Historians on Hamilton
396 pages, 5 3/16 x 8
25 color and 6 black and white illustrations
Hardcover
Release Date:09 May 2018
ISBN:9780813590301
Historians on Hamilton
How a Blockbuster Musical Is Restaging America's Past
Edited by Renee C. Romano and Claire Bond Potter
Rutgers University Press
America has gone Hamilton crazy. Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Tony-winning musical has spawned sold-out performances, a triple platinum cast album, and a score so catchy that it is being used to teach U.S. history in classrooms across the country. But just how historically accurate is Hamilton? And how is the show itself making history?
Historians on Hamilton brings together a collection of top scholars to explain the Hamilton phenomenon and explore what it might mean for our understanding of America’s history. The contributors examine what the musical got right, what it got wrong, and why it matters. Does Hamilton’s hip-hop take on the Founding Fathers misrepresent our nation’s past, or does it offer a bold positive vision for our nation’s future? Can a musical so unabashedly contemporary and deliberately anachronistic still communicate historical truths about American culture and politics? And is Hamilton as revolutionary as its creators and many commentators claim?
Perfect for students, teachers, theatre fans, hip-hop heads, and history buffs alike, these short and lively essays examine why Hamilton became an Obama-era sensation and consider its continued relevance in the age of Trump. Whether you are a fan or a skeptic, you will come away from this collection with a new appreciation for the meaning and importance of the Hamilton phenomenon.
Historians on Hamilton brings together a collection of top scholars to explain the Hamilton phenomenon and explore what it might mean for our understanding of America’s history. The contributors examine what the musical got right, what it got wrong, and why it matters. Does Hamilton’s hip-hop take on the Founding Fathers misrepresent our nation’s past, or does it offer a bold positive vision for our nation’s future? Can a musical so unabashedly contemporary and deliberately anachronistic still communicate historical truths about American culture and politics? And is Hamilton as revolutionary as its creators and many commentators claim?
Perfect for students, teachers, theatre fans, hip-hop heads, and history buffs alike, these short and lively essays examine why Hamilton became an Obama-era sensation and consider its continued relevance in the age of Trump. Whether you are a fan or a skeptic, you will come away from this collection with a new appreciation for the meaning and importance of the Hamilton phenomenon.
For Hamilton fans, history buffs, political thinkers and Broadway acolytes, this collection provides dozens of fascinating perspectives, correctives, and sidelong directives. It probably won’t change your mind about the show, but it will keep you thinking and talking about it, and the world that surrounds it, for a long time to come. If you love Hamilton the musical or have any curiosity about the man himself and where he fits into the American panorama, this is the book for you.
'Hamilton, the musical, has turned thousands of people onto the history of the American founding. For those who want more, Historians on Hamilton digs deep into the myths and realities behind the show.'
Historians on Hamilton is an erudite and accessible scholarly consideration of the Broadway phenomenon that created an Alexander Hamilton palatable for our times. An indispensable work for all interested in the founding and contemporary racial politics.
Deeply documented, culturally astute, interpretively diverse, consistently illuminating—this is a model of intellectual engagement. Providing insight into Hamilton’s significance, the essays cogently reveal how contemporary culture shapes our past.
Treating Hamilton as a historical phenomenon in its own right, contributors to this volume reflect on the lives that inspired it and its meaning for our conflict-ridden present.
Think of this volume as a how-to manual for scholars to use the brilliance of Hamilton to teach about the incredibly complex power dynamics of early America.
Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton is enthralling as musical theater. As history…not so much. Fortunately, two great professional historians, Renee C. Romano and Claire Bond Potter, are here to set the record straight, gathering expert essays to tell you the inconvenient truths about Alexander Hamilton that the hit play leaves out. More than that, though, Historians on Hamilton offers informed and insightful meditations on the themes of history, memory, legacy, interpretation and art that lie at the heart of the Broadway smash. No Hamilton fan should do without it.
A thought-provoking and carefully crafted collection of scholarship that has much to offer readers interested in music, theater, or American history.
Historians on Hamilton is smart and interesting. It was great fun to read all the different points of view and even have some of my opinions changed. What more could you want from a book?
The Issue on the Table: Is 'Hamilton' Good For History?' by Kate Keller
Cumulatively, the essays in Historians on Hamilton provide a useful and impressive range of perspectives from which to appreciate the historical significance of the Broadway sensation, to evaluate the historical accuracy of the story Hamilton tells, and to prod us to consider the contemporary stakes of the historical narratives we consume, celebrate, and propagate.
How ‘Hamilton’ Is Remaking American History' feature and excerpt
The book takes a unique and revolutionary approach in bringing Hamilton to life.
New Books Network podcast interview with authors
This book is a collection of articles on the Broadway play Hamilton with what historians say about the play.... Suffice it to say that most of the play seems to be historically correct, but history is always a matter of interpretation, and Alexander Hamilton is certainly an historical figure who needs interpretation.'
Gift Guide for Book Lovers' by the editors at Stanfordmag.org
Facing up to the award-winning play's power to shape our understanding of America's past, Romano and Potter present a collection of accessible but scholarly essays to investigate Hamilton: An American Musical. Delving into history, politics, race relations and contemporary culture, the book poses big questions: Can Hamilton help create a new, multiracial American civic myth? Or was the real-life Alexander Hamilton--an elitist and a skeptic of democracy--simply too divisive? Besides, who owns American history--and who gets to tell it?
