November 2017

Like many other magazines, such as Mental Floss, Jet and Computerworld, American Heritage is going digital-only.American Heritage is going digital-only.

Appropriately, given its subject matter, the nonprofit American Heritagedebuted its digital version on July 4, five years after it suspended print publication. The magazine, which focuses on lively, accessible scholarship, has won numerous awards, including the National Magazine Award.

The relaunch is still in its early stages. For a limited time, the publication is offering free subscriptions. Subscribers get access to digital issues, newsletters and the 7,000 essays in the AH archives. 

Eventually, the magazine hopes to sustain itself via paid subscribers, though the fund-raising effort is ongoing. The goal is to modernize the site, hire writers and editors, and build systems to track subscribers. There is also an advertising component.

On November 9, 1906, 111 years ago this week, The New York Times ran an article declaring that the President of the United States was about to violate “the traditions of the United States for over a hundred years.”

Theodore Roosevelt had already done many daring and unexpected things. He had gained national renown for resigning his position in the Navy Department so he could fight in the Spanish-American War, and his brash personality remained a cornerstone of his popularity. On this particular November day, he was about to do something that no sitting President had ever attempted. He was going abroad.