Discovering the American Past: A Look at the Evidence, Volume II: Since 1865

Each chapter is organized around the same proven pedagogical framework: The Problem, Background, The Method, The Evidence, Questions to Consider, and Epilogue.

By following this pattern, and using a variety of sources such as letters, maps, statistics, drawings, song lyrics, photography, laws, and cartoons, students learn to examine sources critically, the way historians do.

A new Chapter 2, “Rose Cohen Comes to America,” brings to life the transformative experience of immigration in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries by using the autobiography of a Russian Jewish girl who came of age in New York City working in the garment industry.

A new Chapter 3, “John Muir, Gifford Pinchot, and the Future of American Public Lands,” introduces students to environmental history by having them enter early twentieth century debates about the damming of the Tuolumne River and the flooding of the Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park to provide safe and reliable water to the city of San Francisco.

A new Chapter 10, “The Religious Revolution in Post-World War II America: The Pivotal Role of Southern California,” surveys the rise of religious conservatism in the 1950s and 1960s and its role in American politics.

A new Chapter 11, “The War on Drugs and the Rise of the Prison State,” tries to untangle why the United States has the highest rate of incarceration in the world.

A new Chapter 12, “History Skills in Action,” offers students guidance on the process of designing a research paper, giving them the opportunity to practice applying what they’ve learned in the text.

All the chapters have been revised, some dramatically.