The collection will be of direct relevance and value to public historians. And like its subject, the volume should also appeal to multiple audiences—teachers and students on the college and other levels, scholars concerned with popular memory of the founders, and general readers wishing to learn more about both the musical and the historical world it depicts.
Did ‘Hamilton’ Get the Story Wrong? One Playwright Thinks So,' by James Barron
A valiant attempt to help audiences understand Hamilton’s achievements while also taking stock of the musical’s shortfalls. Accessibly written, the contributions cover the show as both art and history.
Fans of the musical will appreciate this opportunity to approach it from an academic perspective, and educators will find it productive to include particular chapters on their syllabi.
This book is a worthy addition to popular culture studies, history, American Studies, Africana Studies, Latinx Studies and, of course, theatre and musical theatre studies.....Historians on Hamilton successfully meets Miranda’s challenge, presenting engaging essays in which accomplished historians do take Hamilton seriously and offer a range of perspectives on its place in, and depiction of, American history.
Fall Arts Preview: Theater,' by Don Harrison
https://richmondmagazine.com/arts-entertainment/fall-arts-preview-2019-theater/
This collection of brief accessible essays offers nice balance of perspectives and topics. Taken as a whole, they argue that while Miranda’s Hamilton is not as revolutionary, either in terms of artistic originality or disruptive historical narrative, as many have suggested, it remains remarkably entertaining and presents an almost unique opportunity for historians to engage the public in meaningful conversations about the nation’s past and the nature of history itself. Everyone who has seen the show or listened to the cast recording, especially those who teach about it, will appreciate how this provocative and informative volume not only enlightens but also prompts them to revisit the show, one last time.
As a reference work aimed at those bridging the gap between academic and the Broadway audience...the volume will be a valuable contribution to widening discussion beyond the personality-led drama of the stage and the world of the American Revolution.
Just what is the story of Alexander Hamilton as Lin Manuel Miranda’s musical hits Disney Plus?' by Emma Kelly
https://metro.co.uk/2020/07/02/just-what-story-alexander-hamilton-lin-manuel-mirandas-musical-hits-disney-plus-12934519/
As ‘Hamilton’ Arrives on Disney+, Five Lyrics That Have Shaped the Culture,' by John Jurgensen
https://www.wsj.com/articles/as-hamilton-arrives-on-disney-five-lyrics-that-have-shaped-the-culture-11593613712
Hamilton is coming. Here’s how to give it your best shot,' by Jenna Price
Historian, Hamilton fan, or some combination, something in Historians on Hamilton will inform and challenge you.
Historians on Hamilton emerges as a template for thoughtful, deliberate dialogue. In the deft hands of Potter and Romano, the volume manages to be critical and incisive while still, from my impression, maintain a similar spirit to the musical itself. Both provide examples of how to talk across and not at disciplinary, professional, and creative categories. A cultural force as powerful as Hamilton gives historians in many hats a unique opportunity to demonstrate what our work can do....History is not, and should not, the sole interest of historians, but artists, musicians, performers, politicians, activists, and engaged, interested participants in the American and global communities. Historians on Hamilton is an intuitive reminder that historians can, and must, participate on that wider stage.
For Hamilton fans, history buffs, political thinkers and Broadway acolytes, this collection provides dozens of fascinating perspectives, correctives, and sidelong directives. It probably won’t change your mind about the show, but it will keep you thinking and talking about it, and the world that surrounds it, for a long time to come. If you love Hamilton the musical or have any curiosity about the man himself and where he fits into the American panorama, this is the book for you.
'Hamilton, the musical, has turned thousands of people onto the history of the American founding. For those who want more, Historians on Hamilton digs deep into the myths and realities behind the show.'
Historians on Hamilton is an erudite and accessible scholarly consideration of the Broadway phenomenon that created an Alexander Hamilton palatable for our times. An indispensable work for all interested in the founding and contemporary racial politics.
Deeply documented, culturally astute, interpretively diverse, consistently illuminating—this is a model of intellectual engagement. Providing insight into Hamilton’s significance, the essays cogently reveal how contemporary culture shapes our past.
Treating Hamilton as a historical phenomenon in its own right, contributors to this volume reflect on the lives that inspired it and its meaning for our conflict-ridden present.
Think of this volume as a how-to manual for scholars to use the brilliance of Hamilton to teach about the incredibly complex power dynamics of early America.
Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton is enthralling as musical theater. As history…not so much. Fortunately, two great professional historians, Renee C. Romano and Claire Bond Potter, are here to set the record straight, gathering expert essays to tell you the inconvenient truths about Alexander Hamilton that the hit play leaves out. More than that, though, Historians on Hamilton offers informed and insightful meditations on the themes of history, memory, legacy, interpretation and art that lie at the heart of the Broadway smash. No Hamilton fan should do without it.
A thought-provoking and carefully crafted collection of scholarship that has much to offer readers interested in music, theater, or American history.
