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Eric Herschthal, a history doctoral student at Columbia University, has written for The New York Times, The Atlantic Monthly, The New Republic, and elsewhere.

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New York’s First Black Millionaire

COLDHEARTED

Jeremiah Hamilton was a rapacious, double-dealing millionaire in 19th-century America. But Wall Street never let him forget he was black.

Eric Herschthal | Published Dec 04, 2015

The American Revolution’s Losers Weren’t All British

HIDDEN HISTORIES

African American slaves and Native American tribes were often collateral damage in the war for independence.

AD BY The Daily Beast | Published Jul 04, 2015

How Slavery Gave Capitalism Its Start

HORRIBLE TRUTH

Capitalism in the U.S. owes much of its start to slavery, which in turn owed much of its success to government handouts.

Eric Herschthal | Published Apr 24, 2015

Sex Lives of our Founding Fathers

Breeched

Did Hamilton have gay sex? Was Jefferson in love with his slave? Each generation sees in the sex lives of the Founding Fathers what it wants to see.

Eric Herschthal | Published Feb 21, 2014

How Blacks Freed Themselves

Bondage

Who should get the most credit for ending slavery in America and Great Britain? A landmark new book argues that blacks did far more for their own emancipation than previously appreciated.

Eric Herschthal | Published Feb 18, 2014

Revolutionary Cross-Dresser

Racy

In the American Revolution a woman named Deborah Samson donned men’s clothes and fought the British. Now transgender novelist Alex Myers has told her story and explores sexual identity in the 18th century.

Eric Herschthal | Published Feb 04, 2014

How America Was Made

United We Stand

When historian Simon Winchester became American, he decided to set out to understand how the country developed. His new book tells the story of the men who shaped and united America. He talks to Eric Herschthal about what he found.

Eric Herschthal | Published Oct 17, 2013

The North’s Slavery Problem

Not Just the South

Was slavery just as harmful in its benign form in the colonial North as it was in the prerevolutionary South? Eric Herschthal on a new history.

Eric Herschthal | Published May 07, 2013

The Original Slave Colony

Plantation Blues

Barbados presaged all British slave settlements. Andrea Stuart talks to Eric Herschthal about the island’s—and her family’s—tormented history.

Eric Herschthal | Published Jan 24, 2013

Occupy Railroads

Station to Station

<p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Great-American-Railroad-War-Notorious/dp/0312667590/" target="_blank"><i>The Great American Railroad War</i></a><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Great-American-Railroad-War-Notorious/dp/0312667590/"></a> claims that Gilded Age journalists took on railroad tycoons—the equivalent of today’s Wall Street fat-cat bankers—and won. But Eric Herschthal says the press was no hero.</p>

Eric Herschthal | Published Aug 26, 2012

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