December 1956

Mrs. Howe jotted down the “Battle Hymn” in haste, but she lived to hear a nation sing it, and went to her grave to its tune

Some became great, others stayed as they were-- and their story tells of the rise of the Midwest

From his great-grandfather’s papers a poet re-creates that hard-working man of many parts—sailor, farmer, merchant financier—the New England sea captain

It’s the sort of thing that couldn’t happen now, but in the Revolution Molly Corbin and Molly Pitcher were first-rate cannoneers

A special supplement prepared for American Heritage

A cultivated and subtle musical art form nourished the Puritans in the wilderness

If its day was brief, it raised the hem, leveled the classes, and widened a generation’s horizons

Brilliant Benjamin Thompson won world fame as Count Rumford the scientist but never dispelled his countrymen’s suspicions

The story of Manjiro, the shipwrecked waif; of the kindly captain from Fairhaven; and of how Japan, hidden away from the world, learned strange news of other lands

One of the saddest tales in American history tells how a well-intentioned President lost a dazzling opportunity

Washington was his idol, but he could not apply his American ideals to a France sliding into the Terror