Read complete books and articles on: Nineteenth-Century America

United States - officially United States of America, republic (2000 pop. 281,421,906), 3,539,227 sq mi (9,166,598 sq km), North America. The United States is the world's third largest country in population and the fourth largest country in area. It consists of 50 states and a federal district. The conterminous (excluding Alaska and Hawaii) United States stretches across central North America from the Atlantic Ocean on the east to the Pacific Ocean on the west, and from Canada on the north to Mexico and the Gulf of Mexico on the south. The state of Alaska is located in extreme NW North America between the Arctic and Pacific oceans and is bordered by Canada on the east. The state of Hawaii, an island chain, is situated in the E central Pacific Ocean c.2,100 mi (3,400 km) SW of San Francisco. Washington, D.C., is the capital of the United States, and New York is its largest city.

The outlying territories and areas of the United States include: in the Caribbean Basin, Puerto Rico (a commonwealth associated with the United States) and the Virgin Islands of the United States (purchased from Denmark in 1917); in the Pacific Ocean, Guam (ceded by Spain after the Spanish-American War), the Northern Mariana Islands (a commonwealth associated with the United States), American Samoa, Wake Island, and several other islands. The United States also has compacts of free association with the Republic of the Marshall Islands, the Republic of Palau, and the Federated States of Micronesia.

Political Geography

The conterminous United States may be divided into several regions: the New England states ( Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut), the Middle Atlantic states ( New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia), the Southeastern states ( North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Kentucky), the states of the Midwest ( Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, and Missouri), the Great Plains states ( North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, and Kansas), the Mountain states ( Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, and Utah), the Southwestern states ( Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona), and the states of the Far West ( Washington, Oregon, California, and Nevada).

Alaska is the largest state in area (656,424 sq mi/1,700,578 sq km), and Rhode Island is the smallest (1,545 sq mi/4,003 sq km). California has the largest population (2000 pop. 33,871,648), while Wyoming has the fewest people (2000 pop. 493,782). In the late 20th cent., Nevada, Arizona, Florida, Colorado, Utah, Georgia, and Texas experienced the fastest rates of population growth, while California, Texas, Florida, Georgia, Arizona, and North Carolina gained the greatest number of residents. West Virginia, North Dakota, and the District of Columbia experienced population decreases over the same period. The largest U.S. cities are New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, and Philadelphia. Among the other major cities are Boston, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Washington, D.C., Richmond, Virginia Beach, Charlotte, Atlanta, Jacksonville, Tampa, Miami, Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati, Detroit, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Saint Louis, Nashville, Memphis, New Orleans, Kansas City, Oklahoma City, Dallas– Fort Worth, Austin, San Antonio, El Paso, Albuquerque, Denver, Salt Lake City, Phoenix, Tucson, Las Vegas, Seattle, Portland, Sacramento, San Francisco, San Jose, Fresno, Long Beach, San Diego, and Honolulu.

Physical Geography

The conterminous United States may be divided into seven broad physiographic divisions: from east to west, the Atlantic–Gulf Coastal Plain; the Appalachian Highlands; the Interior Plains; the Interior Highlands; the Rocky Mountain System; the Intermontane Region; and the Pacific Mountain System. An eighth division, the Laurentian Uplands, a part of the Canadian Shield, dips into the United States from Canada in the Great Lakes region. It is an area of little local relief, with an irregular drainage system and many lakes, as well as some of the oldest exposed rocks in the United States.

The terrain of the N United States was formed by the great continental ice sheets that covered N North America during the late Cenozoic Era. The southern edge of the ice sheet is roughly traced by a line of terminal moraines extending west from E Long Island and then along the course of the Ohio and Missouri rivers to the Rocky Mts.; land north of this line is covered by glacial material. Alaska and the mountains of NW United States had extensive mountain glaciers and were heavily eroded. Large glacial lakes (see Lake Bonneville under Bonneville Salt Flats; Lahontan, Lake) occupied sections of the Basin and Range province; the Great Salt Lake and the other lakes of this region are remnants of the glacial lakes.

The East and the Gulf Coast

The Atlantic–Gulf Coastal Plain extends along the east and southeast coasts of the United States from E Long Island to the Rio Grande; Cape Cod and the islands off SE Massachusetts are also part of this region. Although narrow in the north, the Atlantic Coastal Plain widens in the south, merging with the Gulf Coastal Plain in Florida. The Atlantic and Gulf coasts are essentially coastlines of submergence, with numerous estuaries, embayments, islands, sandspits, and barrier beaches backed by lagoons. The northeast coast has many fine natural harbors, such as those of New York Bay and Chesapeake Bay, but south of the great capes of the North Carolina coast (Fear, Lookout, and Hatteras) there are few large bays. A principal feature of the lagoon-lined Gulf Coast is the great delta of the Mississippi River.

