Most Americans never learned that there was slavery in the northern United States. Half of all slave voyages docked in tiny Rhode Island, and...
Articles by Author
23 July 2016
Whenever I think of Richard Nixon, a wave of pity washes over me. Has there ever been a mainstream politician in America who was so hated, so reviled, so...
28 May 2016
I have been hoisted on my own petard. For decades now, I have assiduously ignored ninety-nine percent of all the rap music–an oxymoron if ever...
24 March 2016
I was well into my thirties before I learned that Otis Redding wrote and recorded Respect in 1965. As far as I–and probably many others–knew, Respect...
19 January 2016
As someone who has a doctorate in American history, it always makes me nervous to hear people declaim that the United States was founded as a Christian...
16 January 2016
It is truly banal to say that we have never seen a First Lady like Michelle Obama; she is, as they say in the fashion world, a one off. Historically, the...