by Bob Schoone-Jongen. It’s no secret that the United States has had its fair share of financial scandals. Ferdinand Ward fleeced Ulysses Grant in 1881. Samuel Insull bilked thousands of people out of millions of dollars invested in his utility schemes in the 1930s. More recently we’ve seen Bernie Ebbers, Ken Lay, Bernie Madoff, all …
Continue reading William Duer: America’s First Wall Street Villain
Part 5 of the Integration of Faith & History in the Classroom series by Dan Miller. Few developments in the history of any group or individual can be reduced to simple matters of good and evil. Taking an empathetic approach to history means trying to understand the circumstances and perceptions that move people to action. None of …
Continue reading The Christian Historian and Empathy
by Eric M. Washington. It is very late on Wednesday, April 15, 2015. This particular day and year marks the 150th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln’s assassination. Many historians and Americans in general consider Lincoln that most significant president in this country’s history. He was the first Republican to win a presidential election, and of course …
Continue reading Re-Orienting the Contemporary Narrative of African Americans in Baseball
by Bob Schoone-Jongen. About the time when Spring Break arrives I hit the line in the HIST 152 syllabus calling students to consider the 18th-century Enlightenment and its offspring. Of course this leads to political liberalism and the notion that we should trade kings and queens for politicians who won their place through innate ability rather …
Continue reading Enlightenment and Elections
by Kristin Du Mez. Several years back, I heard Tim Gloege give a conference paper on Henry Crowell, Quaker Oats, and American Fundamentalism at a meeting of the American Society of Church History. To this day, that talk stands as one of the smartest, most engaging papers I’ve heard presented at an academic conference. I …
Continue reading Ask the Author: Tim Gloege on Guaranteed Pure
by Frans van Liere. During spring break I was asked by my church friend Phyllis Van Andel to conduct a book discussion for the Calvin Academy for Lifelong Learning (CALL). It could be on any book I wished to discuss, she said. CALL classes are always fun to teach, because of the great enthusiasm of …
Continue reading Hella Haasse, Threshold of Fire
Historical Horizons 