Marse Robert lives on at the Uncyclopedia: Robert E. Lee (1807–1870), or, as his club buddies call him, the iron horse, is a man of note in American history for his actions in the Civil War, in which he fought for the both sides. The first Asian-American military general, he dealt with many important situations [...]

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Over at BackStory, they’re considering the Fourth of July and the Declaration of Independence, prompting a detailed accusation of “BS” from one commenter, who objects, among other things, to the Declaration being referred to as “propaganda.” Meanwhile, at the New York Times, artist Maira Kalman, author of the forthcoming And the Pursuit of Happiness, considers [...]

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I suggested just the other day that . . . you can do like Cushman, and go to the Wilderness yourself. Cut the language screen down and try to feel what it’s like to just be there. Now, when you’re done just being there, you can just be yourself off to Wal-Mart. A split Orange [...]

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Ta-Nehisi Coates, whom I’ve had a habit of quoting lately (here and here and here), is still reading about the Civil War. But he, unlike us, is not waiting for Robert E. Lee. But to paraphrase Grant, I grow heartily weary of hearing of General Lee. I want to talk about us. How will we [...]

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As the opening sentence of a book review, this one is not terribly impressive: If you like history written as a novel, then Vicksburg 1863 by Winston Groom is for you. I enjoy reading history that way so it worked for me. It comes from the blog Civil War Et Al., which is penned by [...]

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The exciting news around these parts is that our Robert E. Lee entry came in last week (we’ve been waiting) and is currently being edited. Our Civil War section has been in progress for more than a year now, but you may have noticed that we still haven’t posted Lee or Stonewall Jackson or J. [...]

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A historical marker was dedicated last Friday to Sacagawea at the statue of Lewis and Clark on West Main Street in Charlottesville. The statue’s image of the Shoshone Indian woman has long been controversial; she’s kneeling, which some people have interpreted as being too subservient. According to the Daily Progress: The statue was erected in [...]

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BackStory had a great live event on Friday. Now they’re asking for your help with show ideas. BackStory invites you to propose a topic for our fall season below and let us know why you think it would make for a compelling hour of radio. Which concerns facing Americans today could use historical unpacking by [...]

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Most but not all entries in Encyclopedia Virginia have a time line. (This one, for instance, does not.) At first, a time line seems like a simple thing; it takes a subject and reduces it to days, months, and years, succinctly outlining the life of a poet, or a governor, or a civil-rights activist. Still, [...]

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A reader who prefers to remain anonymous e-mailed yesterday regarding the minor Jefferson & Hemings brouhaha that has erupted on these pages: It’s funny, I was sort of put off by [Annette Gordon-]Reed’s statement about white people and race at first, especially the notion that “Jefferson could buy and sell people, separate mothers from their [...]

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I just got my hands on the brand-new scholarly edition of Sapphira and the Slave Girl, the last novel by Willa Cather and the Virginia-born writer’s only book set entirely in the state. (Our entry on the book is finished but not yet posted live. Same with our entry on Cather.) Anyway, I’ve already learned [...]

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What was Chester the Crab’s take on Nat Turner’s Revolt, you ask? Or maybe you were just about to ask. Either way, here it is, courtesy of Bentley Boyd, a Virginia-based cartoonist who, like so many other Great People, is actually a native of the Midwest. When I met Bentley, we were both manning booths [...]

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It’s from our Battle of Fredericksburg entry: Burnside, meanwhile, found himself dealing with a recalcitrant Hooker. Which is always the worst, isn’t it? IMAGE: Joe Hooker from Harper’s Weekly, July 5, 1862

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Ta-Nehisi Coates waxes melodramatically about finishing Battle Cry of Freedom and learning that slavery was as African a phenomenon as it was European or American: It is one thing to be judged immoral. But to be judged immoral and backward, at the same time, to be both debauched, and yet in your debauchery, still be [...]

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The other day we asked whether U.S. senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois—best known as the Douglas half of the Lincoln–Douglas debates and a candidate for president in 1860—is best remembered as the Little Giant or, in the memorable formulation of our friends at the Gawker Media Empire, a Shrimpy Something-or-Other. The answer, in case [...]

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Our most popular post to date is titled “The Great Man’s Dirty Linen” (June 24, 2008), and its popularity is due less to yours truly’s searing wit than to its “racy” subject matter: Sally Hemings & Thomas Jefferson. Re-reading the post, which links to this episode of BackStory on race, led me to listen again [...]

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If you will be in the Charlottesville-Albemarle neighborhood of Virginia on Friday afternoon, please take note: Attention Virginians:  On Friday, June 19th at 5:30 PM, BackStory will be staging a rare, live event. The History Guys will be taping a live performance of the show at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center of Public Affairs, [...]

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During the recent presidential election FOX News made an embarrassing error, suggesting that the Lincoln–Douglas debates of 1859 were actually the Lincoln–Douglass debates, as in Frederick Douglass. Oops. Their producers might make up for it by attending the revival of The Rivalry, a 1959 play by Norman Corwin now showing in New York. Wall Street [...]

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The latest episode of With Good Reason features an interview with Lacy Ward, a professor at Longwood University in Farmville and director of the Robert Russa Moton Museum. Especially interesting are Ward’s closing comments regarding how the museum must confront the challenges of a) interpreting such recent history, and b) telling the stories of all [...]

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Yesterday I vented on behalf of the great state of Iowa, a squarish polity whose flag is largely French, whose capital is positively monk-filled, and whose luminaries include Herbert Hoover and Ashton Kutcher. And I quoted at length from an essay published in These United States: Portraits of America from the 1920s by one Johan [...]

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