American History
Charles Dana Gibson and the Gibson Girl
Charles Dana Gibson (1867-1944) was an important illustrator in the Golden Age of American illustration. He sold his first illustration in 1886 to Life magazine,* where his works appeared every week for thirty years. Soon his drawings appeared in every major American magazine, including Harpers’ Weekly, Scribners and Colliers. He illustrated books, including American editions…
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The Exodusters
In 1870s, after the failed promise of equality and opportunity under Reconstruction had ended, thousands of formerly enslaved Black Americans headed to Kansas and other Western states, hoping to take advantage of the opportunity to own land offered by the Homestead Act of 1862, which gave 160 acres of federal land to anyone who agreed…
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Looking Forward to Juneteenth
On June 19, 1865, Union General Gordon Granger read General Order No. 3, which announced the emancipation of enslaved people in Texas, from a balcony in Galveston Texas, or so the story goes. It was two and a half years after Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation went into effect and 2 months after the Civil War had…
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