Historians on Hamilton is smart and interesting. It was great fun to read all the different points of view and even have some of my opinions changed. What more could you want from a book?
The Issue on the Table: Is 'Hamilton' Good For History?' by Kate Keller
Cumulatively, the essays in Historians on Hamilton provide a useful and impressive range of perspectives from which to appreciate the historical significance of the Broadway sensation, to evaluate the historical accuracy of the story Hamilton tells, and to prod us to consider the contemporary stakes of the historical narratives we consume, celebrate, and propagate.
How ‘Hamilton’ Is Remaking American History' feature and excerpt
The book takes a unique and revolutionary approach in bringing Hamilton to life.
New Books Network podcast interview with authors
This book is a collection of articles on the Broadway play Hamilton with what historians say about the play.... Suffice it to say that most of the play seems to be historically correct, but history is always a matter of interpretation, and Alexander Hamilton is certainly an historical figure who needs interpretation.'
Gift Guide for Book Lovers' by the editors at Stanfordmag.org
Facing up to the award-winning play's power to shape our understanding of America's past, Romano and Potter present a collection of accessible but scholarly essays to investigate Hamilton: An American Musical. Delving into history, politics, race relations and contemporary culture, the book poses big questions: Can Hamilton help create a new, multiracial American civic myth? Or was the real-life Alexander Hamilton--an elitist and a skeptic of democracy--simply too divisive? Besides, who owns American history--and who gets to tell it?
The collection will be of direct relevance and value to public historians. And like its subject, the volume should also appeal to multiple audiences—teachers and students on the college and other levels, scholars concerned with popular memory of the founders, and general readers wishing to learn more about both the musical and the historical world it depicts.
Did ‘Hamilton’ Get the Story Wrong? One Playwright Thinks So,' by James Barron
A valiant attempt to help audiences understand Hamilton’s achievements while also taking stock of the musical’s shortfalls. Accessibly written, the contributions cover the show as both art and history.
Fans of the musical will appreciate this opportunity to approach it from an academic perspective, and educators will find it productive to include particular chapters on their syllabi.
This book is a worthy addition to popular culture studies, history, American Studies, Africana Studies, Latinx Studies and, of course, theatre and musical theatre studies.....Historians on Hamilton successfully meets Miranda’s challenge, presenting engaging essays in which accomplished historians do take Hamilton seriously and offer a range of perspectives on its place in, and depiction of, American history.
Fall Arts Preview: Theater,' by Don Harrison
https://richmondmagazine.com/arts-entertainment/fall-arts-preview-2019-theater/
This collection of brief accessible essays offers nice balance of perspectives and topics. Taken as a whole, they argue that while Miranda’s Hamilton is not as revolutionary, either in terms of artistic originality or disruptive historical narrative, as many have suggested, it remains remarkably entertaining and presents an almost unique opportunity for historians to engage the public in meaningful conversations about the nation’s past and the nature of history itself. Everyone who has seen the show or listened to the cast recording, especially those who teach about it, will appreciate how this provocative and informative volume not only enlightens but also prompts them to revisit the show, one last time.
As a reference work aimed at those bridging the gap between academic and the Broadway audience...the volume will be a valuable contribution to widening discussion beyond the personality-led drama of the stage and the world of the American Revolution.
Just what is the story of Alexander Hamilton as Lin Manuel Miranda’s musical hits Disney Plus?' by Emma Kelly
https://metro.co.uk/2020/07/02/just-what-story-alexander-hamilton-lin-manuel-mirandas-musical-hits-disney-plus-12934519/
As ‘Hamilton’ Arrives on Disney+, Five Lyrics That Have Shaped the Culture,' by John Jurgensen
https://www.wsj.com/articles/as-hamilton-arrives-on-disney-five-lyrics-that-have-shaped-the-culture-11593613712
Hamilton is coming. Here’s how to give it your best shot,' by Jenna Price
Historian, Hamilton fan, or some combination, something in Historians on Hamilton will inform and challenge you.
Historians on Hamilton emerges as a template for thoughtful, deliberate dialogue. In the deft hands of Potter and Romano, the volume manages to be critical and incisive while still, from my impression, maintain a similar spirit to the musical itself. Both provide examples of how to talk across and not at disciplinary, professional, and creative categories. A cultural force as powerful as Hamilton gives historians in many hats a unique opportunity to demonstrate what our work can do....History is not, and should not, the sole interest of historians, but artists, musicians, performers, politicians, activists, and engaged, interested participants in the American and global communities. Historians on Hamilton is an intuitive reminder that historians can, and must, participate on that wider stage.
RENEE C. ROMANO is the Robert S. Danforth Professor of History at Oberlin College in Ohio. She is the author or coeditor of many books, including Racial Reckoning: Prosecuting America’s Civil Rights Murders.
CLAIRE BOND POTTER is a professor of history and the executive editor of Public Seminar at The New School in New York. She is the author or coeditor of several books, including War on Crime: Bandits, G-Men, and the Politics of Mass Culture (Rutgers University Press).
About the contributors:
Joseph M. Adelman is an assistant professor of history at Framingham
State University in Massachusetts. A historian of media,
communication, and politics in the Atlantic world, he is currently
working on a book about the circulation of political news during
the American Revolution and the history of the U.S. Post Office.