The Atlantic Coastal Plain rises in the west to the rolling Piedmont (the falls along which were an early source of waterpower), a hilly transitional zone leading to the Appalachian Mountains. These ancient mountains, a once towering system now worn low by erosion, extend southwest from SE Canada to the Gulf Coastal Plain in Alabama. In E New England, the Appalachians extend in a few places to the Atlantic Ocean, contributing to a rocky, irregular coastline. The Appalachians and the Adirondack Mountains of New York (which are geologically related to the Canadian Shield) include all the chief highlands of E United States; Mt. Mitchell (6,684 ft/2,037 m high), in the Black Mts. of North Carolina, is the highest point of E North America.

The Plains and Highlands of the Interior

Extending more than 1,000 mi (1,610 km) from the Appalachians to the Rocky Mts. and lying between Canada (into which they extend) in the north and the Gulf Coastal Plain in the south are the undulating Interior Plains. Once covered by a great inland sea, the Interior Plains are underlain by sedimentary rock. Almost all of the region is drained by one of the world's greatest river systems—the Mississippi-Missouri. The Interior Plains may be divided into two sections: the fertile central lowlands, the agricultural heartland of the United States; and the Great Plains, a treeless plateau that gently rises from the central lowlands to the foothills of the Rocky Mts. The Black Hills of South Dakota form the region's only upland area.

The Interior Highlands are located just W of the Mississippi River between the Interior Plains and the Gulf Coastal Plain. This region consists of the rolling Ozark Plateau (see Ozarks) to the north and the Ouachita Mountains, which are similar in structure to the ridge and valley section of the Appalachians, to the east.

The Western Mountains and Great Basin

West of the Great Plains are the lofty Rocky Mountains. This geologically young and complex system extends into NW United States from Canada and runs S into New Mexico. There are numerous high peaks in the Rockies; the highest is Mt. Elbert (14,433 ft/4,399 m). The Rocky Mts. are divided into four sections—the Northern Rockies, the Middle Rockies, the Wyoming (Great Divide) Basin, and the Southern Rockies. Along the crest of the Rockies is the Continental Divide, separating Atlantic-bound drainage from that heading for the Pacific Ocean.

Between the Rocky Mts. and the ranges to the west is the Intermontane Region, an arid expanse of plateaus, basins, and ranges. The Columbia Plateau, in the north of the region, was formed by volcanic lava and is drained by the Columbia River and its tributary the Snake River, both of which have cut deep canyons into the plateau. The enormous Colorado Plateau, an area of sedimentary rock, is drained by the Colorado River and its tributaries; there the Colorado River has entrenched itself to form the Grand Canyon, one of the world's most impressive scenic wonders. West of the plateaus is the Basin and Range province, an area of extensive semidesert.

The lowest point in North America, in Death Valley (282 ft/86 m below sea level), is there. The largest basin in the region is the Great Basin, an area of interior drainage (the Humboldt River is the largest stream) and of numerous salt lakes, including the Great Salt Lake. Between the Intermontane Region and the Pacific Ocean is the Pacific Mountain System, a series of ranges generally paralleling the coast, formed by faulting and volcanism. The Cascade Range, with its numerous volcanic peaks extends S from SW Canada into N California, and from there is continued south by the Sierra Nevada, a great fault block. Mt. Whitney (14,495 ft/4,418 m), in the Sierra Nevada, is the highest peak in the conterminous United States.

The Pacific Coast, Alaska, and Hawaii

West of the Cascades and the Sierra Nevada and separated from them by a structural trough are the Coast Ranges, which extend along the length of the U.S. Pacific coast. The Central Valley in California, the Willamette Valley in Oregon, and the Puget

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16 of the Best Books and Articles on: Nineteenth-Century America

as selected by Questia librarians

1.

