader of the movement in Great Britain, the Methodist church in America faced a distinctively different dilemma. Slavery proved to be a lasting institution that posed problems for Methodism in the United States and in the larger political context. The issue of slavery plagued Methodism from almost its inception, but the church functioned well although conflicts remained below the surface. William Capers, James Osgood Andrew, and Freeborn Garrettson …

The Sins Of The Father: “Light Horse” Harry Lee And Robert E. Lee, Savannah Labbe

The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History

In early 1862, Robert E. Lee was not yet in command of the Army of Northern Virginia. Instead, he was sent by Confederate President Jefferson Davis to inspect and improve the South’s coastal defenses. This job brought him to Cumberland Island, a barrier island off the coast of Georgia, and while there, he visited the ancestral home of Nathanael Greene, where his father was buried in the family plot. Greene was a famous and talented Revolutionary War general who led the Continental Army to success in taking back the Southern colonies. Lee’s father, “Light Horse” Harry Lee helped Greene take …

Johnson Family - Letters To (Sc 3219), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid and scans (Click on "Additional Files" below) for Manuscripts Small Collection 3219. Letters to Speed and Pernie Johnson, Chattanooga, Tennessee, from various Mormon elders. They write of their missionary activities, primarily in east Tennessee, express faith in their work and that of the Johnsons, and comment on the hardships of the Depression. One of them dismisses a claim that the “blue eagle” symbol of the National Recovery Administration is a sign of the Antichrist. Also includes childhood letters from the Johnsons’ daughter and a photograph of Speed and Pernie Johnson.

At The Edge Of Humanity: American Indian Legal Identity And The Development Of American Citizenship, Zachary Charles Isenhower

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Civic standing in the formative era of the United States was defined by land ownership. Landless white Americans demanded access to western lands, while the American government regulated settler pressure on the borderlands in order to preserve peace, and maintain its authority over citizens. Simultaneously, the U.S. depended upon western lands for revenue and on settlers for expanding its domain. As acquisition of property by white Americans depended in very real terms on dispossessing Indians of their lands, justifying that dispossession became one of the most fraught intellectual processes in American thought.

This project explores how civic identity was not …

From Useful Craft To Works Of Art: The Transformation Of Quilting In The United States From The Nineteenth Century, 1893-1933, Victoria Crozier

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Quilting in the United States transitioned from a useful home craft to an art form from the late 1800s to the mid-1900s in response to industrialization. Before industrialization, quilting was seen as a primarily women’s craft and because of that was not given respect as an art form. During industrialization the American people had a nostalgia for times past because of fast paced growth, and therefore quilting and other home crafts started to become more prevalent. This nostalgia led to the start of the Arts and Crafts Movement in the United States that brought home crafts such as crochet, needlework, …

Dorothea Lange: Capturing The Reality Of The Great Depression And The New Deal Era, Laura Vandemark

James Madison Undergraduate Research Journal (JMURJ)

Dorothea Lange created some of America’s most enduring and influential images as she documented the reality of the Great Depression in the 1930s and early 40s for the Farm Security Administration. Featured in government publications, printed on postage stamps, and used by social activists, Lange’s photographs helped define the era and the emerging field of photojournalism. This paper examines Lange’s motives and process as she tried to capture her subjects’ most intimate moments without exploiting their lives. It draws on Lange’s field notebooks and interviews and surveys the existing body of scholarship to assess how Lange’s life impacted her work …

This Is Why Republicans Can’T Shrug Off The Stormy Daniels Saga, Allen C. Guelzo

Civil War Era Studies Faculty Publications

Stormy Daniels would probably have never been much more than a name in the catalog of porn-movie stars had it not been for Michael Cohen.

On Jan. 12, the Wall Street Journal broke the story that Cohen, one of Donald Trump's personal lawyers, had paid Daniels [npr.org] - or arranged for Daniels to be paid -- $130,000 for her silence over an alleged affair she once had with the president. In a political climate jaded by the sexual shenanigans of politicians, many Americans were tempted to ask, "So what?"