Catherine Allgor is the president of the Massachusetts Historical
Society in Boston, Massachusetts. She is the author of several
books about women and politics in the founding era, including
A Perfect Union: Dolley Madison and the Creation of the American
Nation.
Jim Cullen is a history teacher at the Ethical Culture Fieldston
School in New York City. He is the author of numerous books,
among them The American Dream: A Short History of an Idea That
Shaped a Nation and Sensing the Past: Hollywood Stars and Historical
Visions.
Joanne B. Freeman is a professor of history and American Studies
at Yale University, specializing in the politics and political culture
of Revolutionary and early national America. An elected fellow
of the Society of American Historians and an advisor to the National
Park Service, she is the editor of The Essential Hamilton and Hamilton:
Writings; and the author of Affairs of Honor: National Politics in
the New Republic, which won the Best Book award from the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic. She is currently
completing a study of physical violence in the U.S. Congress.
Leslie M. Harris is a professor of history at Northwestern University.
She is the author of In the Shadow of Slavery: African Americans
in New York City, 1626–1863; and coeditor with Ira Berlin of
Slavery in New York, which accompanied the groundbreaking 2005–
2007 New-York Historical Society exhibition of the same name.
Brian Eugenio Herrera is an assistant professor of theater in
the Lewis Center for the Arts at Princeton University. He is the
author of The Latina/o Theatre Commons 2013 National Convening:
A Narrative Report and Latin Numbers: Playing Latino in Twentieth-
Century U.S. Popular Performance, which was awarded the George
Jean Nathan Prize for Dramatic Criticism and received an Honorable
Mention for the John W. Frick Book Award from the American
Theatre and Drama Society.
Patricia Herrera is an associate professor in the Department of
Theatre and Dance at the University of Richmond, focusing on
U.S. Latinx visual art, performance, and museum exhibitions. She
is also an artist, performer, and educator who uses theater to promote
social justice. She is the author of Nuyorican Feminist Performance:
From the Nuyorican Poets Cafe to Hip Hop Theater.
William Hogeland is the author of three narrative histories of
the founding period, The Whiskey Rebellion, Declaration, and Autumn
of the Black Snake, as well as the expository books Founding Finance
and Inventing American History. His essays have appeared in the Boston
Review, the New York Times, the Atlantic, the Oxford American,
and Best American Music Writing. He blogs at williamhogeland.com.
Lyra D. Monteiro is an assistant professor of history and teaches
in the Graduate Program in American Studies at Rutgers University—
Newark. She has published on issues in cultural heritage and
archaeological ethics and is the codirector of the Museum On Site,
a public humanities organization.
Michael O’Malley is a professor of history at George Mason
University. He is the author of Keeping Watch: A History of American
Time and Face Value: The Entwined Histories of Race and Money in
America.
Jeffrey L. Pasley is a professor of history and the associate director
of the Kinder Institute on Constitutional Democracy at the
University of Missouri. His most recent book is The First Presidential
Contest: The Election of 1796 and the Beginnings of American
Democracy, a finalist for the 2014 George Washington Book Prize.
Claire Bond Potter is a professor of history at The New
School. She is the author of War on Crime: Bandits, G-Men, and the
Politics of Mass Culture and coeditor of the collection Doing Recent
History: On Privacy, Copyright, Video Games, Institutional Review
Boards, Activist Scholarship, and History that Talks Back. She is the
executive editor of Public Seminar. Her essays have appeared in the
Chronicle of Higher Education, Dissent, the Washington Post, Inside
Higher Education, berfrois, and Jacobin.
Renee C. Romano is the Robert S. Danforth Professor of History
and Professor of Comparative American Studies and Africana
Studies at Oberlin College. She is the author of Race Mixing: Black–
White Marriage in Postwar America and Racial Reckoning: Prosecuting
America’s Civil Rights Murders, as well as coeditor of the collections
The Civil Rights Movement in American Memory and Doing Recent
History: On Privacy, Copyright, Video Games, Institutional Review
Boards, Activist Scholarship, and History That Talks Back.
Andrew M. Schocket is a professor of history and American
Culture Studies at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. He is
the author of Fighting Over the Founders: How We Remember the American Revolution and Founding Corporate
Power in Early National Philadelphia. His writing has also appeared in the Washington Post,the San Francisco Chronicle, History News Network, and Salon.
David Waldstreicher is Distinguished Professor of History at
CUNY Graduate Center, and the author of Slavery’s Constitution:
From Revolution to Ratification; Runaway America: Benjamin Franklin,
Slavery, and the American Revolution; and In the Midst of Perpetual
Fetes: The Making of American Nationalism, 1776–1820. As
an editor, his books include John Quincy Adams and the Politics of
Slavery: Selections from the Diary; A Companion to John Adams and
John Quincy Adams; A Companion to Benjamin Franklin; and Beyond
the Founders.
Elizabeth L. Wollman is associate professor of music at Baruch
College, CUNY, and a member of the doctoral faculty in the Theater
Department at CUNY Graduate Center. She is the author of
The Theater Will Rock: A History of the Rock Musical, From “Hair” to
“Hedwig”; Hard Times: The Adult Musical in 1970s New York City;
and the forthcoming The Critical Companion to the American Stage
Musical.