Events That Changed America in the Nineteenth Century » Read Now
by John E. Findling, Frank W. Thackeray. 217 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

In the year 1800 the United States was a fledgling nation. By the time the century ended we had expanded westward exponentially, stamped our imprint as the major power in the Western hemisphere, revolutionized our economy from agriculture to manufacturing, and suffered the schism of a civil war that...
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In the year 1800 the United States was a fledgling nation. By the time the century ended we had expanded westward exponentially, stamped our imprint as the major power in the Western hemisphere, revolutionized our economy from agriculture to manufacturing, and suffered the schism of a civil war that nearly brought the nation as conceived by our forefathers to an end. To help students better understand the momentous changes of that century, this unique resource offers detailed description and expert analysis of the most important events in nineteenth-century America: the Louisiana Purchase, the War of 1812, the Monroe Doctrine, Jacksonian Democracy, Abolition, the War with Mexico, the Civil War, the Industrial Revolution, the Closing of the Frontier, and the Spanish-American War. Each of these events is dealt with in a separate chapter. The books unique format features an introductory essay that presents the facts, followed by an interpretive essay that places the event in a broader context and promotes student analysis. The introductory essay provides factual material in a clear, concise, chronological manner that makes complex history understandable; the interpretive essay, written by a recognized authority in the field in a style designed to appeal to a general readership, assesses the event in terms of its political, economic, sociocultural, and international/diplomatic significance.
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2.

Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era » Read Now
by James M. McPherson. 910 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

Filled with fresh interpretations and information, puncturing old myths and challenging new ones, Battle Cry of Freedom will unquestionably become the standard one-volume history of the Civil War. James McPherson's fast-paced narrative fully integrates the political, social, and military events...
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Filled with fresh interpretations and information, puncturing old myths and challenging new ones, Battle Cry of Freedom will unquestionably become the standard one-volume history of the Civil War. James McPherson's fast-paced narrative fully integrates the political, social, and military events that crowded the two decades from the outbreak of one war in Mexico to the ending of another at Appomattox. Packed with drama and analytical insight, the book vividly recounts the momentous episodes that preceded the Civil War--the Dred Scott decision, the Lincoln-Douglas debates, John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry--and then moves into a masterful chronicle of the war itself--the battles, the strategic maneuvering on both sides, the politics, and the personalities. Particularly notable are McPherson's new views on such matters as the slavery expansion issue in the 1850s, the origins of the Republican Party, the causes of secession, internal dissent and anti-war opposition in the North and the South, and the reasons for the Union's victory. The book's title refers to the sentiments that informed both the Northern and Southern views of the conflict: the South seceded in the name of that freedom of self-determination and self-government for which their fathers had fought in 1776, while the North stood fast in defense of the Union founded by those fathers as the bulwark of American liberty. Eventually, the North had to grapple with the underlying cause of the war--slavery--and adopt a policy of emancipation as a second war aim. This "new birth of freedom," as Lincoln called it, constitutes the proudest legacy of America's bloodiest conflict. This authoritative volume makes sense of that vast and confusing "second American Revolution" we call the Civil War, a war that transformed a nation and expanded our heritage of liberty.
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3.

The Market Revolution: Jacksonian America, 1815-1846 » Read Now
by Charles Sellers. 506 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

...out." By the late nineteenth century, novelist William...second half of the nineteenth century, the Northeast market...revolution. 25 The American economys takeoff...
4.

United States Expansionism and British North America, Ca. 1775-1871 » Read Now
by Reginald C. Stuart. 374 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library
5.

The Romance of Reunion: Northerners and the South, 1865-1900 » Read Now
by Nina Silber. 257 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

...in the late nineteenth century such enthusiastic...mind-numbing mantra in American society. One...ways the late nineteenth century was one of those...collective memory of...
6.

Yankeys Now: Immigrants in the Antebellum United States, 1840-1860 » Read Now
by Joseph P. Ferrie. 230 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

The first great wave of European migration to the United States before the Civil War transformed both the migrants themselves and the country they entered. The extent of this transformation has been difficult to gauge without information on migrants before and after their departure from Europe...
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The first great wave of European migration to the United States before the Civil War transformed both the migrants themselves and the country they entered. The extent of this transformation has been difficult to gauge without information on migrants before and after their departure from Europe. Yankeys Now: Immigrants in the Antebellum US 1840-1860 provides the first detailed look at how these immigrants were changed by their relocation and how the American economy responded to their arrival. The book employs unique data on more than 2,400 British, Irish, and German migrants who appeared on both passenger ship rosters and US census records to document the geographic, occupational, and financial movements of Europeans who traveled to this nation in the 1840s. Contrary to other studies of antebellum immigrants, Joseph P. Ferrie's work finds substantial mobility in all three of these contexts. The ability to follow immigrants from their arrival through several censuses makes it possible to compare the experiences of immigrants who remained in one location to those of immigrants who sought opportunity in new places throughout the 1850s. The latter group's achievements, as carefully traced in this volume, account for most of the contrast with previously published work on this topic. Using information on more than 4,000 native-born Americans followed through the 1850 and 1860 US censuses, Ferrie finds little evidence that immigrants' arrival negatively affected this country's labor force, excluding craft workers in the urban northeast. Taken as a whole, his findings demonstrate the American economy's ability to absorb additions to its workforce while also illustrating the range of opportunities available to nineteenth-century migrants drawn to the United States.
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7.

