Tagged Philadelphia History
Mary Pope Osborne | Magic Tree House: To the Future, Ben Franklin! with Natalie Pope Boyce
Tickets on sale Tuesday, April 23 at 10:00 a.m. Mary Pope Osborne is the prolific author of the beloved Magic Tree House series of children’s books. Featuring time-traveling brother and sister Jack and Annie, the wildly popular…
Historic Preservation in Philadelphia
Paul Steinke, Executive Director of the Preservation Alliance for Greater Philadelphia, will discuss the challenges of historic preservation in a growing city with a robust development climate. He will give an overview of the…
Author Talk: Bill Double
Author Bill Double will present his book Philadelphia’s Washington Square and sign copies of the book, which will be available for purchase. This book recounts the fascinating history of Washington Square, which has played a…
Lorene Cary | Ladysitting: My Year with Nana at the End of Her Century
“A powerful storyteller, frankly sensual [and] mortally funny" ( New York Times ), Lorene Cary is the author of the novels Pride , The Price of a Child , If Sons, Then Heirs , and the memoir Black Ice . A senior lecturer in…
Black History Walk: The Seventh Ward
Co-hosted by Jane’s Walk (https://janeswalk.org/united-states/philadelphia-pa/). Discover the places and people of Philadelphia's historically black Seventh Ward, brought to life through images, as well as their own words…
Nicole Weisensee Egan | Chasing Cosby: The Downfall of America’s Dad
A 14-year veteran crime reporter for the Philadelphia Daily News , Nicole Weisensee Egan was the first journalist to delve into Andrea Constand’s 2005 sexual assault allegations against Bill Cosby. As other news organizations lost…
Through this Lens: African American Photographers
This exhibition of books and other materials from the collections of the Art Department offers a look at the camera work of African American artists from the earliest days of photography to today. In addition to photographers like…
Friends Speaker Series | What Happened to the Lenape? Early Delaware Valley Settlers and Native Americans
The Lenape, the folk who lived hereabouts when the early settlers came, seemed to have vanished into history. Where did they go? What was their relationship to the 17th Century Finns, Swedes, Dutch and English? What…
Janny Scott | The Beneficiary: Fortune, Misfortune, and the Story of My Father
In conversation with Bruce Weber, former obituary writer for the New York Times . Janny Scott, a 15-year reporter for The New York Times , was part of a team that won the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for national reporting. She is also the…
Sanborn Maps Geo Edition (1867-1970)
(1867-1970) provides digital access to thousands of large-scale maps of American towns and cities, searchable by address and GPS coordinates.
Philadelphia Press Index
The Philadelphia Press (1857-1920) was one of Philadelphia's oldest major newpapers. This index is an electronic version of a paper index kept by Free Library staff from 1898 through 1912. It directs you to citations for specific…
Philadelphia Inquirer Digital Archive 1860-2001
This historical newspaper provides genealogists, researchers and scholars with online, easily-searchable first-hand accounts and unparalleled coverage of the politics, society and events of the time.
Philadelphia Evening Telegraph
Philadelphia Evening Telegraph was a daily afternoon newspaper started on January 4, 1864. Search, browse, and read it online here.
Pennsylvania Historical Newspapers
174 full-text historical Pennsylvania newspapers from 1790-1922.
Evening Public Ledger
Evening Public Ledger was one of the most widely read dailies in Philadelphia between 1914 and 1942. Read, search, and browse the full text of the paper here.
Steve Luxenberg | Separate: The Story of Plessy v. Ferguson, and America’s Journey from Slavery to Segregation
A 30-year writer and senior editor at The Washington Post , Steve Luxenberg has overseen reportage that has won a host of awards, including two Pulitzer Prizes for explanatory journalism. He is the author of Annie’s Ghosts: A Journey in…
Howard Schultz | From the Ground Up: My Journey to Reimagine the Promise of America
In conversation with William Kristol, founder and former editor-at-large of The Weekly Standard . The former chairman and CEO of Starbucks, Howard Schultz led the java giant from eleven cafes in the Seattle area to more than 28,000…
Jane Brox | Silence: A Social History of One of the Least Understood Elements of Our Lives
Penning “nonfiction literature of a high and lasting order” ( Chicago Tribune ), Jane Brox is the author of, among other books, Five Thousand Days Like This One , a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award; Brilliant: The…
Andrew Delbanco | The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America’s Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War
“America’s best social critic” ( Time ), Andrew Delbanco is the author of numerous books that explore American history, character, and ideals, including The Real American Dream: A Meditation on Hope , The Puritan Ordeal , and Required…
Nathaniel Philbrick | In the Hurricane’s Eye: The Genius of George Washington and the Victory at Yorktown
“One of America's foremost practitioners of narrative nonfiction” ( The Wall Street Journal ), Nathaniel Philbrick is the author of the National Book Award-winning In The Heart of the Sea , an account of the nearly mythic 19th-century…