Joseph M. Adelman is an assistant professor of history at Framingham
State University in Massachusetts. A historian of media,
communication, and politics in the Atlantic world, he is currently
working on a book about the circulation of political news during
the American Revolution and the history of the U.S. Post Office.
Catherine Allgor is the president of the Massachusetts Historical
Society in Boston, Massachusetts. She is the author of several
books about women and politics in the founding era, including
A Perfect Union: Dolley Madison and the Creation of the American
Nation.
Jim Cullen is a history teacher at the Ethical Culture Fieldston
School in New York City. He is the author of numerous books,
among them The American Dream: A Short History of an Idea That
Shaped a Nation and Sensing the Past: Hollywood Stars and Historical
Visions.
Joanne B. Freeman is a professor of history and American Studies
at Yale University, specializing in the politics and political culture
of Revolutionary and early national America. An elected fellow
of the Society of American Historians and an advisor to the National
Park Service, she is the editor of The Essential Hamilton and Hamilton:
Writings; and the author of Affairs of Honor: National Politics in
the New Republic, which won the Best Book award from the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic. She is currently
completing a study of physical violence in the U.S. Congress.
Leslie M. Harris is a professor of history at Northwestern University.
She is the author of In the Shadow of Slavery: African Americans
in New York City, 1626–1863; and coeditor with Ira Berlin of
Slavery in New York, which accompanied the groundbreaking 2005–
2007 New-York Historical Society exhibition of the same name.
Brian Eugenio Herrera is an assistant professor of theater in
the Lewis Center for the Arts at Princeton University. He is the
author of The Latina/o Theatre Commons 2013 National Convening:
A Narrative Report and Latin Numbers: Playing Latino in Twentieth-
Century U.S. Popular Performance, which was awarded the George
Jean Nathan Prize for Dramatic Criticism and received an Honorable
Mention for the John W. Frick Book Award from the American
Theatre and Drama Society.
Patricia Herrera is an associate professor in the Department of
Theatre and Dance at the University of Richmond, focusing on
U.S. Latinx visual art, performance, and museum exhibitions. She
is also an artist, performer, and educator who uses theater to promote
social justice. She is the author of Nuyorican Feminist Performance:
From the Nuyorican Poets Cafe to Hip Hop Theater.
William Hogeland is the author of three narrative histories of
the founding period, The Whiskey Rebellion, Declaration, and Autumn
of the Black Snake, as well as the expository books Founding Finance
and Inventing American History. His essays have appeared in the Boston
Review, the New York Times, the Atlantic, the Oxford American,
and Best American Music Writing. He blogs at williamhogeland.com.
Lyra D. Monteiro is an assistant professor of history and teaches
in the Graduate Program in American Studies at Rutgers University—
Newark. She has published on issues in cultural heritage and
archaeological ethics and is the codirector of the Museum On Site,
a public humanities organization.
Michael O’Malley is a professor of history at George Mason
University. He is the author of Keeping Watch: A History of American
Time and Face Value: The Entwined Histories of Race and Money in
America.
Jeffrey L. Pasley is a professor of history and the associate director
of the Kinder Institute on Constitutional Democracy at the
University of Missouri. His most recent book is The First Presidential
Contest: The Election of 1796 and the Beginnings of American
Democracy, a finalist for the 2014 George Washington Book Prize.
Claire Bond Potter is a professor of history at The New
School. She is the author of War on Crime: Bandits, G-Men, and the
Politics of Mass Culture and coeditor of the collection Doing Recent
History: On Privacy, Copyright, Video Games, Institutional Review
Boards, Activist Scholarship, and History that Talks Back. She is the
executive editor of Public Seminar. Her essays have appeared in the
Chronicle of Higher Education, Dissent, the Washington Post, Inside
Higher Education, berfrois, and Jacobin.
Renee C. Romano is the Robert S. Danforth Professor of History
and Professor of Comparative American Studies and Africana
Studies at Oberlin College. She is the author of Race Mixing: Black–
White Marriage in Postwar America and Racial Reckoning: Prosecuting
America’s Civil Rights Murders, as well as coeditor of the collections
The Civil Rights Movement in American Memory and Doing Recent
History: On Privacy, Copyright, Video Games, Institutional Review
Boards, Activist Scholarship, and History That Talks Back.
Andrew M. Schocket is a professor of history and American
Culture Studies at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. He is
the author of Fighting Over the Founders: How We Remember the American Revolution and Founding Corporate
Power in Early National Philadelphia. His writing has also appeared in the Washington Post,the San Francisco Chronicle, History News Network, and Salon.
David Waldstreicher is Distinguished Professor of History at
CUNY Graduate Center, and the author of Slavery’s Constitution:
From Revolution to Ratification; Runaway America: Benjamin Franklin,
Slavery, and the American Revolution; and In the Midst of Perpetual
Fetes: The Making of American Nationalism, 1776–1820. As
an editor, his books include John Quincy Adams and the Politics of
Slavery: Selections from the Diary; A Companion to John Adams and
John Quincy Adams; A Companion to Benjamin Franklin; and Beyond
the Founders.