Rude Republic: Americans and Their Politics in the Nineteenth Century » Read Now
by Glenn C. Altschuler, Stuart M. Blumin. 316 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

What did politics and public affairs mean to those generations of Americans who first experienced democratic self-rule? Taking their cue from vibrant political campaigns and very high voter turnouts, historians have depicted the nineteenth century as an era of intense and widespread political...
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What did politics and public affairs mean to those generations of Americans who first experienced democratic self-rule? Taking their cue from vibrant political campaigns and very high voter turnouts, historians have depicted the nineteenth century as an era of intense and widespread political enthusiasm. But rarely have these historians examined popular political engagement directly, or within the broader contexts of day-to-day life. In this bold and in-depth look at Americans and their politics, Glenn Altschuler and Stuart Blumin argue for a more complex understanding of the "space" occupied by politics in nineteenth-century American society and culture. Mining such sources as diaries, letters, autobiographies, novels, cartoons, contested-election voter testimony to state legislative committees, and the partisan newspapers of representative American communities ranging from Massachusetts and Georgia to Texas and California, the authors explore a wide range of political actions and attitudes. They consider the enthusiastic commitment celebrated by historians together with various forms of skepticism, conflicted engagement, detachment,
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8.

Rethinking the Nineteenth Century: Contradictions and Movements (Part I "Economic Expansion and Political Integration: The United States") » Read Now
by Francisco O. Ramirez. 223 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

Series Foreword Preface Introduction Economic Expansion and Political Integration: The United States Movements, Transformations, and Limitations British Empire: Dynamics and Repercussions Rethinking the Emergence of the Social Sciences in the Nineteenth Century Selected Bibliography Index
9.

Black Identity: Rhetoric, Ideology, and Nineteenth-Century Black Nationalism » Read Now
by Dexter B. Gordon. 256 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

Exploring the role of rhetoric in African American identity, political discourse.
10.

The (Other) American Traditions: Nineteenth-Century Women Writers » Read Now
by Joyce W. Warren. 314 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

...good?": Evaluating Nineteenth-Century American Womens Fiction...American literature, and nineteenth- century American women writers, who focused...Queens College in...
11.

Divine Destiny: Gender and Race in Nineteenth-Century Protestantism » Read Now
by Carolyn A. Haynes. 194 pgs.

Collections: Religious Studies, Entire Library

American culture was firmly undergirded by two dominant rhetorics during the nineteenth century: manifest destiny and domesticity. The first celebrated a divinely ordained spread of democracy, individualism, capitalism, and civilization throughout the North American continent. The second codified...
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American culture was firmly undergirded by two dominant rhetorics during the nineteenth century: manifest destiny and domesticity. The first celebrated a divinely ordained spread of democracy, individualism, capitalism, and civilization throughout the North American continent. The second codified "natural" differences and duties of American men and women.
While the two rhetorics were touted as "universal" in their application and appeal, in actuality both assumed a belief in masculine Anglo-Saxon American superiority. The triumph of the nation could be accomplished only through the concomitant removal, acculturation, or elimination of nonwhite peoples and through a careful circumscription of white women. The rhetorics not only were linked through a virulent ethnocentrism and misogyny but also were connected through their reliance on the Protestant belief system and on the church itself.
Yet, curiously, despite their exclusion from the Protestant rhetorics of manifest destiny and domesticity, the nineteenth century featured a remarkable growth in the conversion of women and nonwhite men to the Protestant faith. Why did women and nonwhite men seek to join a dominant religion that in many ways set out to limit and oppress them?
This book responds to that question by exploring the actual words and rhetorical choices made by some of the most progressive Protestant white, African-American, and Native American thinkers of the era: Olaudah Equiano, William Apess, Catharine Beecher, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Sojourner Truth, and Amanda Berry Smith. It argues that American Protestantism was both prohibitive and constitutive, offering its followers an expedient, acceptable but limited means forassuming social and political power and for forming a mutually empathetic, relational notion of self while at the same time foreclosing the possibility for more radical roles and social change.
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12.

Science and Religion in America, 1800-1860 » Read Now
by Herbert Hovenkamp. 273 pgs.

