# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
David Bushnell and his Revolutionary Submarine

By Brenda Milkofsky
At the time of the American Revolution, British military power surpassed that of any western nation. Yet, the son of a Connecticut farmer, David Bushnell, hoped to prove that creativity and inventiveness might win the day for the colonies.

Born in 1740 in a section of Saybrook that is now Westbrook, David Bushnell was the eldest of five children. Still at home and unmarried at age 26, he lost his father and two sisters in a span of three years. His mother quickly remarried, by custom and necessity, and left the farm to David and his younger brother, Ezra. David sold his half of the farm to Ezra and studied to enter Yale College. Although 31-year-old David was much older than other applicants, he was accepted and entered Yale in 1771.

Bushnell Experiments at Yale

Once in New Haven, Bushnell studied religion, mathematics, geometry, Natural Philosophy-as exploration of the natural sciences was then called-and other topics of interest to a budding inventor. Yale's fine library included standard 18th-century scientific texts, so Bushnell had access to the best and latest information to support his own research and experiments.

While still a student, Bushnell experimented with methods to make gunpowder explode under water, terrifying onlookers. In April of 1775, Bushnell's last year at Yale, news of the battles at Lexington and Concord electrified Connecticut. The college closed early and Bushnell went home to Saybrook where he continued to work, now in earnest, on building a submarine that would deliver his underwater mine or explosives.

The Mechanics of the Turtle

Historians are not sure when Bushnell and his brother Ezra began construction of the submarine that launched in the fall of 1776 and became known as the Turtle. For all Bushnell had read during his studies, he faced the practical challenges of making the underwater boat work. The Turtle would be no mere diving bell tethered to the surface by ropes and air hoses. To be effective, the vessel Bushnell envisioned had to submerge, be able to move forward and backward and rise again to the surface, all while supporting a human pilot or operator. And, it had to carry and deliver an underwater mine. He had to solve many problems-how to supply light and air for the craft, how to gauge direction and depth during operation-and he had to solve them quickly.

The hull of the submarine was constructed of oak, somewhat like a barrel, and bound by heavy wrought-iron hoops. This was the age of wood, and barrels and ships' hulls were made everywhere along the Connecticut River and Long Island Sound. However, all of the mechanical parts needed for the submarine required the involvement of highly skilled, experienced artisans and crafters.

To raise and submerge the vessel, the operator flooded the air-filled chamber with water, making it heavier or lighter as needed, to achieve the desired depth. Bushnell went to a known patriot, Isaac Doolittle, a clockmaker and bell founder, who had a shop near Yale, to manufacture these valves and forcing pumps and, perhaps, the bell-shaped hatch as well.

Real ballast, which is the stabilizing weight needed to keep the boat upright in the water, was affixed to the outside bottom and carried inside as well. To propel the boat forward and backward, Bushnell used a front propeller that was operated by a treadle and a hand crank. During Bushnell's lifetime, treadles were used to provide foot power to spinning wheels, lathes, and other large tools. A vertical propeller on the top of the boat assisted with ascent. These two propellers that Bushnell invented and described as "oars" and "like the blades of a windmill" were his greatest contribution to future marine development and to his submarine.

The only light that came into the dark vessel was through the small windows in the hatch. Air came into the chamber through two snorkels that closed over when the boat submerged. Because the air inside the submarine was limited by its size, the vessel was designed to travel on the surface or with its hatch and windows above water. It would only submerge to avoid detection and affix the mine.

Clockworks Technology Adapted to War Needs

The mine Bushnell designed was probably keg shaped and about 2½ feet long and 1½ feet in diameter. Packed with 150 pounds of gunpowder, it could put a hole in the hull of a large British warship. The keg mine was to be attached to the enemy ship by a sharp screw cranked into the wooden hull by the operator inside the submarine.

Igniting the gunpowder underwater presented a challenge, as did timing the explosion so that the Turtle and its operator could get safely away. Two clockmakers worked with Bushnell on various aspects of the Turtle project, Isaac Doolittle of New Haven, mentioned above, and Phineas Pratt of what was then called Potapaug and today is the village of Essex. The team modified a clockwork timing device to trigger a flintlock mechanism from a musket. The sparks made by flint striking steel would ignite the priming powder in the pan that in turn would set off the gunpowder. The operator would set the timing device in motion when releasing the mine from the submarine, allowing him enough time to clear the area.

Once the hull and major manufactured parts of the submarine were in place, the boat was moved from Ezra's farm on the Westbrook Road to what is now Ayer's Point in Old Saybrook on the Connecticut River, where Bushnell had a Yale connection. Here, the boat had its in-water trials and the operator received training.

Putting the Turtle to the Test

Operating the submarine craft required physical strength and stamina so farmer Ezra Bushnell, not scholar David, was trained as the operator. Through a lengthy correspondence by Bushnell's friend Dr. Benjamin Gale (Yale, 1755) of Killingworth to Silas Deane, a member of the Congress from Connecticut who served on the Continental Marine Committee, inventor Benjamin Franklin became aware of the project. In turn, General George Washington and Governor Jonathan Trumbull became supporters. By the time the submarine was moved by boat from the Connecticut River to New York, many people hoped for its success.

