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Once a scene of tragedy, Georgia's 200-year-old Indian Spring Hotel now offers a venue for learning about the past – including the controversial Creek leader who built it.

Chief Will

Famous writers including Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, and the Alcotts turned Sleepy Hollow Cemetery into our country’s first conservation project.

Editor’s Note: Greg Melville teaches English at the U.S.

From ancestral homes of George Washington to World War II runways, there are many sites in the U.K. where you can encounter American's past.

The U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville showcases the rockets, achievements, and artifacts of the space program, as well as the legacy of Wernher von Braun and his team.

Editor’s Note: Brent Glass is Director Emeritus of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History and the author of 50 Gr

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.

What African Americans could not achieve in the courtroom they did in the dance hall, with the invention of a rebellious, and wholly American, new musical artform. 

Editor's Note: Brent Glass is Director Emeritus of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History and the author of 50 Great American Places: Essential Historic Sites Across the U.S., from which this essay is adapted. 

Now a popular state park, the unassuming geological feature along the Illinois River has served as the site of centuries of human habitation and discovery.  

Editor's Note: Mark Walczynski is a retired professor at Illinois Valley Community College and the park historian for the Starved Rock Foundation, located at Starved Rock State Park in Utica, Illinois.

The city embodies the American spirit: freedom, democracy, innovation, arts, and a love of knowledge.

Whether you’re a serious historian or you just enjoy learning about the past, Philadelphia has a lot to offer.

Members of the Maryland Forces guard the memories of the dramatic history at Fort Frederick, the best-preserved fort from the former English colonies in America. 

As I drove through the Maryland woods to
 
Longer ago than I have any desire to admit, I made my first and only trip to Venice, as part of a summer tour with a group of college students.

ST. AUGUSTINE, SETTLED IN 1565, FLAUNTS ITS SPANISH ORIGINS

 

A great ship of today seeks to evoke the golden liners of memory.

 
When, last October, the editors announced the First Annual Great American Place Award —and chose Saratoga Springs, New York, as its recipient—we invited our readers to send us their own suggestions for Great American Place.
WHEN WE’RE FIGURING out where to go for lunch, history probably isn’t so important a guide as the certainty of good food or the hope of an affordable bill. Still, dining with the past can add real splendor to a meal, as J. M.
Last fall, just as this issue was starting to take shape, I received an invitation to a press conference held by the European Commission, a sort of chamber of commerce of nations.

American Heritage interviews Lowell Thomas, the journalist whom Damon Runyon described as “the beau ideal of the radio fraternity, first for his complete artistry and second for his personality. 

As the lights of London’s Covent Garden dimmed that early August evening in 1919, few people, including the young narrator waiting nervously in the wings, sensed the historic nature of the occasion.

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