Table of Contents for American History

American History

Table of Contents

Unit Components Explained

Each of our units are single authored and include a series of interrelated and diverse content. Each unit component speaks to a different topic or aspect of the time period and has been specifically chosen to reinforce the material. Each unit is comparable in focus to a chapter in a textbook but, unlike textbooks, you control which items are given to your students. All of our content is customizable and designed to live alongside your own teaching materials so you can combine content to create a unique program of study.

Unit 1: Europe and the Americas, 1450-1607 by Paula Findlen, Stanford University

Essay: Europe and the Americas, 1450-1607
Lecture: Columbus and Vespucci: A Tale of Two Discoveries
Problem: John White
Problem: Cabeza de Vaca
Problem: Early Maps of the New World
Problem: European Views of Native American Women
Composition: John White

Unit 2: Colonial America, 1607-1750 by Mark Peterson, UC Berkeley

Essay: Colonial America, 1607-1750
Lecture: Gentility, Religious Revivalism, and Self-Transformation in the 18th Century
Problem: Nathaniel Bacon
Problem: John Quelch
Problem: Mission and Presidio in the Southwest
Problem: Devils in the New World
Problem: Colonial Slavery in Virginia and Maryland
Problem: The First Great Awakening Sermons
Composition: Nathaniel Bacon: Bacon’s Rebellion and Land Policy

Unit 3: The American Revolution and Constitution, 1750-1790 by Alan Taylor, University of Virginia

Essay: The American Revolution and Constitution, 1750-1790
Lecture: The Revolution in the West, 1776-1783
Problem: Slaves and Slaveowners
Problem: Captain Hendrick Aupaumut
Problem: The Virginia Declaration of Rights (1776)
Problem: The Declaration of Independence (1776)
Problem: Gouverneur Morris and the U.S. Constitution (1787)
Problem: The Bill of Rights (1789-1792)
Composition: Slaves, Slaveowners, and Abolition, 1773-1785

Unit 4: The Early American Republic, 1790-1815 by Caroline Winterer, Stanford University

Essay: The Early American Republic, 1790-1815
Lecture: The New Rome, 1790-1815
Problem: Women’s Education
Problem: The Growth of Slavery
Problem: Slave Revolts in the Early Republic
Problem: The Monroe Doctrine (1823)
Problem: The First Party System
Composition: Women’s Education

Unit 5: The North, 1815-1860 by Seth Rockman, Brown University

Essay: The North, 1815-1860
Lecture: Free People of Color and Citizenship [African Americans in the North]
Problem: Measuring Alcoholism
Problem: Transportation and Communication
Problem: Alexis de Tocqueville and the Right of Association
Problem: Andrew Jackson’s Speech on the Bank of the United States
Problem: The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850
Composition: Measuring the Problem of Alcoholism in America

Unit 6: The West, 1815-1860 by Karl Jacoby, Columbia University

Essay: The West, 1815-1860
Lecture: Blood and Soil: The US-Mexico War, 1846-1848
Problem: John Wesley Powell
Problem: Chinook Jargon
Problem: Californios and the Bear Flag Revolt
Problem: The Oregon Trail and the Clipper Ship
Problem: Railroad Companies and Western Land Grants
Problem: The Gold Rush, Chinese Immigrants, and Mark Twain
Composition: John Wesley Powell Map [patterns of settlement in the West]

Unit 7: The South, 1815-1860 by Thavolia Glymph, Duke University

Essay: The South, 1815-1860
Lecture: The War Within: The Plantation House in the South
Problem: Slave Labor and Plantation Rules
Problem: Yeoman Farmers
Problem: The Great Compromise on Slavery
Problem: The Dred Scott Decision and the Election of 1860
Problem: Frederick Douglas and John C. Calhoun
Problem: Slave Recollections in the Federal Writers’ Project
Composition: Slave Labor and Plantation Rules

Unit 8: Civil War and Reconstruction, 1860-1877 by Kate Masur, Northwestern University

Essay: Civil War and Reconstruction, 1860-1877
Lecture: Two Years that Changed America, 1865-67 [Reconstruction]
Lecture: Native Americans in the Late 19th Century
Problem: The Emancipation Proclamation
Problem: Stanton and the AERA
Problem: Turning Point: Gettysburg and Vicksburg, July 1863
Problem: The Gettysburg Address
Problem: Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address
Problem: The Black Codes of Mississippi
Problem: The Richmond Bread Riots
Document: Buffalo Soldiers
Composition: The Emancipation Proclamation

Unit 9: The Gilded Age and the Progressive Era, 1877-1914 by Charles Postel, San Francisco State University

Essay: The Gilded Age and the Progressive Era, 1877-1914
Lecture: Populism: Peril or Promise?
Lecture: The Great Migration, by Hasia Diner, New York University [European migration]
Problem: Jacob Riis’s Photos
Problem: The Election of 1912
Problem: Ethnic Enclaves
Problem: Chinese Immigration
Problem: Thomas Nast, Chinese Exclusion, and the Editorial Cartoon
Problem: Omaha Platform (1892)
Problem: Women’s Suffrage Movement and the West
Problem: The Great Migration of African Americans
Composition: Jacob Riis’s Photos

Unit 10: WWI and the 1920s, 1914-1929 by Glen Gendzel, San Jose State University

Essay: WWI and the 1920s, 1914-1929
Lecture: America Enters WWI, 1914-1918
Problem: Advertising
Problem: Patriotic Music
Problem: WWI Propaganda Posters
Problem: The Sykes-Picot Agreement/Balfour Declaration
Problem: Zimmerman Telegram (1917)
Problem: Wilson’s Declaration of War (April 2, 1917)
Problem: Eugene V. Debs v. United States (1918)
Problem: Wilson’s 14 Points Speech
Composition: Advertising in the 1920s and 30s

Unit 11: The Great Depression, 1929-1941 by Linda Gordon, New York University

Essay: The Great Depression, 1929-1941
Lecture: Visual Americanism: The Art of the New Deal [Depression-era murals]
Problem: Letters to the Roosevelts
Problem: Japanese American Internment
Problem: Dorothea Lange and Hispanic Farmworkers
Problem: Huey Long and Demagoguery
Problem: Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms
Composition: Letters to the Roosevelts

Unit 12: WWII and the Cold War, 1941-1972 by Katherine A.S. Sibley, St. Joseph’s University

Essay: WWII and the Cold War, 1941-1972
Lecture: Red Spies in America: Rise of the National Security State
Problem: Anti-Soviet Propaganda
Problem: The Tet Offensive
Problem: Gallup Polls on Entering WWII, 1939-41
Problem: Women and the Home Front in WWII
Problem: The European and Pacific Theaters of War, 1943-45
Problem: The Atomic Bomb and Truman
Problem: Kennedy’s American University Speech
Composition: Anti-Soviet Propaganda

Unit 13: Post-War America, 1945-1972 by Mark Brilliant, UC Berkeley

Essay: Post-War America, 1945-1972
Lecture: “The Color of America has Changed”: The Long and Wide Civil Rights Movement
Problem: The Legacy of Perez v. Sharp
Problem: Love Canal
Problem: Black Nationalism and Malcolm X
Problem: Voting Rights Act of 1965
Problem: Anti-War Rock Music of the 1960s
Problem: Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers
Composition: The Legacy of Perez v. Sharp [law of interracial and same-sex marriage]

Unit 14: The Conservative Turn, 1972-2000 by Julian Zelizer, Princeton University