In June of 1776, a massive British force of warships and transports carrying as many as 50,000 soldiers, hired Hessians, and Marines began arriving in New York harbor. Bushnell hoped to take bold action by sinking the HMS Eagle, the flagship of British Admiral Howe. When the Turtle arrived on a small coastal sloop in mid-summer, the scene must have been frightening. Almost immediately, Ezra Bushnell, the trained pilot, came down with a debilitating fever. Unwilling to wait for another opportunity, David Bushnell applied to Brigadier General Samuel Parsons of Lyme, who was in New York with the 10th Continental Regiment, for volunteers. From those offered, Bushnell chose Ezra Lee, also of Lyme, to pilot the Turtle. To avoid discovery during Lee's training, they moved back up the Connecticut coast and finally back to Saybrook. After two weeks of training, the mission to plant and detonate explosives under a British ship was rescheduled.

Ezra Lee described the event: "We set off from the City, the Whale boats towed me as nigh the ships as they dare go, and then they cast me off. I soon found that I was too early in the tide, as it carried me down to the [transport] ships. I however, hove about, and rowed for 5 glasses [2½ hours], by the ship's bells, before the tide slackened so that I could get along side the man of war, which lay above the transports."

Unable to "row" with the propellers against the tide, Lee had spent two and a half hours "treading water" to avoid being swept away. Rowing the Turtle meant using his legs to rock the treadle back and forth while also turning the hand crank. By the time the tide turned, and Lee maneuvered near Admiral Howe's flagship, the sun was coming up and he was exhausted from his efforts.

Later, Lee described his unsuccessful attempt to fasten the mine. "When I rowed under the stern of the ship, could see men and deck and hear them talk-then I shut all doors, sunk down, and came up under the bottom of the ship, up with the screw against the bottom but found that it would not enter." Unable to affix the mine and with daylight upon the water, Lee decided to make for shore before the vessel was discovered by passing boats. But it was too late. Guard boats put off from shore in his direction and soldiers mounted the fort on Governor's Island to catch sight of the strange craft.

Lee writes that he "let loose the magazine [mine] in hopes, that if they should take me, they should likewise pick up the magazine, and then we should all be blown up together..." Ezra Lee did not lack courage, only experience in a craft no one on earth had ever before piloted in action. The mine did explode, frightening off the pursuing guard boat; Lee escaped with his life and with Bushnell's machine.

Following Lee's ill-fated mission, Bushnell and his supporters took the submarine up to the Hudson River, where Lee again was unsuccessful in blowing up a ship. Following the first mine explosion, the British Navy warned their mariners to keep a sharp lookout. Lee and the Turtle were discovered and then swept off target by the tide. Even Phineas Pratt, the other trained operator, met with failure when moonlight revealed the Turtle to watchful British eyes and they fired upon the craft. A few days after these two unsuccessful attacks, the British sunk a number of vessels including the one carrying the submarine.

The Father of Submarine Warfare

Although the patriots recovered the vessel, David Bushnell was in poor health and he later wrote, "I therefore gave over the pursuit for that time, and waited for a more favorable opportunity, which never arrived." Bushnell did develop other mines that could be delivered without his submarine. The Continental forces used one type in New London Harbor and another on the Delaware River; both were successful.

When the war ended-and with brother Ezra having died in 1786-David Bushnell left Connecticut and went to Warrenton, Georgia, with Yale classmate Abraham Baldwin. There, he taught at Franklin College and continued to work on delivery systems for underwater mines. Not long before he died in 1826, Bushnell was in contact with the US Department of the Navy about a floating torpedo.

David Bushnell's submarine invention and underwater mine were first made known to the American public in 1798 when future-president Thomas Jefferson gave a lecture to the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia. He used as the source for his talk a 1787 letter to him from David Bushnell documenting in detail both inventions. Later printed, that description in Bushnell's own language is the basis for his honor as the Father of Submarine Warfare.
Brenda Milkofsky was Director & Curator of the Connecticut River Museum in Essex, Connecticut, when the very first working reproduction of Bushnell's submarine was built and successfully tested in waters off the Museum, where the story continues to be told.

LEARN MORE

Websites

"The Submarine Turtle: Naval Documents of the Revolutionary War." Naval History and Heritage Command, 2016. Link.

Places

"Connecticut River Museum," 2016. Link.

Documents

Abbot, Henry L. "Engraving - Bushnell's American Turtle," 1881. Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division. Link.

"Guide to the David Bushnell Papers, 1783-1956." Yale University, 2016. Link.

Books

Abbot, Henry L., and Frank J. Anderson. Beginning of Modern Submarine Warfare Under Captain Lieutenant David Bushnell. Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1966.

Grant, Marion H., and Old Saybrook. Bicentennial Committee. The Infernal Machines of Saybrook's David Bushnell: Patriot Inventor of the American Revolution. Old Saybrook, CT: Bicentennial Committee, 1976.

Manstan, Roy R., and Frederic J. Frese. Turtle: David Bushnell's Revolutionary Vessel. Yardley, PA: Westholme Publishing, 2010.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
David Bushnell and his Revolutionary Submarine | ConnecticutHistory.org

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
By Brenda Milkofsky At the time of the American Revolution, British military power surpassed that of any western nation. Yet, the son of a Connecticut farmer, David Bushnell, hoped to prove that creativity and inventiveness might win the day for the colonies.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Reports on the yellow fever epidemic, 1793 | Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Between August 1 and November 9, 1793, approximately 11,000 people contracted yellow fever in the US capital of Philadelphia. Of that number, 5,000 people, 10 percent of the city's population, died. The disease gets its name from the jaundiced eyes and skin of the victims. Other symptoms include fever, headache, and "black vomit" caused by bleeding into the stomach.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.authors[].name
The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
James Horton on Slavery and the American Revolution

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
American Public Media podcast "Order 9066" takes its name from the executive order that authorized the forced relocation of tens of thousands of Japanese Americans during World War II.

Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Yesterday (February 19) marked 76 years since President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which authorized the forced removal of nearly 120,000 Japanese Americans from the West Coast to internment camps during World War II . American Public Media commemorated the anniversary with the premiere of its latest podcast, " Order 9066."

An emailed statement notes that the radio organization developed "Order 9066" in collaboration with the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, which currently features an exhibit on the internment of Japanese Americans. The statement adds that the podcast explores this dark point in American history-in which Japanese Americans were treated as possible enemy spies despite never being convicted of espionage-via the perspectives of internment survivors. They include podcast narrators Sab Shimono ("Waterworld") and Pat Suzuki ("The Year of the Dragon"), both of whom were incarcerated as children at the Granada Relocation Center in Colorado.

According to the podcast's official webpage, "Order 9066" draws on these first-person accounts to highlight the anti-Asian racism and jingoism that fueled internment, the lives of internees and the post-World War II movement among Japanese Americans to demand that the government acknowledge its violation of their rights. The podcast series will consist of eight episodes, debuting now through July.

Listen to the first episode of "Order 9066" below.

Related Articles

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
New Podcast Chronicles Internment of Japanese Americans | Colorlines

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
American Public Media podcast "Order 9066" takes its name from the executive order that authorized the forced relocation of tens of thousands of Japanese Americans during World War II. Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images Yesterday (February 19) marked 76 years since President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which authorized the forced removal of nearly 120,000 Japanese Americans from the West Coast to internment camps during World War II .

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Historian Ed Baptist provides context on the creation and enforcement of a U.S. racial binary that endures today, as well as Black resistance as a force for political change. And Aisha White urges educators to ask themselves, "What did you learn about race when you were younger?" before they engage with children. She argues that self-reflection and ongoing education are vital tools to combat the fallacy of ignoring students' racialized experiences.

People from all corners of public life are telling teachers to stop discussions about race and racism in the classroom, but keeping the truth of the world from students simply doesn't work. English teacher Matthew Kay urges educators to create brave spaces instead. He provides examples of classroom strategies for engaging with students at the intersections of race, literature and lived experience. Hint: it involves vulnerability, accountability and quality affirmations.

This season, we're examining the century between the Civil War and the modern civil rights movement to understand how systemic racism and slavery persisted and evolved after emancipation-and how Black Americans still developed strong institutions during this time. Co-hosts Hasan Kwame Jeffries and Bethany Jay discuss how students need to grasp this history to understand injustices many of them face today, from voter suppression to mass incarceration.

In 2015, Coach Steve Bandura loaded the Anderson Monarchs, a Little League baseball team from Philadelphia, onto a 1947 Flxible Clipper Bus for a barnstorming tour back in time. Bandura and the players recount lessons learned while visiting historic civil rights sites, meeting veteran activists and playing baseball along the way. And historian Derrick E. White, co-host of The Black Athlete podcast, explores the intersection of sports and civil rights history.

The civil rights movement offers critical context for understanding the systemic police violence, voter suppression efforts, 'law and order' rhetoric and criminalization of activism we see today. It also helps us understand the strategies activists use to fight these injustices. Historians Shannon King and Nishani Frazier explain how they use 21st-century Black activism to teach the movement's history-and how they use the movement to help students better understand the contemporary Black freedom struggle.

The history of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense can help us understand the transition from civil rights to Black Power and contemporary issues like mass incarceration. From the Ten-Point Platform to survival programs, historian Robyn C. Spencer outlines key aspects of the party's revolutionary ideology, grassroots activism and community service. And historian Jakobi Williams joins to share valuable classroom insights.

Historian Clarence Lang joins us for a conversation about Malcolm X. We discuss his commitment to Black pride and self-determination and his rejection of the white gaze and the myth of American exceptionalism. Learn how teaching about the life and works of Malcolm X can illuminate the universe of possibilities of the civil rights movement-and the diversity of ideology, strategy and political thought within the Black freedom struggle.

In this episode, we talk with movement veteran Courtland Cox about lessons from the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and his own development as a young organizer of the Emmett Till generation. We join Karlyn Forner and John B. Gartrell to tour the resources available through SNCC Digital Gateway. And we hear from student organizer Kaia Woodford about the lessons from the Civil Rights and Black Power Movements that inform her activism today.

Oral histories, historic sites, archives and museums expand students' understanding of the past. They fill in gaps in our textbooks-complementing what's included and capturing what's not. This episode highlights online oral history collections including the Civil Rights History Project. It offers recommendations for students conducting their own oral histories. And it explores resources from the National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee.

Teaching civil rights history to young learners creates both opportunities and challenges. The 1964 Mississippi Freedom Summer Project and the subsequent Freedom Schools offer important lessons for helping elementary students to understand the civil rights movement. In this episode, we explore community-based strategies and activities for bringing the Black freedom struggle into your classroom.

