Skip to main content

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine and get a FREE tote.

History / U.S. History

Newly elected Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, surrounded by children and grandchildren of members of Congress, holds up her gavel in the U.S. Capitol on Thursday, Jan. 4, 2007.

Women Who Shaped History

This Historic Gavel Hammers Home the Achievements of Nancy Pelosi… and the United States

The congresswoman donates to the Smithsonian artifacts tied to her first day as Speaker of the House in 2007

The Library of Congress recently digitized this portrait of John Willis Menard, the only known photograph of the African-American trailblazer.

The International Vision of John Willis Menard, First African-American Elected to Congress

Although he was denied his seat in the House, Menard continued his political activism with the goal of uniting people across the Western Hemisphere

Choctaw chief Greenwood LeFlore had 15,000 acres of Mississippi land (above, his Mississippi home Malmaison) and 400 enslaved Africans under his dominion.

How Native American Slaveholders Complicate the Trail of Tears Narrative

The new exhibition ‘Americans’ at the National Museum of the American Indian prompts a deeper dive for historic truths

"Now," says the American Indian Museum's director Kevin Gover (right with Lonnie Bunch, director of the African American History museum) "some of these institutions are able to produce excellent scholarship that tells a vastly different story from what most Americans learn.”

Two Museum Directors Say It’s Time to Tell the Unvarnished History of the U.S.

History isn’t pretty and sometimes it is vastly different than what we’ve been taught, say Lonnie Bunch and Kevin Gover

Anna Murray Douglass helped Frederick escape from slavery, and continued to support his abolitionist work for the rest of her life.

Women Who Shaped History

The Hidden History of Anna Murray Douglass

Although she’s often overshadowed by her husband, Frederick Douglass, Anna made his work possible

More women than men were left standing after the war and pandemic.

Women Who Shaped History

How the 1918 Flu Pandemic Helped Advance Women’s Rights

While the virus disproportionately affected young men, women stepped into public roles that hadn’t previously been open to them

President Lyndon Johnson constituted the Kerner Commission to identify the genesis of the violent 1967 riots that killed 43 in Detroit and 26 in Newark (above, soldiers in a Newark storefront), while causing fewer casualties in 23 other cities.

The 1968 Kerner Commission Got It Right, But Nobody Listened

Released 50 years ago, the infamous report found that poverty and institutional racism were driving inner-city violence

Ruth (Woodworth) Creveling, US Navy Yeoman (F), 1917-1920

During World War I, Many Women Served and Some Got Equal Pay

Remembering the aspirations, struggles and accomplishments of women who served a century ago

None

Women Who Shaped History

Women Who Shaped History

Collecting the stories of women who forever changed the course of the American story

The Tennessee Woman Suffrage Memorial in Knoxville is a start to what should be a nationwide trend.

Women Who Shaped History

Why We Need to Start Building Monuments to Groundbreaking Women

The brilliant female codebreakers of WWII were forgotten to history, but would that have happened had they been recognized with the same fervor as men?

Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders director Kelli Finglass (left) peruses the donated materials with current DCC captains Jinelle (middle) and KaShara (right). Foregrounded are the original uniform sketches of designer Paula Van Wagoner.

A Classic American Cheerleading Troupe Tumbles to Smithsonian Immortality

“America’s Sweethearts” are as dedicated to social service as they are to the Dallas Cowboys

A scene from Hulu's "The Looming Tower"

There’s Great Drama Within the Truths of “The Looming Tower”

How filmmaker Alex Gibney brought a documentarian’s eye to the story of the 9/11 attacks

Many of the fascinating stories tied to women across history are preserved in the collections of the Smithsonian Institution.

This Museum Tour Is the Perfect Guide to Celebrating Women’s History in Style

From the National Portrait Gallery to the Air and Space Museum, here’s where to find the stories of wondrous women come March

The Senate as a Court of Impeachment for the Trial of Andrew Johnson

The Political Circus and Constitutional Crisis of Andrew Johnson’s Impeachment

When the 17th president was accused of high crimes and misdemeanors in 1868, the wild trial nearly reignited the Civil War

Slave sale, Charleston, South Carolina

When Emancipation Finally Came, Slave Markets Took on a Redemptive Purpose

During the Civil War, the jails that held the enslaved imprisoned Confederate soldiers. After, they became rallying points for a newly empowered community

Malcolm X by Copain, c. 1967

Is It Time for a Reassessment of Malcolm X?

A Smithsonian Channel film, “The Lost Tapes,” challenges misconceptions about the charismatic leader

Page 84 of 172