Because, as they like to say in high-stakes poker, the Daniels …

Treehouses: Civilizing The Wildness Of Men And Nature, Courtney Mckinney

English Undergraduate Distinction Projects

In this paper, I explore how treehouses operate symbolically in tandem with culture. Through an analysis of British and American print culture, I argue that the treehouse building project became bound to boyhood at the turn of the twentieth century as the naturalist movement spread and youth organizations embraced treehouses as part of their vision for the development of boys. Parents and youth leaders intend for treehouse projects to build self-reliance, independence, imagination, and courage in their boys. Congruously, this activity associated with a child’s personal growth takes place in an actual growing organism. I analyze how treehouses juxtapose humans …

True Americanism: Mexican-American And Irish-American Nationalism Through The Twentieth Century, Zachary Adams

History Theses and Dissertations

In the years after World War I, Mexican Americans and Irish Americans consciously utilized the language and symbols of American patriotism to advance their social and political agendas. In doing so, they adopted and repurposed the rhetoric that a new wave of American nationalists, the True Americanists, sought to use to negate their very citizenship. True Americanists argued that the cultural obligations of United States citizenship required complete assimilation. With Mexican-American and Irish-American community leaders continuing to rely upon messages of shared ethnicity to garner and mobilize followers, their use of Irishness and Mexicanness ran afoul of this new nationalism. …

Radical Social Ecology As Deep Pragmatism: A Call To The Abolition Of Systemic Dissonance And The Minimization Of Entropic Chaos, Arielle Brender

Student Theses 2015-Present

This paper aims to shed light on the dissonance caused by the superimposition of Dominant Human Systems on Natural Systems. I highlight the synthetic nature of Dominant Human Systems as egoic and linguistic phenomenon manufactured by a mere portion of the human population, which renders them inherently oppressive unto peoples and landscapes whose wisdom were barred from the design process. In pursuing a radical pragmatic approach to mending the simultaneous oppression and destruction of the human being and the earth, I highlight the necessity of minimizing entropic chaos caused by excess energy expenditure, an essential feature of systems that aim …

Looking Ahead To The 2018 Pohanka Internship Program, Ryan Bilger

The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History

This summer, 21 Gettysburg College students will head to the front lines of public history through the Brian C. Pohanka Internship Program. From Andersonville National Historic Site to Minute Man National Historical Park, these interns will carry forward the legacy of the late Brian C. Pohanka, while also developing their own skills in the field of public history. Brian Pohanka was an avid student of the Civil War who shared his love of the past through presenting and reenacting, as some of the interns who bear his name will do this summer. They will work at some of the sites …

Miller, George W., B. 1843? (Sc 3220), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid and typescript (Click on "Additional Files" below) for Manuscripts Small Collection 3220. Letter, 19 January 1863, of George W. Miller to his sister. In camp at Bowling Green, Kentucky, the unhappy soldier writes of the threat of death from battle and disease, of “tyrannical” officers, and of a debt owed to him at home. He is angered to learn that an uncle in Fostoria, Ohio is a secessionist. He also mentions his brother Jacob’s engagement in a “big fight” lasting five days.

Webster, Mrs. William - Letter To (Sc 3221), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid and typescript (Click on "Additional Files" below) for Manuscripts Small Collection 3221. Letter, October 1864, written by “Ann” to her sister, Mrs. William Webster in Lorain County, Ohio, apparently after leaving home to join her husband Ed, stationed at a garrison in Columbus, Kentucky. Ann writes of her recent illness and the frequency of sickness in women coming from the North; of Ed’s military duties; of a “boy” back home; and of her lack of fear when alarms are raised at the garrison. In an apparent reference to Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest, she doubts that he will …

Clarence Irving And The Rediscovery Of Black America, Robert D. Parmet

Publications and Research

Clarence L. Irving, Sr., a retired machinist, founded an archive of African American music at York College, CUNY. He also managed and coached a New York City sandlot baseball team, the Bisons, and conceived the idea of placing the images of African American women on United States postage stamps.

The Home Front: The Experience Of Soldiers And Civilians In The Louisiana Maneuvers Of 1940 And 1941, John G. D'Antoni

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

In the years before and during World War II, the United States Army conducted a series of military maneuvers in north-central Louisiana. The two biggest maneuvers occurred in May 1940 and September 1941. The Louisiana Maneuvers are credited with helping to prepare the U.S. armed forces for World War II. Previous studies of the 1940 and 1941 maneuvers have focused on the day-to-day activities during the maneuvers or the generals behind the maneuvers. This study will focus on the impacts of the maneuvers on the soldiers themselves and on the citizens of north-central Louisiana who lived in the maneuver area. …

Both Sides Of The Barbed Wire: Lives Of German Prisoners Of War And African Americans In Camp Claiborne, Louisiana, 1944-1946, Claire Delucca

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Located outside of Alexandria, Louisiana, Camp Claiborne was temporarily home to more than 500,000 U.S. servicemen and women during its short existence. Thousands of German prisoners of war also were held for more than two years in a section of the camp. Racial problems stemming from the policies of Jim Crow South and the blatant inequality eventually led to an African American mutiny within the camp. The events from 1944 to 1946 at Camp Claiborne provide insight into the mindsets of white Southerners and the generation of African Americans who would influence the major civil rights victories in the following …