Collections: Religious Studies, Entire Library

...the first half of the nineteenth century, American Protestants became...the beginning of the nineteenth century, American colleges began hiring...God. In this way...
13.

Sons of Liberty: The Masculine Mind in Nineteenth-Century America » Read Now
by David G. Pugh. 186 pgs.

Collections: Psychology, Entire Library

...The Masculine Mind in Nineteenth- Century America DAVID G. PUGH...role women played in nineteenth-century American life. It is not a study...shedding all inhibitions, "...
14.

Perfecting the Family: Antislavery Marriages in Nineteenth-Century America » Read Now
by Chris Dixon. 322 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

Gender relations and family life among radical abolitionists in antebellum America
For three turbulent decades before the outbreak of the Civil War, radical abolitionists labored to reform American society. Some carried the struggle beyond the public crusade against slavery, extending it into the...
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Gender relations and family life among radical abolitionists in antebellum America
For three turbulent decades before the outbreak of the Civil War, radical abolitionists labored to reform American society. Some carried the struggle beyond the public crusade against slavery, extending it into the private realm of family relations. Appalled by the horrors inflicted on black families in the Southern slave states, and concerned about the precise meaning of freedom in the North, they sought to make their own marriages into models of affection and equality.
Chris Dixon creates a vivid portrait of these antislavery families, focusing on eight prominent couples. He examines the details of their domestic lives and reveals the relationship between their abolitionist and domestic ideologies, showing how they both confronted and conformed to the emergent bourgeois culture of nineteenth-century America.
While radical abolitionists held men accountable for many of the corruptions that they felt were poisoning American life, they did not believe men were beyond redemption. As Dixon shows, the abolitionists set out to redefine masculinity by renouncing power and oppression in favor of intimacy and cooperation.
Perfecting the Family examines the ways in which these reformers tried -- with mixed success -- to make those affectionate qualities the basis for a new, companionate type of marriage, in which women and men would go forward as equal partners.
"Very well researched, clearly argued, and well written". -- Anne M. Boylan, University of Delaware
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15.

Families and Farmhouses in Nineteenth-Century America: Vernacular Design and Social Change » Read Now
by Sally McMurry. 261 pgs.

Collections: Entire Library

The antebellum era and the close of the 19th century frame a period of great agricultural expansion. During this time, farmhouse plans designed by rural men and women regularly appeared in the flourishing Northern farm journals. This book analyzes these vital indicators of the work patterns, social...
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The antebellum era and the close of the 19th century frame a period of great agricultural expansion. During this time, farmhouse plans designed by rural men and women regularly appeared in the flourishing Northern farm journals. This book analyzes these vital indicators of the work patterns, social interactions, and cultural values of the farm families of the time. Examining several hundred owner-designed plans, McMurry shows the ingenious ways in which "progressive" rural Americans designed farmhouses in keeping with their visions of a dynamic, reformed rural culture. From designs for efficient work spaces to a concern for self-contained rooms for adolescent children, this fascinating story of the evolution of progressive farmers' homes sheds new light on rural America's efforts to adapt to major changes brought by industrialization, urbanization, the consolidation of capitalist agriculture, and the rise of the consumer society.
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16.

The Voices That Are Gone: Themes in 19th-Century American Popular Song » Read Now
by Jon W. Finson. 338 pgs.

Collections: Entire Library

In this unique and readable study, Jon Finson views the mores and values of nineteenth-century Americans as they appear in their popular songs. The author sets forth lyricists' and composers' notions of courtship, technology, death, African Americans, Native Americans, and European ethnicity by...
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In this unique and readable study, Jon Finson views the mores and values of nineteenth-century Americans as they appear in their popular songs. The author sets forth lyricists' and composers' notions of courtship, technology, death, African Americans, Native Americans, and European ethnicity by grouping songs topically. He goes on to explore the interaction between musical style and lyrics within each topic. The lyrics and changing musical styles present a vivid portrait of nineteenth-century America. The composers discussed in the book range from Henry Russell ("Woodman, Spare That Tree"), Stephen Foster ("Oh! Susanna"), and Dan Emmett ("I Wish I Was in Dixie's Land"), to George M. Cohan and Maude Nugent ("Sweet Rosie O'Grady"), and Gussie Lord Davis ("In the Baggage Coach Ahead"). Readers will recognize songs like "Pop Goes the Weasel," "The Yellow Rose of Texas," "The Fountain in the Park," "After the Ball," "A Bicycle Built for Two," and many others which gain significance by being placed in the larger context of American history.
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