A monthly roundup of Gilded Age and Progressive Era news articles and blog posts from around the web.
How American Legionnaires attempted to rehabilitate the nativist reputation they earned during the First Red Scare
Library of Congress primary source sets for teaching Black history
Tracing a thread from nineteenth-century Spiritualism to the post-WWII UFO era
Recovering the neglected literary contributions of Progressive-Era women typists and editors
A GAPE tradition: hand-colored photographs
Solving a meat shortage with hippopotamus steaks? A teaching activity exploring food bioethics using a 1910 primary source
The Gilded Age and Progressive Era Podcast discusses The Political Reconstruction of American Tobacco, 1862–1933 with author Patrick O’Connor
A tentative start to the animal rights movement in Reconstruction-era Florida
Romance and the Progressive-Era energy industries
Archival love letters from the Music Division of the Library of Congress
Victorian “vinegar valentines” to send your enemies
Stories from Ellis Island Hospital—and the fight to preserve the now-abandoned complex
The turn-of-the-century origins of Olympics pin trading
Examining the life of Carter G. Woodson 100 years after he launched “Negro History Week,” precursor to Black History Month
Boxing on the radio: the first sports streaming service
What one widow’s efforts to secure her husband’s Civil War pension reveal about the limits of “equal rights” in the postemancipation administrative state
Photographing America’s coaling towers
Dr. Kelly Marino joins the Gilded Age and Progressive Era Podcast to discuss her new book, Votes for College Women: Alumni, Students, and the Woman Suffrage Campaign
Black History Month genealogy: tracing enslaved ancestors
America’s first steam-powered monorail was built for the 1876 Centennial International Exhibition
Boardinghouses and the dream of the home in the Reconstruction-era West
Mapping 250 places across America in recognition of the country’s 250th anniversary
Bridgebuilders and nationalist myths: challenging deeply ingrained evolutionist narratives of technology and invention
“Striking” images of bowling alleys through history
Andrew Varsanyi is a doctoral candidate in History at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. His forthcoming dissertation explores transnational populism and agrarian political movements in North America, analyzing cross-border connections between U.S. and Canadian farmers. He has taught history at Mount Royal University and the University of Calgary.
Laura Crossley is Co-Editor-in-Chief of the SHGAPE Blog. She received her PhD in history from George Mason University, specializing in Indigenous histories and digital history. Her research examines how political debates over land, statehood, and Native sovereignty in the American West played out at the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition.