Sandra Moats is Professor of History at University of Wisconsin-Parkside. This interview is based on her new book, Navigating Neutrality: Early American Governance in the Turbulent Atlantic (University of Virginia Press, 2021). JF: What led you to write Navigating Neutrality? […]
George Washington
Vaccine mandates are very American
Ohio representative Jim Jordan recently tweeted this: Not really. Here is The Washington Post: At a time when the delta variant’s summer surge has renewed the nation’s divisions over coronavirus vaccines, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) on Monday said mandates enforcing […]
Jack Hibbs dabbles in American history and it is a disaster. We need another Dudley Rutherford moment!
In 2011, Dudley Rutherford, the pastor of the Shepherd of the Hills Church in Porter Ranch, California, sat down in front of a camera and told the inspiring story behind the writing of “The Star-Spangled Banner.” (The video has been removed from […]
The C-SPAN presidential rankings are here!
C-SPAN asked scholars to rank the presidents in terms of public persuasion, crisis leadership, economic management, moral authority, international relations, administrative skills, relations with Congress, vision, the pursuit of justice, and “performance within the context of the times.” The list […]
18th-Century British-Americans getting homesick
As someone who wrote extensively about homesickness in my first book, I thoroughly enjoyed J.L. Bell’s recent post at Boston 1775. He even mentions Philip Vickers Fithian! Here is a taste: One might assume the word was still working its […]
Virtually every thing Jack Hibbs says in this video about Washington at Valley Forge is wrong
In the winter of 1777-1778 the Continental Army faced one of its lowest points in the Revolutionary War. British troops under the direction of General William Howe were in control of Philadelphia. George Washington’s soldiers were coming off major defeats […]
San Francisco school board will not rename schools
Some of you may remember our posts earlier this year about the San Francisco school board’s decision to rename forty-four schools that honor historical figures such as George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. It now appears the board […]
Preserving the Great Dismal Swamp
The Great Dismal Swamp is a massive swamp located along the border of Virginia and North Carolina. George Washington was a shareholder in the Dismal Swamp Company, a venture in land speculation that tried to drain the swamp and turn […]