From the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History:

"The financial crisis and the ensuing economic recession of 2007-09 serve to remind us that such crises and downturns have been recurring events in American history. They have occurred on average once every fifteen to twenty years since 1789. In this seminar we will study the causes of some major financial crises—those of 1792, 1837-39, 1873, 1893-95, 1907, 1929-33, 1989-90, and 2007-09—and will explore the social, political, and economic consequences of the crises. We will discuss the typical pattern of most of the crises, differences among them, and issues such as whether legislative and regulatory responses to a crisis make subsequent crises more or less likely. Participants will visit the Museum of American Finance on Wall Street to gain a better understanding of the complexities of our financial system, how it developed over two centuries, and how periodically it has crashed on the rocks of excessive risk taking and speculation."

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From the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History:

"Led by Patty Limerick, this seminar uses focused case studies to explore the larger picture of environmental history, a subject that has grown increasingly complex as historians deepen their understanding of the vast role of 'anthropogenic change' (also known as 'history'!) in reconfiguring the places and processes we think of as 'natural.' Much of the seminar explores the transformation of attitudes, from the assessment of North American landscapes and resources by early settlers to the recognition of the changing 'baseline' of global warming, along with a reconsideration—and revision—of the usual polarity pitting utilitarian approaches in opposition to preservationist approaches to the management of nature. With guest speakers drawn from the University of Colorado's widely respected environmental studies program, the roles of naturalists and scientists in shaping American thinking about nature will receive particular attention, as will changes in the production and consumption of energy, a fundamental matter in environmental history. The concluding field trip to Rocky Mountain National Park gives the themes of the lectures and discussions a down-to-earth grounding in a visit to one of the most popular units in the nation's public lands, while close attention to John McPhee's Encounters with the Archdruid provides a framework for drawing lessons from the past to enhance the quality of contemporary environmental decision-making."

From the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History:

"Professors Kenneth Jackson and Karen Markoe explore one of the most exciting and important periods in American history: the quarter-century between the end of Reconstruction and the beginning of Theodore Roosevelt's presidency. Lectures focus on the rise of machine politics, the transportation revolution, the development of new social elites, the changing role of women, the literary figures who helped define the age, housing for the rich and poor, and an examination of New York City at the center of the Gilded Age."

From the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History website:

"The Progressive Era marked the modernization of the American state, the expansion of citizenship, the ascendancy of 'big business,' the transformation of American liberalism, and the development of a social politics. It was also the moment when the United States assumed the role of a world power, culminating in its participation in World War I and its role in negotiating the ambitious but flawed treaty that ended it. Taking exception to interpretations of the era that see 'American exceptionalism,' this seminar will explore the era and its reforms (and their limits) in the context of the larger global response to industrialization and urbanization under conditions of unregulated capitalism."

From the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History:

"Professor David Kennedy examines the experience of the American people in the Great Depression and World War II. Lecture topics include the origins and impact of the Great Depression; the nature and legacy of the New Deal; the military and diplomatic dimensions of American participation in World War II; and the war's impact on American society. Special attention will be given to the historical debate about the Depression's causes; America and the Holocaust; the wartime internment of Japanese-Americans; and the use of atomic bombs against Japan."

From the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History:

"A century and a quarter after it came to a close, Reconstruction remains a pivotal but much misunderstood era of American history. This one-week seminar will examine the history of Reconstruction, understood both as a specific period of the American past, which began during the Civil War, and as a prolonged and difficult process by which Americans sought to reunite the nation and come to terms with the destruction of slavery. In political terms, Reconstruction ended in 1877, when the federal government abandoned the idea of intervening in the South to protect the rights of black citizens. As a historical process it lasted to the turn of the century, until new systems of labor and race relations and a new political order were entrenched in the South. And in debates about racial equality, the interpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment, affirmative action, and the responsibility of the federal government for defining and protecting the rights of citizens, issues central to Reconstruction remain part of our lives today. Reconstruction also offers an opportunity to consider the 'politics of history': how changing interpretations of the past are shaped by the world in which the historian lives and the assumptions he or she brings to the materials of history. During the course of the week, teachers will also annotate one or two documents from the Reconstruction period for classroom use."

From the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History:

"During the 1850s, the United States was a nation of foreboding and hope. An irresolvable conflict between North and South seemed to be approaching, along with periodic hopes that the divide could somehow be bridged and conflict forestalled. At the start of the decade, the nation's eloquent orators were led by John C. Calhoun and Daniel Webster; ten years later, a new voice had been added to public discourse: that of Abraham Lincoln. Literary artists—including Herman Melville, Walt Whitman, and Harriet Beecher Stowe—addressed the issues of slavery, regional autonomy, and federal power both directly and obliquely in poetry and prose. In this seminar we will explore this ominous yet hopeful era, with the aim of understanding the political and moral issues that drove Americans apart, and how the literature of the period can help us understand why."

From the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History:

"Abraham Lincoln will stand at the center of the seminar, though less as a biographical subject than as a prism for exploring key aspects of his age. The themes and topics to be addressed include slavery and the Old South; the abolitionist impulse and the broadening antislavery movement; party political realignment and the sectional crisis of the 1850s; evangelicalism and politics; the election of 1860, the secession of the Lower South, and the coming of war; wartime leadership, political and military; the Civil War home front; emancipation; the elements of Confederate defeat and Union victory; and the meaning of the war for American nationalism."

From the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History:

"When Americans are asked to rank their presidents, Abraham Lincoln almost always comes out at the top. But why? Sometimes, the reason is that he freed the slaves . . . or that he saved the Union . . . or that he was a great war president . . . or that he was a master of words. All of these are true, but these truths don't get at the man behind these truths. Although Lincoln had next-to-nothing in the way of formal education, he possessed a natural intellectual curiosity, a voracious appetite for reading, and a passion for ideas. He was a lawyer, a politician, a fixer. But he was more than just a lawyer, a politician, or a fixer. Lincoln's curiosity . . . his reading . . . his ideas . . . led him into the vortex of the great clashes of ideas in the nineteenth century about religion, politics, Romanticism, race, and slavery. In this seminar, we will see how Lincoln was shaped by three important issues in his day:

• The clash of religion and the Enlightenment
• The offense of slavery
• The fight for the survival of democracy

This seminar will be an exploration of Lincoln's mind—of the great intellectual problems he faced, of the books he read, of the ideas he defended, and of the kind of democracy he thought was worth saving. And at the end, we will come to know Lincoln, not just as the greatest of presidents, but as a man of great ideas as well."