History Lessons

The articles below provide access to valuable resources, including articles, videos, and courses that deepen knowledge and civic engagement.

For six days in August 1835, a struggling New York newspaper told its readers that a celebrated astronomer ...

How an illiterate Missouri runaway became the most famous frontiersman in America — and how a fuller reckoning ...

How two nights of violence in a Virginia county reshaped the laws of the American South — and ...

How a shrewd Gold Rush businesswoman built a fortune, backed the abolitionist cause, and took racial exclusion in ...

How a Missouri farmwife turned a biscuit, a hotel, and a hard-won legal right into a life that ...

On August 10, 1821, Missouri became the 24th state. Getting there required one of the most consequential — ...

How a chance discovery by James Marshall at a remote sawmill transformed California, the United States, and the ...

Signed into law on August 5, 1861, America's first federal income tax was enacted as part of Congress's ...

In 1823, President James Monroe issued a declaration that reshaped relations between the United States, Latin America, and ...

From merchants and missionaries to gold seekers and pioneer families, one western Missouri town stood at the center ...

James K. Polk served as the 11th president of the United States from 1845 to 1849. Although he ...

Completed in 1825, the Erie Canal connected the Great Lakes to the Atlantic, transforming commerce, accelerating westward expansion, ...