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Friends of American Heritage gathered to celebrate 75 years of great writing and education about our nation's history.

Previously unknown, a map drawn by Lord Percy, the British commander at Lexington, sheds new light on the perilous retreat to Boston 250 years ago this month.

What began as a civil war within the British Empire continued until it became a wider conflict affecting peoples and countries across Europe and North America.

Overshadowed in memory by Lexington and Concord, the Massachusetts town of Menotomy saw the most violent and deadly fighting on April 19, 1775.

This special issue looks at the dramatic and momentous events that occurred 250 years ago this month.

Classic Essays from Our Archives

Searching for “Shenandoah” | Winter 2022, Summer 2025, Vol 67, No 1

By Bruce Watson

It's one of the oldest folk ballads in our national songbook, but where did it come from? The answer is complex, multi-layered, American.

trapper family

"The Sparck of Rebellion" | Winter 2010, Summer 2025, Vol 59, No 4

By Douglas Brinkley

Badly disguised as Indians, a rowdy group of patriotic vandals kicked a revolution into motion.

boston tea party

Columbus and Genocide | October 1975, Vol 26, No 6

By Edward T. Stone

The discoverer of the New World was responsible for the annihilation of the peaceful Arawak Indians

columbus

Two Intimate Enemies | September 2000, Summer 2025, Vol 51, No 5

By Joseph J. Ellis

When John Adams was elected president, and Thomas Jefferson as vice president, each came to see the other as a traitor. Out of their enmity grew our modern political system.

jefferson adams

Alice Paul: “I Was Arrested, Of Course…” | February 1974, Summer 2025, Vol 70, No 3

By Robert S. Gallagher

An interview with the famed suffragette, Alice Paul

alice paul

Who Invented Scalping? | April 1977, Vol 28, No 3

By James Axtell

In recent years many voices—both Native-American and white—have questioned whether Indians did in fact invent scalping. What is the evidence?

scalping

    Today in History

  • Reagan asks Gorbachev to tear down this wall

    President Ronald Reagan, speaking in front of the Brandenburg Gate section of the Berlin Wall, asks that Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev "Tear down this wall!" Reagan spoke at the 750th anniversary of Berlin, which was united as the German capital in 1989. 

  • George Bush born

    41st President George Herbert Walker Bush in born in Milton, Massachusetts. The son of Connecticut Senator Prescott Bush, he volunteered for the U.S. Navy after Pearl Harbor and became the youngest Naval aviator in American history. Bush later served in the House of Representatives, directed the CIA, and was elected to both the vice presidency and the presidency in the 1980s.

    More »

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