This popular reader uses both primary and secondary sources to explore social history topics and sharpen students' interpretive skills. Each chapter includes one secondary source essay and several related primary source documents. Chapter introductions tie the readings together and pose questions to consider.

Table of Contents:
VOLUME I (1492-1877) I. Colonial Society, 1492-1783 1. The First Americans ESSAY Peter Nabokov with Dean Snow, Algonquians and Iroquoians: Farmers of the Woodlands DOCUMENTS "Of the Naturall Inhabitants of Virginia," 1624 Recollections of a "White Indian" (1759), 1823 An Indian's View, 1805 The Indians of New Mexico, 1599 2. Conflicting Cultural Values in Early America ESSAY T.H. Breen, Looking Out for Number One: Conflicting Cultural Values in Early Seventeenth-Century Virginia DOCUMENTS Virginia, A Troubled Colony, 1622 The Experiences of an Indentured Servant, 1623 "We shall be as a City upon a Hill," 1630 3. Husbands and Wives, Parents and Children in Puritan Society ESSAY Steven Mintz and Susan Kellogg, The Godly Family of Colonial Massachusetts DOCUMENTS Two Poems, 1678 A Law for "the good education of children," 1642 Monitoring Style and Behavior in Puritan Massachusetts, 1675 Good Manners for Colonial Children, 1722 4. The Enslavement of Africans in Britain's American Colonies ESSAY Jon Butler, The Evolution of Slavery in Colonial America DOCUMENTS Virginia Statutes Regarding Slavery, 1662, 1669 Recollections of the Middle Passage, 1788 5. Eighteenth-Century Religion: Progress and Piety ESSAY Alan Taylor, Awakenings DOCUMENTS A New York Act to Encourage the Baptizing of Negro, Indian and Mulatto Slaves, 1706 The Great Awakening in Connecticut, 1740 "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," 1741 6. Urban Life in the Eighteenth-Century ESSAY Pauline Maier, Boston and New York in the Eighteenth Century DOCUMENTS Benjamin Franklin's Union Fire Company, 1738 Philadelphia, 1748 The Scourge of Yellow Fever, Philadelphia, 1793 New Orleans, 1751 7. People at War: Society During the American Revolution ESSAY Alfred F. Young, George Robert Twelves Hewes, A Patriot Shoemaker of Boston DOCUMENTS "Remember the Ladies," Abigail and John Adams Exchange Views, 1776 Travails of a Loyalist Wife and Mother, 1777 A New Hampshire Boy Joins the Navy, 1779 Part I Suggestions for Further Reading II. Social Life in a New Nation, 1784-1877 8. The Onset of Industry: The Lowell Venture ESSAY Tom Dublin, Women, Work, and Protest in the Early Lowell Mills DOCUMENTS Recollections of a Strike (1836), 1898 "Regulations to Be Observed," Hamilton Manufacturing Company, 1848 A Mill Worker's Grievances, 1845 9. The Cherokee Removal: An American Tragedy ESSAY Dee Brown, The Trail of Tears DOCUMENTS Memorial of the Cherokee Nation, 1830 Removal Defended, 1830 The "Crime" of Removal, 1838 10. Moving West ESSAY Malcolm J. Rorbough, To California by Sea and by Land DOCUMENTS Oregon Fever, 1845 Emigrants to Texas, c. 1857 The Promise of California, 1846 A Letter from Oregon Territory, 1847 11. Paths to Salvation: Revivalism and Communitarianism ESSAY Paul E. Johnson, Charles Finney's Rochester Revival DOCUMENTS Religious Excitability, 1835 " This COUNTRY IS RUN MAD after preaching, c. 1830 Visiting the Shakers, c. 1841 A Letter from Brook Farm, 1841 12. New People in a New Land ESSAY Tyler Anbinder, From Famine to Five Points Documents Imminent Dangers, 1835 Coming to the Aid of Immigrants, 1857-1858 Resolves of Welcome and Support, 1847 13. The Age of Reform ESSAY Margaret Hope Bacon, Lucretia Mott: Pioneers for Peace DOCUMENTS An Abolitionist's Fourth of July, 1852 Songs of the Temperance Movement, 1847 The "Reformatory and Elevating Influences" of the Public Schools, 1848 Resolutions of the Seneca Falls Convention, 1848 14. Plantation Society in the Antebellum South ESSAY Drew Gilpin Faust, Culture, Conflict, and Community on an Antebellum Plantation DOCUMENTS Managing Slaves, 1837 Songs of Freedom, c. 1820-1860 A Sad Epoch in the Life of a Slave Girl, 1861 15. The Soldiers' Civil War ESSAY James L. McDonough, Glory Can Not Atone: Shiloh--April, 6, 7, 1862 DOCUMENTS A Black Soldier Writes to President Lincoln, 1863 Andersonville: "...death stalked on every hand," 1864 Recollections of War, 1875 16. Reconstruction: Triumphs and Tragedies ESSAY Mark Andrew Huddle, To Educate a Race Documents A Letter To My Old Master, c.1865 The Knights of the White Camelia, 1868 Frederick Douglass Demands the Franchise, c. 1865 Part II Suggestions for Further Reading