“Two exhibitions in Los Angeles respond to the racist monuments to Confederate soldiers that have been erected all over the United States.”
civil war
The Eloquent Vindicator in the Electric Room
No one remembers the assassination of Congressman James M. Hinds. What do we risk by making it just another part of American history?
40 Acres and a Lie
“We compiled Reconstruction-era documents to identify 1,250 formerly enslaved Black Americans given land—only to have it returned to their enslavers.”
Enslaved potter David Drake searched for his family. More than 150 years later, they’ve found him.
“‘He was sending these messages,’ said Daisy Whitner, whom genealogists have identified as a descendent of Drake.”
The State of Waiting
Separated by war, boundaries, and immigration policies they cannot control, one young Yemeni couple refuses to give up on love.
Finding Solace in the Charged Particles of the Aurora Borealis
“Cree First Nations believe ‘the northern lights are dancing spirits of loved ones who have passed on.’”
Memory and the Lost Cause
An incomplete nostalgia still undergirds parts of American life.
Bowie Knives, Concealed Rifles, and Caning Charles Sumner
As the Civil War loomed, weapons — like the recently invented bowie knife and rifles that were shipped to Kansas hidden in crates labeled as bibles — became complex political symbols.
Tennessee, Goddamn: Memphis Fights To Remove Its Confederate Monuments
The legacy of General Nathan Bedford Forrest has the city going up against the state of Tennessee.
American Sphinx
Civil War monuments in the North erased an emancipated Black population. But the Sphinx looked to a new world: an integrated Africa and America.
