The Best American History Essays 2006

THE ORGANIZATION OF AMERICAN HISTORIANS was founded in 1907 and publishes the Journal of American History. The largest international learned society devoted to American history, it has 9,000 members in the USA and around the world.

JOYCE APPLEBY is Professor Emerita, University of California, Los Angeles, USA, and President of both the Organization of American Historians and the American Historical Association.

Ten of the best articles in American history published in 2006 selected from over 300 learned and popular journals. Topics range from the general to the specific and cover all aspects of American history, from the early days of the republic through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. These are the questions that today's historians are asking.

Accessible - a quick and easy way to review top work in the field of American history

Introduction; J.Appleby Joseph Ellis Inventing the Presidency From American Heritage ; W.Holton 'Divide et Impera': Federalist 10 in a Wider Sphere From The William and Mary Quarterly ; L.A.Schwalm 'Overrun with Free Negroes': Emancipation and Wartime Migration in the Upper Midwest From Civil War History ; C.R.Osthaus The Work Ethic of Plain Folk: Labor and Religion in the Old South From The Journal of Southern History ; D.L.McGuire 'It was Like All of Us had Been Raped': Sexual Violence, Community Mobilization and the African-American Freedom Struggle From The Journal of American History ; E.Avila Popular Culture in the Age of White Flight: Film Noir, Disneyland, and the Cold War (Sub)Urban Imaginary From the Journal of Urban History ; C.Brooks Sing Sheng vs. Southwood: Residential Integration in Cold War California From the Pacific Historical Review ; R.E.Luker Murder and Biblical Memory: The Legend of Vernon Johns From the Virginia Magazine of History and Biography ; T.J.Sugrue Affirmative Action from Below: Civil Rights, the Building Trades, and the Politics of Racial Equality in the Urban North, 1945-1969 - From The Journal of American History ; M.D.Lassiter The Suburban Origins of 'Color-Blind' Conservatism: Middle-Class Consciousness in the Charlotte Busing Crisis From the Journal of Urban History ; M.D.Lassiter Other Articles Nominated for the 2006 Competition