Elizabeth L. Wollman is associate professor of music at Baruch
College, CUNY, and a member of the doctoral faculty in the Theater
Department at CUNY Graduate Center. She is the author of
The Theater Will Rock: A History of the Rock Musical, From “Hair” to
“Hedwig”; Hard Times: The Adult Musical in 1970s New York City;
and the forthcoming The Critical Companion to the American Stage
Musical.
CLAIRE BOND POTTER is a professor of history and the executive editor of Public Seminar at The New School in New York. She is the author or coeditor of several books, including War on Crime: Bandits, G-Men, and the Politics of Mass Culture (Rutgers University Press).
About the contributors:
Joseph M. Adelman is an assistant professor of history at Framingham
State University in Massachusetts. A historian of media,
communication, and politics in the Atlantic world, he is currently
working on a book about the circulation of political news during
the American Revolution and the history of the U.S. Post Office.
Catherine Allgor is the president of the Massachusetts Historical
Society in Boston, Massachusetts. She is the author of several
books about women and politics in the founding era, including
A Perfect Union: Dolley Madison and the Creation of the American
Nation.
Jim Cullen is a history teacher at the Ethical Culture Fieldston
School in New York City. He is the author of numerous books,
among them The American Dream: A Short History of an Idea That
Shaped a Nation and Sensing the Past: Hollywood Stars and Historical
Visions.
Joanne B. Freeman is a professor of history and American Studies
at Yale University, specializing in the politics and political culture
of Revolutionary and early national America. An elected fellow
of the Society of American Historians and an advisor to the National
Park Service, she is the editor of The Essential Hamilton and Hamilton:
Writings; and the author of Affairs of Honor: National Politics in
the New Republic, which won the Best Book award from the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic. She is currently
completing a study of physical violence in the U.S. Congress.
Leslie M. Harris is a professor of history at Northwestern University.
She is the author of In the Shadow of Slavery: African Americans
in New York City, 1626–1863; and coeditor with Ira Berlin of
Slavery in New York, which accompanied the groundbreaking 2005–
2007 New-York Historical Society exhibition of the same name.
Brian Eugenio Herrera is an assistant professor of theater in
the Lewis Center for the Arts at Princeton University. He is the
author of The Latina/o Theatre Commons 2013 National Convening:
A Narrative Report and Latin Numbers: Playing Latino in Twentieth-
Century U.S. Popular Performance, which was awarded the George
Jean Nathan Prize for Dramatic Criticism and received an Honorable
Mention for the John W. Frick Book Award from the American
Theatre and Drama Society.
Patricia Herrera is an associate professor in the Department of
Theatre and Dance at the University of Richmond, focusing on
U.S. Latinx visual art, performance, and museum exhibitions. She
is also an artist, performer, and educator who uses theater to promote
social justice. She is the author of Nuyorican Feminist Performance:
From the Nuyorican Poets Cafe to Hip Hop Theater.
William Hogeland is the author of three narrative histories of
the founding period, The Whiskey Rebellion, Declaration, and Autumn
of the Black Snake, as well as the expository books Founding Finance
and Inventing American History. His essays have appeared in the Boston
Review, the New York Times, the Atlantic, the Oxford American,
and Best American Music Writing. He blogs at williamhogeland.com.
Lyra D. Monteiro is an assistant professor of history and teaches
in the Graduate Program in American Studies at Rutgers University—
Newark. She has published on issues in cultural heritage and
archaeological ethics and is the codirector of the Museum On Site,
a public humanities organization.
Michael O’Malley is a professor of history at George Mason
University. He is the author of Keeping Watch: A History of American
Time and Face Value: The Entwined Histories of Race and Money in
America.
Jeffrey L. Pasley is a professor of history and the associate director
of the Kinder Institute on Constitutional Democracy at the
University of Missouri. His most recent book is The First Presidential
Contest: The Election of 1796 and the Beginnings of American
Democracy, a finalist for the 2014 George Washington Book Prize.
Claire Bond Potter is a professor of history at The New
School. She is the author of War on Crime: Bandits, G-Men, and the
Politics of Mass Culture and coeditor of the collection Doing Recent
History: On Privacy, Copyright, Video Games, Institutional Review
Boards, Activist Scholarship, and History that Talks Back. She is the
executive editor of Public Seminar. Her essays have appeared in the
Chronicle of Higher Education, Dissent, the Washington Post, Inside
Higher Education, berfrois, and Jacobin.
Renee C. Romano is the Robert S. Danforth Professor of History
and Professor of Comparative American Studies and Africana
Studies at Oberlin College. She is the author of Race Mixing: Black–
White Marriage in Postwar America and Racial Reckoning: Prosecuting
America’s Civil Rights Murders, as well as coeditor of the collections
The Civil Rights Movement in American Memory and Doing Recent
History: On Privacy, Copyright, Video Games, Institutional Review
Boards, Activist Scholarship, and History That Talks Back.
Andrew M. Schocket is a professor of history and American
Culture Studies at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. He is
the author of Fighting Over the Founders: How We Remember the American Revolution and Founding Corporate
Power in Early National Philadelphia. His writing has also appeared in the Washington Post,the San Francisco Chronicle, History News Network, and Salon.
