In celebration of July 4, several items from the Library’s collections document how the nation’s 1876 centennial celebration inspired women suffragists to continue the fight for the vote and for equality.
A new acquisition sheds light on White House New Year’s receptions, fashion, and the social customs of Washington society during the presidency of James Monroe in the early national period.
This Thanksgiving take inspiration from Alice Stone Blackwell’s “Pleasure Book,” where the journalist and women’s rights advocate recorded daily moments of optimism and joy.
Excerpts from a letter written November 27, 1864, by Lieutenant Samuel E. Nichols of the Union Army provide insight into the surprise contingencies that afflicted soldiers in his unit on Thanksgiving Day during the Civil War.
The first man hanged in Washington, D.C., was an Irishman. His trial provides a unique lens on the early republic and its nascent national capital. The case drew national attention, particularly among Federalist newspaper editors, who used it to expose the threat of Irish immigrants and their hold over the sitting U.S. president, Thomas Jefferson.