If you're finding this podcast useful, please support us by taking our 10 question Listener Survey. And stay tuned! More episodes are on the way. In the meantime, if you're looking for ways to talk with students about the relationship between the hard history of white supremacy and the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, Learning for Justice resources can help you lead student-responsive, historically grounded discussions about the recent violence.

From the hard work of organizing to the reality of everyday life under Jim Crow, films and literature can bring historical context to life for students. In this episode, we recommend several "must use" films, books, poems and plays for teaching the civil rights movement. We also discuss strategies for incorporating these works across the curricula and for turning even problematic texts into grist for meaningful critical discussions.

Everyone thinks they know the story, but the real history of Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott is even better. This episode details the events that set the stage for Ms. Parks' civil disobedience. You'll meet the leaders and organizations who transformed a moment of activism into a 13-month campaign. And you'll learn about the community that held fast in the face of legal and political attacks, economic coercion, intimidation and violence.

To fully understand the United States today, we have to comprehend the central role that slavery played in our nation's past. That legacy is also the foundation for understanding the civil rights movement and its place within the history of the Black freedom struggle. This episode is a special look back at our first season. It explores and expands on the 10 Key Concepts that ground Learning for Justice's K-12 frameworks for teaching the hard history of American slavery.

You cannot teach the civil rights movement without talking about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. But it's critical that students deconstruct the mythology surrounding the movement's most iconic figure to learn about the man, not just the hero. The real Dr. King held beliefs that evolved over time. A complex man, he was part of a much larger movement-one that shaped him as much as he shaped it.

The civil rights movement was never strictly a Southern phenomenon. To better understand the Jim Crow North, we explore discrimination and Black protest in places like Milwaukee, Omaha, Cleveland and New York. To examine the Black Freedom Movement beyond the South, we examine the Black-led fights to gain access to decent housing, secure quality education and end police brutality in these cities.

Armed resistance and nonviolent direct action co-existed throughout the civil rights era. In this episode, three historians confront some comfortable assumptions about nonviolence and self-defense. Wesley Hogan examines the evolution, value and limitations of nonviolence in the movement. Christopher Strain offers a three-part strategy for rethinking this false dichotomy in the classroom. And Akinyele Umoja offers insights about armed resistance from his research in Mississippi.

Alice Qannik Glenn is the host of Coffee and Quaq and assistant producer of The Forgotten Slavery of our Ancestors. This short, classroom-ready film offers an introduction to the history of Indigenous enslavement on land that is currently the United States. This new resource from Learning for Justice features an extensive group of experts, many of whom will be familiar to listeners from Season 2.

Jim Crow was more than signs and separation. It was a system of terror and violence created to control the labor and regulate the behavior of Black people. In this episode, historian Stephen Berrey unpacks the mechanics of racial oppression, the actions white people took-in and beyond the South-to maintain white supremacy, and the everyday ways Black people fought back. And the directors of the film An Outrage join ELA-teacher Ahmariah Jackson to discuss teaching the racial terror of lynching.

Music chronicles the history of the civil rights struggle: The events, tactics and emotions of the movement are documented in songs of the era. From The Freedom Singers to Sam Cooke, historian Charles L. Hughes explains how your students can use music for both historical insight and evidence in the classroom.

Students don't enter our classrooms as blank slates. When it comes to the civil rights movement, we often have to help our students unlearn what they think they know while we're teaching them what actually happened. The people were more complex, the strategies more complicated and the stakes more dangerous than we like to remember. In this episode, historian Nishani Frazier and social studies teacher Adam Sanchez demonstrate the value of teaching the movement from the grassroots up.

Teaching the civil rights movement accurately and effectively requires deconstructing the myths and misconceptions around it. Most people are familiar with a very specific version of the movement that exaggerates government support and denies the existence and persistence of racism outside the South. Julian Bond called this the "Master Narrative." It celebrates sanitized icons and downplays grassroots organizing. And it overhypes nonviolence while disparaging self-defense and Black Power. In this episode, we talk with historian Nishani Frazier and social studies teacher Adam Sanchez about how to separate fact from fiction in your civil rights teaching.

The systems that enabled and perpetuated African and Indigenous enslavement in what is now the U.S. have much in common, and their histories tell us a great deal about the present. Professors Bethany Jay and Steven Oliver join us to talk about connections between the first two seasons and how to teach them, and we preview what's to come in season three.

In this special call-in episode, listeners share their stories and questions from throughout season 2-including teaching remotely, working with families and stakeholders, and incorporating social justice into subjects like math and science. As educators, we're strongest when we support each other. And you'll hear great suggestions from fellow teachers, like these resources we discuss from Fairfax County Public Schools in Virginia.

It's time for our first call-in show! We know things are chaotic for you and every other educator right now. We feel it too, so this seems like the perfect time to talk. Pick up the phone and dial 888-59-STORY (888-597-8679). Our lines are open until Sunday night, April 19. Teaching hard history is even harder right now, so let's talk about resources you can use if you're teaching virtually. Ask us your questions; tell us your stories. And let us know how you're doing.

Indian Removal was a brutal and complicated effort that textbooks often simplify. It is also inseparably related to slavery. Enslavers seeking profit drove demand for Indigenous lands, displacing hundreds of thousands of Indigenous people. Some of these Indigenous people participated in chattel slavery. Focusing on the Chickasaw and Choctaw nations, this episode pulls the lens back to show how Removal and enslavement must be taught together. This story must be told if we're going to understand the full hard history of American enslavement.

