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19th Century America

The 19th was the United States' first full century as a nation. It was full of birth pangs, moments of triumph, and things that made everyone shake their head and wonder what was going on. One of the most interesting of the latter bits was when British ex-pat Joshua Norton crowned himself Emperor of the United States, "reigning" from San Francisco.

Most people remember the 19th century for the Civil War. While it certainly was a significant event, one of the most important events in American history even, there were a number of surrounding factors that were just as important, and without which the War Between the States would never have developed.

Arguably the most significant of these was Western Expansion. The idea that Americans were fulfilling some kind of national destiny by claiming the Western part of the continent was called Manifest Destiny, and its origins can be found in the writings of some of the most prominent Founding Fathers, like Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. Their dedication to the Enlightenment ideal of human progress (that mankind controlled its own destiny, and that that destiny was to move ever forward) translated into a need to expand their country as far as possible.

As with anything else, God used that humanist doctrine to advance His own truth. While politicians and opportunists went West to obtain land, gold, and freedom, Christian missionaries went to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ. People like Marcus and Narcissa Whitman and Jason Lee braved the Oregon Trail simply to share their faith with the Native Americans in the Western Territories; the Whitmans even gave their lives, becoming the Pacific Northwest's most famous martyrs.

Meanwhile, back in the East the bigwigs were conspiring to breach the 3,000 mile gap between the East and West coasts with a recently improved invention: the steam engine train. The First Transcontinental Railroad wasn't completed till 1869 (four years after the Civil War had ended), but it's origins reach back to the 1840s when it was first envisioned by Asa Whitney.

In fact, the transcontinental railroad was a significant element of Abraham Lincoln's presidential campaign and administration. This was the problem: the North wanted the Trans to go through their territory because they had so much industrial product to move, while the South wanted it to run through the bottom half of the States so they could transport cotton, sorghum, and other agricultural goods.

The reality was a bit of a compromise, but the violent debates that stirred Congress had no small part in fomenting the division that would ultimately erupt in full-blown war. Slavery was the main issue, but it affected so many other factors that to reduce the origins of the Civil War to slavery alone is a bit revisionist and narrow-sighted.

For a lot of the 19th century, it seemed that the United States led a charmed existence, that Progress was a sure thing and there was nothing really to fear, certainly no problem that couldn't be overcome. The last two decades were exceedingly prosperous, leading to a sense of smug optimism that only the terror of World War I, the moral chaos of the Jazz Age, and the sudden insecurity of the Great Depression could effectively end.

Not everyone was man-centered and materialistic, however. The 19th century saw a surge in evangelism unlike anything the fledgling nation had seen, so pervasive and productive that it was called the Second Great Awakening. Unfortunately, a lot of doctrinal dilution came with the new preaching, but there were plenty of genuine conversions, and much good came of them.

It's difficult to reduce a one hundred year span to a few paragraphs, and there are certainly things we could have mentioned. Comprehensive treatments aren't always the best way to study history, though; each era has its own spirit and attitudes (its own zeitgeist, if you want to get all technical and German) that best represent it. We hope you'll bear that in mind in your study of the 19th century in America, and indeed throughout your study of history here and around the globe.

Topics of Interest from the 19th Century:

