17th Century

New Worlds For All

This semester I am taking a survey class of US history up to 1865. For that class, I just finished reading a book entitled New Worlds for All: Indians, Europeans, and the Remaking of Early America by Colin G. Calloway. The book itself was actually quite interesting. Calloway discusses how the world not only changed … more →

November 2, 2008

Who were the real cowboys? (Part 2)

The history of the cowboy is a story that begins long ago. What we now think of as a uniquely American tradition is not solely American at all. Cowboy tradition first originated in mediæval Spain with the hacienda, or estate. The haciendas belonged to wealthy landowners and were generally, but not always, located on vast … more →

June 7, 2008