The Americas were built on the lands, labor and lives of Indigenous peoples. Despite being erased from history textbooks after the so-called first Thanksgiving, Indigenous peoples did not disappear. Colonial settlers relied on the cooperation, exploitation and forced labor of their Native neighbors to survive and thrive in what became North America. Focusing on New England, historian Margaret Newell introduces us to the Charter Generation of systematically enslaved people across this continent.

From 1936 to 1938, the Federal Writers' Project collected stories from people who had been enslaved. The WPA Slave Narrative Collection at the Library of Congress is a valuable resource; these oral histories are also problematic. Interpreting these narratives within literary and historical context, students can develop primary source literacy. Historian Cynthia Lynn Lyerly outlines unique insights these texts can add to your curriculum.

To better understand the United States' past and present, we need to better understand Indigenous identities-and classrooms play a huge role. This starts with examining what's missing from our social studies, history, civics and government curricula. Throughout this episode, we reference the K-5 Framework for Teaching Hard History as we shed light on key topics like sovereignty, land and erasure.

Educators can no longer ignore our country's history of Indigenous enslavement. Our students need a fuller understanding of the pivotal history of slavery to comprehend the present and develop a vision for our nation's future. In this mid-season recap, we highlight key lessons about this consequential part of American history-along with teaching strategies and resources-through the voices of leading scholars and educators featured so far.

Throughout the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, the forced labor and bondage of Indigenous peoples was integral to the economic and political history of what became the Southwestern United States. Historian and author Andrés Reséndez outlines the significance of silver mining, Indigenous enslavement and resistance in the history of New Mexico and Latin America. We examine how, as white settlers moved west, so-called "free soil" states like California continued to institutionalize coerced labor.
Listen Now

A hundred years before the first ship carrying enslaved Africans arrived in Virginia, Europeans introduced the commercial practice of enslavement in "The New World." And for the next 400 years, millions of Indigenous people throughout the Americas were enslaved through several forms of forced labor and bondage. Historian and author Andrés Reséndez calls this "The Other Slavery," and his work is changing our understanding of the transatlantic slave trade.
Listen Now

Andrés Reséndez is the author of The Other Slavery: The Uncovered Story of Indian Enslavement in America. His work has changed conventional wisdom about the institution of slavery in the Atlantic world. Over the next two episodes, host Hasan Kwame Jeffries and Reséndez will discuss key turning points in this history-exploring how it expands our understanding of the transatlantic slave trade and the lasting legacy of colonialism, which continues to reverberate in our communities. Be sure to join us.
Listen Now

Each autumn, Thanksgiving brings a disturbing amount of inaccurate information and troubling myths into classrooms across the United States. Most students don't learn much about the history of Native nations-and even less about Indigenous peoples today. Dr. Debbie Reese explains what to look for and what to avoid (or teach with a critical lens) when selecting children's books by and about Indigenous people. She also recommends specific books to counter common misconceptions in your classroom.
Listen Now

Children's books are often the primary way young students are exposed to the history of American slavery. But many books about slavery sugarcoat oppression. Professor Ebony Elizabeth Thomas examines what we should consider when it comes to how children's books portray African Americans and Indigenous people, their cultures and the effects of enslavement. She also explains why it's crucial to create "a balance of narratives" when selecting books about marginalized and underrepresented communities.
Listen Now

For elementary teachers approaching the topic of slavery, it can be tempting to focus only on heroes and avoid explaining oppression. But teachers' omissions speak as loudly as what they choose to include. And what children learn in the early grades has broad consequences for the rest of their education. Dr. Kate Shuster guides us through the new Teaching Hard History K-5 framework from Learning for Justice. We also learn how four elementary teachers are beginning to use it in their classrooms.
Listen Now

Understanding Indigenous enslavement expands our conception of slavery in what is now the United States. It spread across the entire continent and affected millions of people of different backgrounds. If we define slavery too narrowly, we can fail to see its persistence over time and even its modern-day permutations. Historian Christina Snyder examines the Civil War, Lincoln and emancipation with Indigenous people in mind.
Listen Now

Millions of Indigenous people lived in North America before European colonial powers invaded. Along with an insatiable desire for free labor, Europeans brought a system of slavery that significantly differed from the historical practices of enslavement among Native nations. Historian Christina Snyder tells the story of what happened when these worlds collided. European concepts of bondage transformed the way Native nations interacted with each other, resulted in the enslavement and death of millions of Indigenous people, and sparked widespread resistance by Native nations.
Listen Now

The Smithsonian's Eduardo Díaz and Renée Gokey discuss the importance of learning about Indigenous enslavement. And former Teaching Tolerance Director Maureen Costello explains all of the program's classroom resources available for teaching this history, including a first-of-its-kind K-5 framework.
Listen Now

We're turning our attention to the enslavement of Indigenous people, spending more time with teachers in the classroom and adding support for K-5 educators. Tune in next week for more advice about teaching the history and long legacy of American slavery.
Listen Now

Download the transcript for all of season 1 here.

