History Twitter is Good II

Twitter is often a hellscape of pile-ons and bad opinions, but once you find your people, there’s nothing like it. Here are the most thoughtful, vexing, delightful tweets I bookmarked from historians over the last couple of weeks. 

By the numbers: In 1897, Helen Dortch, 34, married Longstreet, 76. The Civil War ended in 1865. She was a widow from 1904-1962, more than half of her 99 years. They had no children.

John Harris @drjohnaeharris

Wow. Confederate General James Longstreet’s wife, Helen Dortch Longstreet, lived until 1962.

Imagine rushing to a bookstore on pub day, hurriedly opening it up to the chapter about you, and seeing this.

bkr @bkrewind

Never forget that Ethel Merman was married to Ernest Borgnine for 1.5 months and then made the chapter in her autobiography titled "My Marriage to Ernest Borgnine" just a blank page

Don’t get John Locke started on sourdough starters. 

David Armitage @DavidRArmitage

Want to know “the right way” to make pancakes? John Locke’s got you covered (Bodleian MS Locke c. 25, f. 85).

File under “I had no idea!”

Kaitlyn Greenidge @surlybassey

From @Hugh_Ryan for @harpersbazaarus ...this fantastic oral history of the time five Gay Liberation Front activists traveled across the US to organize a queer contingent for the Black Panther's Constitutional Convention...Happy Pride!

harpersbazaar.comThe Incredible True Adventure of Five Gay Activists in Search of the Black Panther PartyHistorian Hugh Ryan collects five Gay Liberation Front activists’ memories of communes, free love, coming out, getting arrested, consciousness-raising rap sessions, gun shooting, acid dropping, and trying to be macrobiotic at McDonald’s

Dominique Jean-Louis @DominiqueJL15

A reminder that A. Philip Randolph had the space to develop his radical labor critiques because his wife Lucille was a good friend of Madam CJ Walker’s and ran a Walker salon of her own to support the two of them while he took classes and organized. https://t.co/M09MjAqwTk

Dr. Keisha N. Blain @KeishaBlain

✨ #OnThisDay: On August 2, 1925, the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, a labor union for African American employees of the Pullman Company, was organized. A. Philip Randolph was its first president. #history #labor #TodayinHistory https://t.co/I6WRKm0YsW

When Americans are chiller than the French. 

John Overholt @john_overholt

Just putting it out there that Houghton claims no rights over the reproduction of public domain works in its collections.

ArtReview_ @ArtReview_

Louvre takes legal action against Pornhub over erotic art history guide https://t.co/mP7lvcoue7 https://t.co/MIekUL4xI5

There’s this. 

Daryl Sturgis✊🏽 @darylsturgis

Before antibiotics folks used to think sitting people with TB in a park under the sun would cure them.

𝑃𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑐𝑒𝑠𝑠 𝑇𝑖𝑎𝑛𝑎①①①👑💅🏽 @Rider_100x

@ImFocusedMaaan @DoGoodRon_ I’m trynna figure out what y’all think yalls ancestors did to cure their sicknesses……..

On a related note. 

Brendan Nyhan @BrendanNyhan

Evidence suggests the problem is the greater visibility of terrible people in online spaces, not the online format itself - new @boralexander1 @M_B_Petersen psyarxiv.com/hwb83/

Noah Smith 🐇 @Noahpinion

I am a big fan of the "It's just Twitter" theory of American cultural deterioration. Two things reliably turn nice normal people into raging flaming assholes: 1) getting behind the wheel of a car, and 2) Twitter. https://t.co/TARNJ60S1W

Elmo’s politics are right. 

Adam Shprintzen @VegHistory

This is incredible. I had to record my week's video in the kids' room. After slightly turning my head, Elmo now is invading the White House during Jackson's inauguration (just to the left of my glasses).

I’ve never read anything like this. Historians rarely talk about the stories we tell while living our own, particularly early in our career, when we’re under such intense pressure and scrutiny. 

Yuliya Komska @ykomska

Though there is no separation between the stories we tell about the lives of others and our own, the latter are infinitely more difficult to put into words and to assert. A searing and courageous account of how these two cross by ⁦@JoyNeumeyer⁩.

academic.oup.comDarkness at Noon: On History, Narrative, and Domestic ViolenceAbstract. This essay is inspired by my experience of domestic violence while earning a PhD in Russian history. It applies the philosophy of history to escaping

Recent history. Imagine if he’d incited an insurrection!

