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Agriculture Wars

On country music as a lens through which to trace the corporatization of American farming.

Carter G. Woodson’s West Virginia Wasn’t ‘Trump Country,’ It Was a Land of Opportunity

In his travelogues, Woodson rhapsodized over what he saw as a love of democracy among hard-scrabble mountain settlers of both races.

Mail-Order Magazines Did More Than Just Sell Things

The cheap monthly publications that flooded rural homes offered more than just advertising—they also provided companionship.

A Hillbilly Syllabus

“Some people call me Hillbilly, Some people call me Mountain Man; Well, you can call me Appalachia, ’Cause Appalachia is what I am.” —Del McCoury

Coal No Longer Fuels America. But the Legacy — and the Myth — Remain.

Coal country still clings to the industry that was long its chief source of revenue and a way of life.
Pete Seeger.

American Dreamers

Pete Seeger, William F. Buckley, Jr., and public history.
Food writer Edna Lewis.

What Is Southern?

A food writer's reminiscences of local cuisine in the springtime.
Homesteader Jack Whinery and his family.

Savoring Pie Town

Sixty-five years after Russell Lee photographed New Mexico homesteaders coping with the Depression, a Lee admirer visits the town for a fresh slice of life
Author Sanora Babb, with her husband James Wong Howe, in their library.

The Woman Who Defined the Great Depression

John Steinbeck based “The Grapes of Wrath” on Sanora Babb’s notes. But she was writing her own American epic.
Tourists on a ferry sailing along the coast of Maine.

A Picture-Book Guide to Maine

Children’s stories set on the coast suggest a wilder way of life.
A collage of newspaper articles discussing the possibility of Absaroka becoming the 49th state.

How the Depression Fueled a Movement to Create a New State Called Absaroka

In the 1930s, disillusioned farmers and ranchers fought to carve a 49th state out of northern Wyoming, southeastern Montana and western South Dakota.
Poster for the WPA theatrical production of "It Can't Happen Here" by Sinclair Lewis

Stealing the Show

Why conservatives killed America’s federally funded theater.
The album cover of "Cowboy Carter" released by Beyonce in 2024

Cowboy Carter and the Black Roots of Country Music

Beyoncé is following in the footsteps of many Black musicians before her.
Men in suits, suburban neighborhood, woman holding a microphone, and a quarry.

The ‘Southern Lady’ Who Beat the Courthouse Crowd

One woman’s crusade for democratic participation and political efficacy in the face of powerful institutions.
A mother sits behind a sign reading, "I have a Bible, I don't need those dirty books."

The Great Textbook War

What should children learn in school? It's a question that's stirred debate for decades, and in 1974 it led to violent protests in West Virginia.

Jason Aldean Can’t Rewrite the History His Song Depends On

That history has nothing to do with culture wars, and everything to do with what real justice looks like in the United States, and who has access to it.
Scene from "The Sugarland Express." A woman is leaning out the window of police car.

Hot Pursuit: The Brief Rise of 1970s Hixploitation Cinema

On the drive-in movie culture that captured a yearning for fast cars on dusty roads.
Painting of a girl with a basketball looking out a window.

Lady Vols Country

How college basketball coach Pat Summitt transformed women's sports.
Senators Cory Booker and Chuck Grassley conversing.

How Washington Bargained Away Rural America

Every five years, the farm bill brings together Democrats and Republicans. The result is the continued corporatization of agriculture.
Visualization showing the largest cities in the US, from the Statistical Atlas of the Eleventh Census, 1790-1890

Growing New England's Cities

What can a visualization of population growth in cities and towns in the Northeast tell us about different moments in the region's economic geography?
A father and son stand in front of an illustration of a circular target, while the son holds a small gun.

American as Apple Pie

How marketing made guns a fundamental element of contemporary boyhood.
Black and white photograph of Loretta Lynn holding a microphone

Personifying a Country Ideal, Loretta Lynn Tackled Sexism Through a Complicated Lens

The singer wasn't a feminist torchbearer, but her music amplified women's issues.
Erick Cedeño on a bicycle and map of a route through the west.

Following the Black Soldiers who Biked Across America

Bikepacking historian Erick Cedeño retraces the Buffalo soldiers' legendary journey from Montana to Missouri to rethink it and its place in American history.
Members of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union break open barrels of liquor seized during Prohibition, 1929.

Roe Is the New Prohibition

The pro-life movement needs to know that such culture wars result not in outright victory for one side but in reaction and compromise.
Paul Ryan against a background of graph paper and a dotted line.

The Struggle for the Soul of the GOP

Is the Republican Party compatible with democracy?
A cemetery with a dusting of snow.

Safer Than Childbirth

Abortion in the 19th century was widely accepted as a means of avoiding the risks of pregnancy.
Aerial view of a combine harvester in a grain field.

Abolish the Department of Agriculture

The USDA has become an inefficient monster that often promotes products that are bad for consumers and the environment. Let’s replace it with a Department of Food.
Cotton field.

"Once Everybody Left, What Were We Left With?"

Over a 100 years ago, white mobs organized by white elites and planters in Arkansas swarmed into rural Black sharecropping communities in the Arkansas Delta.

Before Interstates, America Got Around on Interurbans

The fate of electrified “rural trolleys” at the beginning of 20th century could offer lessons for today’s train boosters.

The South’s Resistance to Vaccination Is Not As Incomprehensible As It Seems

The psychological forces driving “red COVID” have deep historical roots.

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