Subject: History
A captivating account that narrates, month by month, the events of 1917: Red Banners, White Mantle is popular Catholic history at its finest. The drama of the Great War and the Russian Revolution are juxtaposed with the spiritual dimension of the age: the diabolism of Rasputin, the Apparition of the Virgin at Fatima, the malignancy of Lenin, the saintly courage of (the now blessed) Charles of Austria. Few standard histories have ever given such a high degree of consideration to the supernatural and the Christian interpretation of history as does 1917.
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Publication Date: July 2010
Too many colleges and universities have become places for focusing on means and not upon ends—and, as such, places where the confused and bewildered of the next generation acquire techniques and tools, but graduate having gained neither direction nor order to their souls.
The Hillsdale College History Faculty has painstakingly assembled American Heritage: A Reader in order to provide its own students with a true liberal arts education grounded in the American tradition. Perfect for classroom use at the high school level and up, this extraordinary textbook will provide readers both inside and outside the classroom with a traditional educational experience that enlarges and ennobles the mind.
From the Preface:
“The primary role of this Reader is to supply a rich sample of documents from the periods we examine. These primary sources provide portals into the American past. Reading them, we escape the provincialism of our own t…
[ Read more ]When Barack Obama with great fanfare signed the 2009 stimulus bill, he quietly gutted America’s most successful domestic policy achievement—the 1996 welfare reform. This revolutionary policy had freed millions of Americans from the shackles of dependency. There was no legitimate reason to undo what had succeeded, and the moral and economic costs will be huge. The facts are clear: welfare reform worked for America. And we urgently need to relearn why.
Government Is the Problem is the story of a broken welfare system that needed to be fixed, of a great leader named Ronald Reagan who said that it could be fixed, of doubters who said that it could not be fixed, and of the man—Robert B. Carleson—who fixed it. Carleson pioneered the true reform that reversed a growing dependence on the welfare state and moved America away from the ruinous path of income redistribution.
Much has been written about welfare reform over the years – a lot of it by people who had no involvement with t…
[ Read more ]One of the most powerful and compelling figures of all history, Isabel of Spain was a force with which to be reckoned and should rightfully eclipse the better-known Elizabeth of England, both as a woman and as a national leader. The first full scholarly biography of Queen Isabel in English for nearly seventy five years, Isabel of Spain is extensively annotated and eminently readable.
[ Read more ]Larry P. Arnn, the President of Hillsdale College, traces the history of education from the founding of the U.S. Office of Education (based on the Prussian system) in 1869 to the Higher Education Act of 1965 and its subsequent reauthorizations, to contemporary legislation. He connects these changes to fundamental shifts in our understanding of what education is, of the purpose and ends of government, and of what it means to be human. He offers insight into the idea of liberal education as it developed in Western civilization, marked by the confluence of biblical religion and Socratic philosophy.
[ Read more ]World War II is one of those rare events in history whose retelling will forever guide us toward a deeper understanding of freedom and tyranny; honor and infamy; the roles of prudence, folly, and chance in human affairs; and man’s capacity for courage, endurance, and sacrifice. These nine essays by leading World War II historians, adapted from presentations given at a Hillsdale College seminar, are written with an eye to these timeless and valuable lessons. Authors include Stephen E. Ambrose, John Lukacs, Martin Gilbert, Victor Davis Hanson, and Gerhard L. Weinberg, among others.
[ Read more ]Standard histories on the Age of Colonization tell a sad story of the ills inflicted on indigenous peoples by exploitative Western powers. This book offers a realistic corrective. The Spanish conquest of the New World is shown vividly—in its fervor and exuberance, but most importantly with attention to its central evangelical and civilizing impulse, which made the Americas a central part of Christendom.
[ Read more ]English historian and Christian humanist Christopher Dawson stood at the very center of the Catholic literary and intellectual revival in the four decades preceding Vatican II. One can find his influence throughout the twentieth-century Catholic Right. Poet and social critic T. S. Eliot considered him the foremost thinker of his generation, and the founder of American conservatism, Russell Kirk, wrote that he had been “saturated in Dawsonian historical studies [and] my own books reflect Dawson’s concepts.”
Dawson’s reputation declined dramatically during the cultural shifts accompanying Vatican II, and few remembered the English Catholic in the final decades of the twentieth century. A revival of interest of Dawson and his body of work increased dramatically in the last years of John Paul II’s and the beginning of Benedict’s pontificates. This book offers the first study of Dawson’s life and thought as a whole. It is especially poignant as a post–9/11 ree…
[ Read more ]Swords Around the Cross presents one of the few full-length treatments of the heroic struggle of the Irish clansmen in their effort to defend their faith and country against English encroachment and conquest in the sixteenth century. This book has infuriated establishment academics for its honest and thorough treatment of the Irish past. In so doing, the image of a “golden age” under Elizabeth I is dealt a serious blow.
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