Review by C. Hollis Crossman
C. Hollis Crossman used to be a child. Now he is a husband and father, teaches adult Sunday school in his Presbyterian congregation, and likes weird stuff. He might be a mythical creature, but he's definitely not a centaur.Read more of his reviews here.
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Abe Lincoln Gets His Chance
by Frances Cavanah
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Biography for 3rd-6th grade
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Abraham Lincoln in Peace and War
by Earl Schenck Miers
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American Barns and Covered Bridges
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American Children Through Their Books
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Carry On, Mr. Bowditch
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1956 Newbery Medal winner
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Chief Joseph Country
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Children of the Wild West
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Civil War Battles
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Clara Barton: Amazing Civil War Nurse
Amazing Americans
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Coming Fury
Centennial History of the Civil War Volume 1
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Death Valley Scotty
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Early Days of a Cowboy on the Pecos
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Embattled Rebel
by James M. McPherson
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Enemies of Slavery
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Facing West
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Famous American Trails
by Bruce Grant; illustrated by Lorence F. Bjorklund
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Fields of Fury
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First Step
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Flaming Arrows
by William O. Steele, Illustrated by Paul Galdone
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Food and Recipes of Westward Expansion
Cooking Throughout American History
by George Erdosh
1st edition from PowerKids Press
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$3.60 (1 in stock)
Fortune's Bones
by Marilyn Nelson, notes and annotations by Pamela Espeland
from Front Street
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2005 Coretta Scott King Author Honor Book
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$4.80 (1 in stock)
Forward March to Freedom
by Barbara Kay Greenleaf
from Grosset & Dunlap
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From Log Cabin to White House with Abraham Lincoln - Set
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From Slave Ship to Freedom Road
by Julius Lester
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Gathering of Days
by Joan Blos
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1980 Newbery Medal winner
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Gettysburg: Battle & Battlefield
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Gettysburg: The Last Invasion
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$8.00 (1 in stock)
Gilded Age: A History in Documents
Pages From History
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Going West
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Harriet Beecher Stowe
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History of Human Society: Pioneer America
The History of Human Society
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1st edition from Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.
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Home Crafts (Historic Communities)
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from Crabtree Publishing
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House Divided
by Ben Ames Williams, jacket & illustrations by Reginald Marsh
from Houghton Mifflin
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I am Sacagawea
Ordinary People Change the World
by Brad Meltzer, illustrated by Christopher Eliopoulos
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$4.00 (1 in stock)
Image of War: 1861-1865 Volume 1
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from Nelson Doubleday, Inc.
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$5.00 (1 in stock)
Incredible Journey of Lewis and Clark
by Rhoda Blumberg
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Historical Reference for 4th-6th grade
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$8.00 (1 in stock)
Inventing the Future
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from National Geographic
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Jacksonland
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$6.40 (1 in stock)
James Fenimore Cooper
by Donald A. Ringe
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Jeb Stuart
Historical American Biographies
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Jefferson Davis and His Generals
by Steven E. Woodworth
from University Press of Kansas
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$4.80 (1 in stock)
John Brown Russwurm
by Mary Sagarin, Introduction by Ernest Kaiser
1st edition from Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Books
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John Brown's Body
by Stephen Vincent Benet
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Pulitzer Prize Winner
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$5.00 (1 in stock)
John Brown: One Man Against Slavery
by Gwen Everett, Illustrated by Jacob Lawrence
from Rizzoli International Publications
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$3.20 (1 in stock)
John James Audubon: Painting America's Wildlife
by Janet Stevenson, illustrated by Robert Boehmer
from Encyclopedia Britannica
for 7th-10th grade
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$9.60 (1 in stock)
John Wanamaker: King of Merchants
by William Allen Zulker
from Eaglecrest Press
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$4.80 (1 in stock)
Joshua Barney
by Ralph D. Paine
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$7.00 (1 in stock)
Kathleen: A Yankee Girl at Gettysburg
by Alice Turner Curtis
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$4.40 (1 in stock)
Kidnapped Circus
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$4.00 (1 in stock)
Kids at Work
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1995 NCTE Orbis Pictus Honor Book
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$6.40 (1 in stock)
Killer Angels
by Michael Shaara
1st edition from Ballantine Books
Historical Fiction for 9th-Adult
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Kit Carson: Folk Hero and Man
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from Doubleday & Company
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Last Princess
by Fay Stanley; illustrated by Diane Stanley
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Picture Book Biographies for Kindergarten-3rd grade
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$8.00 (1 in stock)
Laura's Album
by William Anderson
1st edition from HarperCollins
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$9.00 (1 in stock)
Leaders of the North and South
Civil War Chronicles
by Bill Sell
from MetroBooks
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$5.60 (1 in stock)
Leafy Rivers
by Jessamyn West
First Edition from Harcourt, Brace & World
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$4.00 (1 in stock)
Lewis and Clark and Me
by Laurie Myers
from Henry Holt and Company
Fictionalized Biography for 3rd-6th grade
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$4.00 (1 in stock)
Life on the Mississippi
Signet Classics
by Mark Twain
from Harper & Brothers
Autobiography for 9th-Adult
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$7.20 (1 in stock)
Lincoln: A Photobiography
by Russell Freedman
from Houghton Mifflin
Biography for 5th-9th grade
1988 Newbery Medal winner
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$6.40 (2 in stock)
Little House in the Big Woods
by Laura Ingalls Wilder, illustrated by Garth Williams
Book Club Edition from Harper & Row
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$3.20 (1 in stock)
Little House in the Big Woods
by Laura Ingalls Wilder
Uniform Edition from Harper & Brothers
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in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$5.60 (1 in stock)
Little House in the Big Woods (Pictorial Cover)
by Laura Ingalls Wilder
from Harper & Row
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$5.60 (4 in stock)
Little Women
by Louisa May Alcott, illustrator unknown
Undated from M. A. Donohue & Company
Realistic Romantic Fiction for 5th-8th grade
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$9.60 (1 in stock)
Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy
by Gary D. Schmidt
from Scholastic Inc.
for 7th-9th grade
2005 Newbery Honor Book
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$6.40 (1 in stock)
Lotta Crabtree
by Lois V. Harris
from Pelican Publishing Company
for 3rd-6th grade
in Biographies (Location: BIO)
$3.20 (1 in stock)
Make Way for Sam Houston
by Jean Fritz; illustrated by Elise Primavera
First Edition from G.P. Putnam's Sons
for 3rd-6th grade
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$3.20 (1 in stock)
Mama Went to Jail for the Vote
by Kathleen Karr, illustrated by Malene Laugesen
from Hyperion Books for Children
for Preschool-2nd grade
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$4.80 (1 in stock)
Many Thousand Gone
by Virginia Hamilton
from Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.
for 4th-6th grade
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$9.00 (1 in stock)
Mark Twain
by Edward Wagenknecht
2nd Printing, 1962 from University of Oklahoma Press
for 10th-Adult
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$6.40 (1 in stock)
Mark Twain and the Queens of the Mississippi
by Cheryl Harness
from Simon and Schuster
Biography for 2nd-5th grade
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$9.60 (1 in stock)
Massacre at Fall Creek
by Jessamyn West
from Harcourt Brace Jovanich
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$4.80 (1 in stock)
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