Historian Bethany Jay returns - answering questions from educators across the country. Host Hasan Kwame Jeffries and the co-editor of Understanding and Teaching American Slavery confront teacher anxieties and counter misconceptions in our season finale.
Listen Now

From elementary to high school, YA literature can introduce fundamental themes and information about slavery, especially when paired with primary sources. John H. Bickford shows how to capitalize on the strengths and weaknesses of trade books about slavery.
Listen Now

Using the present to explore the past. Tamara Spears and Jordan Lanfair suggest a Social Studies unit about Resistance & Kanye West, and a set of English Language Arts lessons examining holidays to understand the legacy of American slavery.
Listen Now

How it's done. Tamara Spears teaches middle school Social Studies in New York and Jordan Lanfair is a high school English Language Arts teacher in Chicago. Each has been developing additional lessons about slavery for years. They share their experiences.
Listen Now

Over the next few episodes, we're bringing Season One to a close. Tune in for stories from the classroom, guidance for elementary teachers and language arts classes. And answers to questions from listeners like you.
Listen Now

Enslavement didn't end with Emancipation. Historian James Brewer Stewart discusses modern-day slavery happening across the world-and right here in the U.S.-showing educators how to connect the past with the present.
Listen Now

A listener's question leads to a meaningful moment. And now we want more! Take a listen, then email us to tell us your story about teaching hard history for an upcoming, special episode.
Listen Now

At James Madison's Montpelier, the legacy of enslaved people isn't silenced-and their descendants have a voice. Christian Cotz, Price Thomas and Dr. Patrice Preston Grimes explain how that happened, and why it's important.
Listen Now

In the United States, justice was never blind. Historian Paul Finkelman goes beyond legal jargon to illustrate how slavery was entangled with the opinions of the Court-and encoded into the Constitution itself.
Listen Now

Constitutional historian Paul Finkelman explains the deeply racist bargains the founding fathers struck in order to unify the country under one document and discusses what students need to know about how slavery defined America after the Revolution.
Listen Now

Film historian Ron Briley returns with more documentary, feature film and miniseries suggestions for history and English instructors. From Ken Burns to Black Panther, this episode offers background and strategies for incorporating pop culture into classroom lessons.
Listen Now

Film has long shaped our nation's historical memory, for good and bad. Film historian Ron Briley offers ways to responsibly use films in the classroom to reframe the typical narrative of American slavery and Reconstruction.
Listen Now

Most students leave school thinking enslaved people lived like characters in Gone With the Wind. Dr. Deirdre Cooper Owens reveals the remarkable diversity of lived experiences within slavery and explains the gap between what scholars and students know.
Listen Now

To see a more complete picture of the experience of enslaved people, you have to redefine resistance. Dr. Kenneth S. Greenberg offers teachers a lens to help students see the ways in which enslaved people fought back against the brutality of slavery.
Listen Now

Students learning about slavery often ask, "Why didn't enslaved people just run away or revolt?" Lindsay Anne Randall offers a lesson in "Process Drama"-a method teachers can use to answer this question, build empathy and offer perspective.
Listen Now

In many ways, the U.S. has fallen short of its ideals. How can we explain this to students-particularly in the context of discussing slavery? Professor Steven Thurston Oliver has this advice for teachers: Face your fears.
Listen Now

Follow the money. Dr. Christy Clark-Pujara explains why American slavery couldn't have existed without a national commercial infrastructure that supported and benefited from the labor of enslaved people.
Listen Now

Dr. Bethany Jay is back to talk about teaching the end of the Civil War, and how enslaved people's participation in the war helped subvert the institution of slavery.
Listen Now

What really caused the Civil War? In this episode, Salem State University Professor Bethany Jay offers tips for teaching lesser-known history that clarifies this question and cuts through our cloudy national understanding of the Confederacy.
Listen Now

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
What we don't know about American history hurts us all. Teaching Hard History begins with the long and brutal legacy of chattel slavery and reaches through the victories of and violent responses to the civil rights movement to the present day.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Until now, the slaves who lived at Monticello, Thomas Jefferson's Virginia estate, existed largely in the background.

On Saturday, Monticello unveiled new exhibits designed to amplify hundreds of people whose enslavement helped create and run the Founding Father's grandiose home.

One of the most well-known of these slaves was Sally Hemings. She's widely believed to have been mother to six of his children, although that fact was once fiercely disputed by some.

As NPR reported last year, Christa Dierksheide, a historian for the Thomas Jefferson Foundation at Monticello, says it wasn't until the 1990s that Hemings' story was included in the history of Monticello, as the narrative upset the reputation of Jefferson, the man who wrote "all men are created equal."

Before Saturday, visitors could learn about Hemings and tour the living quarters of other slaves. Now, in the newly renovated space believed to be Hemings' room, Monticello sheds light on who she was as a human.

Gayle Jessup White, who helped launch the new exhibits, is a descendant of Sally Hemings' brother and, through another ancestor, of Thomas Jefferson. White says Hemings' room would've been part of the main house, in a cellar-like area of what the museum calls the South Wing.

"It's not a recreation of what her room would've looked like at the time, but rather, a presentation of Sally Hemings as a fully-dimensioned human being: a mother, a sister, a daughter, a world traveler," White says.

Like all of the enslaved people here, White says, Hemings was multi-dimensional. "That's the story that we want the public, our guests, to understand."

Previously, Monticello held two separate tours - one of the house and one of Mulberry Row, where the enslaved people lived and worked. In other words, visitors could decide whether to experience this darker side of history.

But by introducing new exhibits that are interwoven into one tour, Monticello acknowledges the dynamic experience helps complete its history.

