Doris Kearns Goodwin

On January 5, 2013, director Steven Spielberg, historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, and screenwriter Tony Kushner returned to Richmond, Virginia, where “Lincoln” was filmed, to discuss the process of “Bringing History to Life on Film” before an audience of 4,200. Moderated by Tim Reid.

By now many of you have seen the short video featuring Doris Kearns Goodwin and her introduction to an upcoming Lincoln exhibit titled, “Team of Rivals.”  The exhibit will open in October at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library & Museum in Springfield, Illinois.  The goal of the exhibit looks interesting: This exhibition takes you inside [...]

Dimitri Rotov…

by Kevin Levin on April 27, 2010 · 0 comments · Follow me on

in Civil War Historians, Public History

is going to blow a gasket when he sees this.  Enjoy Dimitri.

Henry Louis Gates as Filmmaker

by Kevin Levin on February 16, 2009 · 23 comments · Follow me on

in Civil War Historians

Today I showed a segment of Henry L. Gates’s “Looking for Lincoln” to my Civil War Memory class.  They enjoyed it and it provides an excellent overview of some of the themes that will be explored in this last full week of classes before the trimester ends.  We looked specifically at the segments on emancipation [...]

Obama and Civil War Memory

by Kevin Levin on January 11, 2009 · 6 comments · Follow me on

in Current Affairs, Memory

A few months ago I speculated on how an Obama victory might affect how we remember our Civil War.  I suggested that the election of our first black president (regardless of political affiliation) would present us with an opportunity to remember and commemorate aspects of the war that have traditionally been downplayed, if not ignored [...]

Thanks to James Oakes, Matthew Pinsker, and Brian Dirck for attempting to apply the breaks to the overused and abused Goodwinian meme, “Team of Rivals.” Oakes: For one thing, there was nothing new in what Lincoln did. By tradition, presidents-elect reserved a cabinet position, often secretary of state, for the leading rival in their party. [...]