David Waldstreicher is Distinguished Professor of History at
CUNY Graduate Center, and the author of Slavery’s Constitution:
From Revolution to Ratification; Runaway America: Benjamin Franklin,
Slavery, and the American Revolution; and In the Midst of Perpetual
Fetes: The Making of American Nationalism, 1776–1820. As
an editor, his books include John Quincy Adams and the Politics of
Slavery: Selections from the Diary; A Companion to John Adams and
John Quincy Adams; A Companion to Benjamin Franklin; and Beyond
the Founders.
Elizabeth L. Wollman is associate professor of music at Baruch
College, CUNY, and a member of the doctoral faculty in the Theater
Department at CUNY Graduate Center. She is the author of
The Theater Will Rock: A History of the Rock Musical, From “Hair” to
“Hedwig”; Hard Times: The Adult Musical in 1970s New York City;
and the forthcoming The Critical Companion to the American Stage
Musical.
Joseph M. Adelman is an assistant professor of history at Framingham
State University in Massachusetts. A historian of media,
communication, and politics in the Atlantic world, he is currently
working on a book about the circulation of political news during
the American Revolution and the history of the U.S. Post Office.
Catherine Allgor is the president of the Massachusetts Historical
Society in Boston, Massachusetts. She is the author of several
books about women and politics in the founding era, including
A Perfect Union: Dolley Madison and the Creation of the American
Nation.
Jim Cullen is a history teacher at the Ethical Culture Fieldston
School in New York City. He is the author of numerous books,
among them The American Dream: A Short History of an Idea That
Shaped a Nation and Sensing the Past: Hollywood Stars and Historical
Visions.
Joanne B. Freeman is a professor of history and American Studies
at Yale University, specializing in the politics and political culture
of Revolutionary and early national America. An elected fellow
of the Society of American Historians and an advisor to the National
Park Service, she is the editor of The Essential Hamilton and Hamilton:
Writings; and the author of Affairs of Honor: National Politics in
the New Republic, which won the Best Book award from the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic. She is currently
completing a study of physical violence in the U.S. Congress.
Leslie M. Harris is a professor of history at Northwestern University.
She is the author of In the Shadow of Slavery: African Americans
in New York City, 1626–1863; and coeditor with Ira Berlin of
Slavery in New York, which accompanied the groundbreaking 2005–
2007 New-York Historical Society exhibition of the same name.
Brian Eugenio Herrera is an assistant professor of theater in
the Lewis Center for the Arts at Princeton University. He is the
author of The Latina/o Theatre Commons 2013 National Convening:
A Narrative Report and Latin Numbers: Playing Latino in Twentieth-
Century U.S. Popular Performance, which was awarded the George
Jean Nathan Prize for Dramatic Criticism and received an Honorable
Mention for the John W. Frick Book Award from the American
Theatre and Drama Society.
Patricia Herrera is an associate professor in the Department of
Theatre and Dance at the University of Richmond, focusing on
U.S. Latinx visual art, performance, and museum exhibitions. She
is also an artist, performer, and educator who uses theater to promote
social justice. She is the author of Nuyorican Feminist Performance:
From the Nuyorican Poets Cafe to Hip Hop Theater.
William Hogeland is the author of three narrative histories of
the founding period, The Whiskey Rebellion, Declaration, and Autumn
of the Black Snake, as well as the expository books Founding Finance
and Inventing American History. His essays have appeared in the Boston
Review, the New York Times, the Atlantic, the Oxford American,
and Best American Music Writing. He blogs at williamhogeland.com.
Lyra D. Monteiro is an assistant professor of history and teaches
in the Graduate Program in American Studies at Rutgers University—
Newark. She has published on issues in cultural heritage and
archaeological ethics and is the codirector of the Museum On Site,
a public humanities organization.
Michael O’Malley is a professor of history at George Mason
University. He is the author of Keeping Watch: A History of American
Time and Face Value: The Entwined Histories of Race and Money in
America.
Jeffrey L. Pasley is a professor of history and the associate director
of the Kinder Institute on Constitutional Democracy at the
University of Missouri. His most recent book is The First Presidential
Contest: The Election of 1796 and the Beginnings of American
Democracy, a finalist for the 2014 George Washington Book Prize.
Claire Bond Potter is a professor of history at The New
School. She is the author of War on Crime: Bandits, G-Men, and the
Politics of Mass Culture and coeditor of the collection Doing Recent
History: On Privacy, Copyright, Video Games, Institutional Review
Boards, Activist Scholarship, and History that Talks Back. She is the
executive editor of Public Seminar. Her essays have appeared in the
Chronicle of Higher Education, Dissent, the Washington Post, Inside
Higher Education, berfrois, and Jacobin.
Renee C. Romano is the Robert S. Danforth Professor of History
and Professor of Comparative American Studies and Africana
Studies at Oberlin College. She is the author of Race Mixing: Black–
White Marriage in Postwar America and Racial Reckoning: Prosecuting
America’s Civil Rights Murders, as well as coeditor of the collections
The Civil Rights Movement in American Memory and Doing Recent
History: On Privacy, Copyright, Video Games, Institutional Review
Boards, Activist Scholarship, and History That Talks Back.