Katiejohn @Katiejo50033270

Obamas Remember the Tan Suit scandal?

Don’t read, don’t vote, let us get away with anything.

Aaron Hanlon @AaronRHanlon

1) This is a short thread on how and why we're getting the 'culture wars' wrong. You think e.g. Christopher Rufo similar are culture warriors fighting on the battleground of ideas (perhaps so do they). But that's wrong. ...

Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ @realchrisrufo

This is a lie. Almost 20 years ago, the founder of critical race theory, Kimberlé Crenshaw, boasted that "critical race theory" has been "used as interchangeably for race scholarship as Kleenex is used for tissue." It's their own definition; now they are being exposed. https://t.co/7kdFD0rSno

Julia Ioffe @juliaioffe

History comes at you fast

Susan Glasser @sbg1

Offline for an hour only to discover that it is now apparently House GOP official position that Nancy Pelosi not Donald Trump to blame for 1/6 insurrection at the Capitol. #2021

T.J. Stiles @TJStiles_Author

One thing I've learned in studying history is that the obvious is usually true, at least with big stuff. Slavery is the reason for the Civil War. The pandemic is real. Vaccines work. Climate change is real & worsening. Trump lost the election & caused the Capitol attack. Come on.

Facial hair was a flex. 

Suzannah Lipscomb 💙 @sixteenthCgirl

For the first Monday of August, I have a treat on the podcast for you: Dr Eleanor Rycroft @EarlyModernista being absolutely brilliant on BEARDS and manhood. Listen up at podfollow.com/not-just-the-T…

Chaotic good. 

Kevin M. Kruse @KevinMKruse

This thread is a pretty good example of what it’s like for a historian to watch a movie set in the past.

Angus Johnston @studentactivism

Watching The Greatest Showman with Casey, and trying desperately to figure out when it's supposed to be set.

This feels true for many of us. 

jayson m porter @RogueChieftan

Every professional historian is also an amateur historian, and I love that for us.

Did you know founding father Henry Knox was a bookseller before the Revolution? I’ll forever be indebted to him for writing detailed letters to his wife, which I quoted heavily in You Never Forget Your First.

J. L. Bell @Boston1775

Henry Knox had just turned twenty-one, time to launch his own business—most likely with money from the booksellers who had trained him in the field and were ready to retire.

Jake @ HUB History @HUBhistory

From the Boston Gazette and Country Journal #OnThisDay in 1771. https://t.co/lHjBHN3Mh9 https://t.co/bGpAau4BB9

Archives are essential to my work, and most have been closed or inundated with requests for almost two years. They were just reopening or were scheduled to be…but this keeps happening. 

Truman Library @TrumanLibrary

Due to an increase in COVID-19 cases in Jackson County, Mo., the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library & Museum will close until further notice, effective today, July 26. Learn more here:

trumanlibrary.govTruman Library to Close Temporarily Due to Public Health Conditions | Harry S. TrumanIndependence, Mo., July 26, 2021 – Due to an increase in COVID-19 cases in Jackson County, Mo., the Harry S.

50% of tweets fall under “you do you.”

Hannah E. Palsa 🐱🎧 @HannahPalsa

Hi, animal historian here. Animal and children have often been linked together in history by their helplessness and their inability to speak (at least until a certain age for children) Animal welfare and child welfare was linked in the 19th century—

Gregory A. Hargreaves @bordergroves

Unpopular opinion: your pets are not children, nor are they equal to children.

Angry Staff Officer @pptsapper

My sisters are texting me about whether William Tecumseh Sherman was hot or not I sent them his iconic thirst trap pic In case you were wondering how weird my family is

On a related note:

I look forward to reading Tiya Miles’ All That She Carried, excerpted in The Atlantic in June. 

My great grandmother Rose

mother of Ashley gave her this sack when

she was sold at age 9 in South Carolina

it held a tattered dress 3 handfulls of

pecans a braid of Roses hair. Told her

It be filled with my Love always

she never saw her again

Ashley is my grandmother

Ruth Middleton

1921

Thanks for reading! You can find me on Twitter and Instagram and my books, as well as others mentioned on SMK, on Bookshop and Amazon. If you have a question or comment, I want to hear it! studymarrykill@gmail.com.