"Going forward, guests will have a tour that is all-inclusive, that tells the story not only of Thomas Jefferson and his family but of the enslaved families as well," White says. "It's not just about Thomas Jefferson, it's about the people who made Thomas Jefferson's life possible. And that would've been the enslaved people who kept this plantation running."

Many Americans don't want to confront our country's ugliest period, she says. "But at Monticello we're giving humanity to people long forgotten. And the people to whom we're giving humanity are my people - they're my family."
NPR's Elizabeth Baker and Martha Wexler produced and edited this story for broadcast.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Jefferson's Monticello Makes Room For Sally Hemings

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Until now, the slaves who lived at Monticello, Thomas Jefferson's Virginia estate, existed largely in the background. On Saturday, Monticello unveiled new exhibits designed to amplify hundreds of people whose enslavement helped create and run the Founding Father's grandiose home. One of the most well-known of these slaves was Sally Hemings.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Check back here often to learn fascinating new things about Monticello, Thomas Jefferson, and the Foundation.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
At the desert site of an internment camp in California, an 86-year-old man leads tours of what was home to him and 10,000 other Japanese-Americans during World War II.

Image

A Japanese-American internment camp, called Manzanar, in California in July 1942. Credit Hulton Archive/Getty Images

I first read the word "Manzanar" when I was about 8 years old. It was in a book that a teacher gave me as a parting gift when my family left San Francisco for Upper Arlington, Ohio. "In case you ever feel alone," she said.

I return to Ohio once a year for the Fourth of July. I spent most of this week tearing apart my childhood room, sifting through dusty boxes and shelves in search of that book, " Amelia's Notebook," by Marissa Moss.

It's a first-person story of a girl who moved away from California. In a sequel, Amelia described a family trip in which she first visited Manzanar: "It was like a camp for war prisoners, only these people weren't enemy soldiers, just regular people - kids even!"

"I can't believe it really happened," Amelia said, "but you can still see some guard posts and a cemetery with Japanese writing on the gravestones ... But no one ever told me."

I forgot about Manzanar until 10th grade. It was 2004; George W. Bush had just been re-elected, the second battle of Falluja raged in Iraq, and the United States was contending with post-9/11 Islamophobia.

After a brief lesson on Executive Order 9066, which led to the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II, our American studies class voted that the decision was ultimately the right one. The country had to make wartime sacrifices in the name of national security, my classmates reasoned.

A list of Japanese-Americans who were held at Manzanar is kept at the site's visitor center. Credit James Tensuan for The New York Times

I remember staring at my desk, face burning and not daring to look up. As the only Asian-American in that 50-student class, I wasn't about to raise my hand.

The Zeiglers - the husband-and-wife team who taught the class - were swift and unequivocal in their response. They told us that they were very disappointed; that the decision had since been universally condemned, and the United States had apologized and compensated survivors in 1988. "Maybe it's because of everything that's going on right now," Ms. Zeigler said, shaking her head in dismay.

Last week, the Supreme Court took the Zeiglers' view, tossing out the 1944 Court ruling that had upheld the internments.

I was surprised that we were even learning about Japanese internment. It was the first time I had heard the subject being discussed, and I was also acutely aware that some of my classmates had tugged at the corners of their eyelids to greet me when we were younger. And yet we sat side by side, looking together at archival images of signs that read "Japs keep moving - this is a white man's neighborhood."

In my mind, it was a uniquely American story. Most of those who were interned were American citizens, like myself: born and raised in the United States, but considered the enemy because of how they looked. It wasn't my experience, or my family's, as Korean-Americans. But by studying others' lives, we learned of a collective past that tenuously connected us to a present that we struggled to understand.

Mas Okui, who was sent to Manzanar with his family when he was 10 years old, guiding a tour at the nearby Eastern California Museum in Independence, Calif., in April. Credit James Tensuan for The New York Times

After World War II ended, the prisoners scattered. Some headed east, wanting to put the camps behind them. Others returned to the West Coast and tried to pick up where they had left off, but had trouble resettling, acting as if nothing had happened.

Then there are those, like Mas Okui, whose "search for a defining experience which shaped Japanese-American identity led them to Manzanar." Mr. Okui was sent to the camp with his family when he was 10 years old. Born and raised in the Los Angeles area, he returned home after his release and taught high school history and social studies for decades. One of his assignments was to require students to interview a person who had lived through an important event in history.

Mr. Okui, 86, now educates visitors to Manzanar. "I felt it was incumbent on me, and I'll do it as long as I can," he told me as I recently joined one of his tours. Maybe we revisit the past to better understand ourselves and to help shape a better future. And maybe we do so by returning to the places that have been instrumental in forming who we are.

Near the end of my stay in Ohio, I went for a run, past a neighbor's sign urging passers-by to "Make America Great Again." As I retraced the familiar path home, I looped back, cutting across a lawn and nearly stumbling into another yard sign. It read: "No matter where you are from, we're glad you're our neighbor."
In our interactive story, Mr. Okui leads a tour of Manzanar [Visit]
Inyoung Kang is an editor on the news desk at The Times.

Inyoung Kang is an editor and producer based in New York. @inyoungk

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
'I Can't Believe It Really Happened': Remembering Manzanar

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
At the desert site of an internment camp in California, an 86-year-old man leads tours of what was home to him and 10,000 other Japanese-Americans during World War II. I first read the word "Manzanar" when I was about 8 years old.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Africans organized their societies around the family unit, and gold supply often dictated which society held the most power-until the start of the Atlantic slave trade.