Andrew M. Schocket is a professor of history and American
Culture Studies at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. He is
the author of Fighting Over the Founders: How We Remember the American Revolution and Founding Corporate
Power in Early National Philadelphia. His writing has also appeared in the Washington Post,the San Francisco Chronicle, History News Network, and Salon.
David Waldstreicher is Distinguished Professor of History at
CUNY Graduate Center, and the author of Slavery’s Constitution:
From Revolution to Ratification; Runaway America: Benjamin Franklin,
Slavery, and the American Revolution; and In the Midst of Perpetual
Fetes: The Making of American Nationalism, 1776–1820. As
an editor, his books include John Quincy Adams and the Politics of
Slavery: Selections from the Diary; A Companion to John Adams and
John Quincy Adams; A Companion to Benjamin Franklin; and Beyond
the Founders.
Elizabeth L. Wollman is associate professor of music at Baruch
College, CUNY, and a member of the doctoral faculty in the Theater
Department at CUNY Graduate Center. She is the author of
The Theater Will Rock: A History of the Rock Musical, From “Hair” to
“Hedwig”; Hard Times: The Adult Musical in 1970s New York City;
and the forthcoming The Critical Companion to the American Stage
Musical.
Chronology
Introduction: History is Happening in New York - Renee C. Romano and Claire Bond Potter
Act I: The Script
Chapter 1: From Ron Chernow's Alexander Hamilton to Hamilton: An American Musical - William Hogeland
Chapter 2: "Can We Get Back to Politics? Please?" Hamilton's Missing Politics in Hamilton - Joanne B. Freeman
Chapter 3: Race-Conscious Casting and the Erasure of the Black Past in Hamilton - Lyra D. Monteiro
Chapter 4: The Greatest City in the World? Slavery in New York in the Age of Hamilton - Leslie M. Harris
Chapter 5: “Remember….I’m Your Man”: Masculinity, Marriage, and Gender in Hamilton - Catherine Allgor
Act II: The Stage
Chapter 6: “The Ten Dollar Founding Father”: Hamilton, Money and Federal Power - Michael O’Malley
Chapter 7: Hamilton as Founders Chic: A Neo-Federalist, Antislavery, Usable Past? - David Waldstreicher and Jeffrey L. Pasley
Chapter 8: Hamilton and the American Revolution on Stage and Screen - Andrew M. Schocket
Chapter 9: From The Black Crook to Hamilton: A Brief History of Hot Tickets on Broadway - Elizabeth L. Wollman
Chapter 10: Looking at Hamilton from Inside the Broadway Bubble - Brian Eugenio Herrera
Act III: The Audience
Chapter 11: Mind the Gap: Teaching Hamilton - Jim Cullen
Chapter 12: Who Tells Your Story: Hamilton as a People’s History - Joseph M. Adelman
Chapter 13: Reckoning with America’s Racial Past, Present, and Future in Hamilton - Patricia Herrera
Chapter 14: Hamilton: A New American Civic Myth by Renee C. Romano
Chapter 15: Safe in the Nation We’ve Made: Staging Hamilton on Social Media - Claire Bond Potter
Sample Syllabus
Acknowledgments
Notes on Contributors
Index
Introduction: History is Happening in New York - Renee C. Romano and Claire Bond Potter
Act I: The Script
Chapter 1: From Ron Chernow's Alexander Hamilton to Hamilton: An American Musical - William Hogeland
Chapter 2: "Can We Get Back to Politics? Please?" Hamilton's Missing Politics in Hamilton - Joanne B. Freeman
Chapter 3: Race-Conscious Casting and the Erasure of the Black Past in Hamilton - Lyra D. Monteiro
Chapter 4: The Greatest City in the World? Slavery in New York in the Age of Hamilton - Leslie M. Harris
Chapter 5: “Remember….I’m Your Man”: Masculinity, Marriage, and Gender in Hamilton - Catherine Allgor
Act II: The Stage
Chapter 6: “The Ten Dollar Founding Father”: Hamilton, Money and Federal Power - Michael O’Malley
Chapter 7: Hamilton as Founders Chic: A Neo-Federalist, Antislavery, Usable Past? - David Waldstreicher and Jeffrey L. Pasley
Chapter 8: Hamilton and the American Revolution on Stage and Screen - Andrew M. Schocket
Chapter 9: From The Black Crook to Hamilton: A Brief History of Hot Tickets on Broadway - Elizabeth L. Wollman
Chapter 10: Looking at Hamilton from Inside the Broadway Bubble - Brian Eugenio Herrera
Act III: The Audience
Chapter 11: Mind the Gap: Teaching Hamilton - Jim Cullen
Chapter 12: Who Tells Your Story: Hamilton as a People’s History - Joseph M. Adelman
Chapter 13: Reckoning with America’s Racial Past, Present, and Future in Hamilton - Patricia Herrera
Chapter 14: Hamilton: A New American Civic Myth by Renee C. Romano
Chapter 15: Safe in the Nation We’ve Made: Staging Hamilton on Social Media - Claire Bond Potter
Sample Syllabus
Acknowledgments
Notes on Contributors
Index