Joseph Ellis | American Dialogue: The Founders and Us
In conversation with Jason Freeman, author events producer and editor A “sure-handed and entertaining guide through the thickets of argument, personality and ideology out of which the American nation emerged” ( The Economist ),…
Ray Didinger | The Eagles Encyclopedia: Champions Edition with Mark Leibovich | Big Game: The NFL in Dangerous Times
Fly Eagles fly! Five-time Pennsylvania Sportswriter of the Year Ray Didinger updated his and late co-writer Robert S. Lyons’s bestselling The Eagles Encyclopedia —“the definitive book for any Eagles fan” ( Philadelphia Daily News )—to…
Nelson Díaz | Not from Here, Not from There/No Soy de Aquí ni de Allá: The Autobiography of Nelson Díaz
In conversation with Sabrina Vourvoulias, journalist, short story author and novelist Introduced by Henry Cisneros A 1972 Temple University Law School graduate, Nelson Díaz was the first Puerto Rican lawyer admitted to the Pennsylvania…
David Levering Lewis | The Improbable Wendell Willkie: The Businessman Who Saved the Republican Party and His Country, and Conceived a New World Order
In conversation with Sam Katz, civic entrepreneur and executive producer of History Making Productions Professor emeritus of history at New York University, David Levering Lewis won the Pulitzer Prize in 1994 and 2001 for his “superb” (…
Jamie Bernstein | Famous Father Girl: A Memoir of Growing Up Bernstein
In conversation with Peter Dobrin, classical music critic and culture writer, The Philadelphia Inquirer . Jamie Bernstein is the oldest daughter of Leonard Bernstein, one of the 20th century’s best known musicians. Chief conductor of…
Michael A. Smerconish | Clowns to the Left of Me, Jokers to the Right: American Life in Columns
Michael A. Smerconish is the host of The Michael Smerconish Program on SiriusXM Channel 124, the host of CNN’s Smerconish on Saturday mornings, a Sunday Philadelphia Inquirer columnist, and a New York Times bestselling author.…
Mary Morris | Gateway to the Moon with Nathaniel Popkin | Everything is Borrowed
“A marvelous storyteller” ( Chicago Tribune ), Mary Morris explores some of her favorite themes—away versus home, childhood memories, and the Midwest—in such works of fiction as A Mother’s Love, House Arrest , and The Jazz Palace . The…
Anna Badkhen | Fisherman’s Blues: A West African Community at Sea with Min Jin Lee | Pachinko
With an artist’s eye and a ground-level view of people in extremis across the world, writer Anna Badkhen offers “rich and lucid prose [that] illustrates her journey as vividly as might a series of photographs” ( Christian Science…
Lamont “U-God” Hawkins | Raw: My Journey into the Wu-Tang
In conversation with A.D. Amorosi, reporter Philadelphia Style Magazine and The Philadelphia Inquirer . Lamont “U-God” Hawkins is one of the founding members of the Wu-Tang Clan, “the most significant posse in hip-hop” ( Rolling…
Jed Perl | Calder: The Conquest of Time: The Early Years: 1898-1940
Watch the video here . “Few people write about art as beautifully” ( Wall Street Journal ) as Jed Perl, a regular contributor to The New York Review of Books and the former 20-year art critic for The New Republic . A longtime…
Gordon S. Wood | Friends Divided: John Adams and Thomas Jefferson
Watch the video here . Acclaimed for synthesizing historical insight with wit and exuberance, Gordon S. Wood won the Pulitzer Prize for History and the Ralph Waldo Emerson Award for The Radicalism of the American Revolution , a…
Juan González | Reclaiming Gotham: Bill de Blasio and the Movement to End America's Tale of Two Cities
Watch the video here . In conversation with Nermeen Shaikh , co-Host and Producer at Democracy Now! Ms. Shaikh is the author of The Present as History: Critical Perspectives on Global Power and has an M.Phil. in politics from Cambridge…
The Legacy of Race and Policing
Watch the video here . Seeking to encourage and host conversations about differences and complex social issues, and in response to the National Endowment for the Humanities’ call for public programming on the legacy of race in the…
William Hogeland | Autumn of the Black Snake: The Creation of the U.S. Army and the Invasion That Opened the West
Watch the video here . Blending dramatic historical narrative with critical interpretation in order to make surprising connections to contemporary political and cultural struggles, William Hogeland's three books on founding American…
Wendy Lesser | You Say to Brick: The Life of Louis Kahn
Watch the video here . “Consistently engaging, sly, witty, understated…and written with simple elegance” ( The New York Observer ), Wendy Lesser’s many essay collections, works of fiction, and edited volumes include The Pagoda in the…
Philadelphia Thanksgiving Day Parade
The oldest Thanksgiving Day parade in the country takes place right here in Philadelphia!
National Parks Center – Valley Forge
Valley Forge was the site of the 1777-1778 winter encampment of the Continental Army. The park commemorates the sacrifices and perseverance of the Revolutionary War generation and honors the ability of citizens to pull together and…
National Constitution Center
The National Constitution Center is the first and only institution in America established by Congress to “disseminate information about the United States Constitution on a non-partisan basis in order to increase the awareness and…