To Be Everything: Sylvia Plath And The Problem That Has No Name, Alanna P. Mcauliffe

Student Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores, in depth, how the poetry of Sylvia Plath operates as an expression of female discontent in the decade directly preceding the sexual revolution. This analysis incorporates both sociohistorical context and theory introduced in Betty Friedan’s 1963 work The Feminine Mystique. In particular, Plath’s work is put in conversation with Friedan’s notion of the “problem that has no name,” an all-consuming sense of malaise and dissatisfaction that plagued American women in the postwar era. This notion is furthered by close-readings of poems written throughout various stages of Plath’s career (namely “Spinster,” “Two Sisters of Persephone,” “Elm,” “Ariel,” “Daddy,” …

Your Commencement Weekend Guide To Visiting Gettysburg, Abigail K. Major

The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History

Commencement weekend is nearing, which has inspired us to compile a list of Civil War activities and programs you can take part in during your visit. The following events and activities are suitable whether you are a Civil War buff, general history enthusiast, or are just curious about learning more about the Civil War. [excerpt]

Spalding, Delphina, B. 1845? (Sc 3218), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid and scan (Click on "Additional Files" below) for Manuscripts Small Collection 3218. Affidavit, 3 October 1887, of Delphina Spalding in support of a charge against Ned Spalding, Marion County, Kentucky for “unlawfully killing, disfiguring, injuring and maiming” a hog belonging to Delphina’s husband Dick Spalding.

To Remain Near The "Water Ditch," Paiute Sovereignty And United States Settler Colonialism, Owens Valley, California, 1870-1937, Lee Murray Hanover

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This thesis argues that Owens Valley Paiute sovereignty manifested itself both inherently and adaptively from 1870 to 1937. Sovereignty is an historically contingent term that reflects how nations deploy power to retain control over their communities and provide self-determination within economics, politics, culture, and society. This thesis illuminates Paiute sovereignty through the Peoplehood model, explaining how Paiute sovereignty existed at the moment of their creation, when Coyote placed them next to the Water Ditch—Owens River—and told them to spread throughout but never leave their homeland, the Owens Valley. This inherent mandate allowed Paiutes to adapt Coyote’s stipulation to remain in …

"The Only People Who Can Get Aids-Are People": The Aids Crisis In Mainstream Crisis, 1981-1995, Franklin Howard

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This study examines the representation of the AIDS crisis and People with AIDS (PWAs) in comics produced by mainstream publishing companies in America. Between 1988 and 1995, mainstream comic artists at DC Comics and Marvel Comics used their art to offer social commentary on the crisis. This commentary focused primarily on social issues like violence against PWAs and social ostracizing instead of the critiques of the Reagan Administration and medical institutions found in similar comics produced by activists in the queer communities. They provided education and advocated acceptance through their character’s actions and dialogue as well as in their own …

Outer Space In A Western Place: How Environmental Perceptions Of The American West Shaped The Space Race, William Marino

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This thesis analyzes how environmental perceptions of the American West at the intersections of nature and technology shaped vital decisions regarding the space race. The analysis is first contextualized by pervasive political ideologies of the Cold War, which elucidates how these firmly held beliefs turned into political actions and transformed the post-World War II arms race into the space race. The author next examines the technological sublime, an awe-inspiring experience arising in people when they view impressive feats of massive, powerful, human-built machines, in this case nuclear bombs, and rockets. Where the nuclear bomb’s destructive capabilities eventually turned many Americans …

Blackdom: Interpreting The Hidden History Of New Mexico's Black Town, Austin J. Miller

History ETDs

This master’s thesis recovers the history of Blackdom, New Mexico. Founded by an African American family from Georgia, Blackdom is a ghost town that existed in the early decades of the twentieth century near Roswell, New Mexico. Blackdom was initially imagined as both a refuge from the hostilities of Jim Crow society and as a for-profit enterprise. Entanglement in land-fraud scandals hindered the town’s early development, but Blackdom eventually grew to nearly three hundred residents, with its own school, Baptist church, post office, and general store. Blackdom settlers practiced a variety of agricultural methods, including dry farming and irrigation from …

A Slaughter Forgotten: A Reflection On The Wayside On Iverson’S Assault, Zachary A. Wesley

The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History

Nearly every visitor to Gettysburg can easily point to Pickett’s Charge as the bloodiest loss the Confederates suffered on the field during the three days of fighting here. However, few know that another Confederate assault during the battle rivaled the horrendous casualty rates of July 3. On the afternoon of July 1, Brigadier General Alfred Iverson ordered his North Carolina brigade forward against the Federal positions on Oak Ridge, essentially sending them to their slaughter. [excerpt]