The beginning of the Atlantic slave trade in the late 1400s disrupted African societal structure as Europeans infiltrated the West African coastline, drawing people from the center of the continent to be sold into slavery.

New sugar and tobacco plantations in the Americas and Caribbean heightened the demand for enslaved people, ultimately forcing a total of 12.5 million Africans across the Atlantic and into slavery.

Early West African society

West Africa stretches from modern-day Mauritania to the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It encompasses lush rainforests along the equator, savannas on either side of the forest, and much drier land to the north. Until about 600 CE, most Africans living in this area were hunter-gatherers. In the driest areas, herders maintained sheep, goats, cattle, or camels. In the more heavily wooded area near the equator, farmers raised yams, palm products, or plantains. The savanna areas yielded crops including rice, millet, and sorghum.

Although there were large trading centers along the rivers-the Senegal, Gambia, Niger, Volta, and Congo-most West Africans lived in small villages and identified primarily with their extended family or clan, rather than an ethnic or national identity. Wives, children, and dependents were a sign of wealth; men frequently practiced polygyny, or the custom of having more than one wife. In times of need, West Africans relied on relatives from near and far for support. Hundreds of separate dialects emerged from different west African clans; in modern Nigeria, nearly 500 languages are still spoken.

African societies practiced human bondage long before the Atlantic slave trade began. Famine or fear of stronger enemies might force one tribe to ask another for help and give themselves in bondage in exchange for assistance. Similar to the European serf system, those seeking protection or relief from starvation would become the servants of those who provided relief. Debt might also be worked off through some form of servitude. Furthermore, prisoners of war between different African societies oftentimes became enslaved.

Typically, these servants became a part of the extended tribal family. There is some evidence of chattel slavery, in which people were treated as personal property, in the Nile Valley. It appears there was a slave-trade route through the Sahara that brought sub-Saharan Africans to Rome, a global center of slavery.

Religion and the African empire

Religious movement helped shape African societal structure. Following the death of the prophet Muhammad in 632 CE, Islam spread quickly across North Africa, bringing not only a unifying faith but a political and legal structure as well. Only those who had converted to Islam could rule or be engaged in trade.

The first major empire to emerge in West Africa was the Ghana Empire. By 750, the Soninke farmers of the region had become wealthy by taxing traders who traversed their area. For instance, the Niger River basin supplied gold to the Amazigh (Berber) and Arab traders from west of the Nile Valley, who brought cloth, weapons, and manufactured goods into the African interior. Since Ghana's king controlled the gold supply, he was able to maintain price controls and afford a strong military.

Soon, however, a new kingdom emerged. By 1200 CE, under the leadership of Sundiata Keita, Mali replaced Ghana as the leading state in West Africa. After Sundiata's rule, the court converted to Islam, and Muslim scribes played a large part in administration and government. Miners then discovered huge new deposits of gold east of the Niger River. By the 14th century, the empire was so wealthy that while on a hajj, or pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca, Mali's ruler Mansa Musa gave away enough gold to create serious price inflation in the cities along his route. Timbuktu, the capital city, became a leading Islamic center for education, commerce, and the slave trade.

The Atlantic slave trade

The European slave trade began with Portugal's exploration of the west coast of Africa in search of a sea trade route to the East. The East had bountiful new resources, like spices and silk, and the Portuguese were eager to acquire these goods without the laborious journey by land from Europe to Asia.

In 1482, Portuguese traders built Elmina Castle in present-day Ghana, on the west coast of Africa. Originally built as a fortified trading post, the castle had mounted cannons facing out to sea, not inland toward continental Africa. The Portuguese had greater fear of a naval attack from other Europeans than of a land attack from Africans.

Although the Portuguese originally used the fort for trading gold, by the 16th century they had shifted their focus to trading enslaved people, as the demand for slave labor ballooned in the New World. The dungeon of the fort morphed to serve as a holding pen for Africans from the interior of the continent. On the upper floors, Portuguese traders ate, slept, and prayed. Enslaved people lived in the dungeon for weeks or months until ships arrived to transport them to Europe or the Americas. For them, the dungeon of Elmina was their last sight of their home continent.

By 1444, the Portuguese brought enslaved people from Africa to work on the sugar plantations of the Madeira Islands, off the coast of modern Morocco. The slave trade then expanded across the Atlantic as European colonies demanded an ever-increasing number of workers for the extensive plantations growing the labor-intensive crops of tobacco, sugar, and eventually rice and cotton.

Soon, the Spanish, Dutch, and English all followed the Portuguese in transporting enslaved people across the Atlantic. The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database estimates that 12.5 million Africans were sent through the Middle Passage -across the Atlantic-to work in the New World. Many Africans died on their way to the Americas, and those who did arrive often faced conditions worse than the slave ships. Soon, the Atlantic slave trade would contribute to enshrining a racial hierarchy into New World culture.

What do you think?

How did religion, natural resources, and location each determine the prosperity of African societies?

What role did the Atlantic slave trade play within European competition during the colonial era?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
African societies and the beginning of the Atlantic slave trade (article) | Khan Academy

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Learn for free about math, art, computer programming, economics, physics, chemistry, biology, medicine, finance, history, and more. Khan Academy is a nonprofit with the mission of providing a free, world-class education for anyone, anywhere.