**Winner of the Philip Schaff Prize (for best book on the history of Christianity by a North American scholar)New Yorker — "Best Books of 2024"Finalist, Best Book in Utah History, Utah Historical SocietyThe first major history of Mormonism in a decade, drawing on newly available sources to reveal a profoundly divided faith that has nevertheless shaped the nation.**The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was founded by Joseph Smith in 1830 in t...

Best Book Award • Mormon History AssociationA brilliant young historian excavates the brief life of a lost Mormon city, uncovering a “grand, underappreciated saga in American history” (Wall Street Journal).In Kingdom of Nauvoo, Benjamin E. Park draws on newly available sources to re-create the founding and destruction of the Mormon city of Nauvoo. On the banks of the Mississippi in Illinois, the early Mormons built a religious utopia, estab...

Few lives have been as consequential for modern Mormonism as D. Michael Quinn. The son of a Mexican immigrant father and a California Mormon mother, Quinn became an influential participant in the New Mormon History movement. Much of his scholarly work remains classic in the field. Yet while he was publicly celebrated for his award-winning books and articles, he privately struggled to reconcile his sexuality with his faith. Eventually, his revisionist scholarship and homosexuality placed hi...

A collection of original essays exploring the history of the various American religious traditions and the meaning of their many expressionsThe Blackwell Companion to American Religious History explores the key events, significant themes, and important movements in various religious traditions throughout the nation’s history from pre-colonization to the present day. Original essays written by leading scholars and new voices in the field discuss how religio...

America was born in an age of political revolution throughout the Atlantic world, a period when the very definition of 'nation' was transforming. Benjamin E. Park traces how Americans imagined novel forms of nationality during the country's first five decades within the context of European discussions taking place at the same time. Focusing on three case studies - Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and South Carolina - Park examines the developing practices of nationalism in three specific conte...

An extraordinary story of faith and violence in nineteenth-century America, based on previously confidential documents from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.Compared to the Puritans, Mormons have rarely gotten their due, often treated as fringe cultists or marginalized polygamists unworthy of serious examination. In Kingdom of Nauvoo, Benjamin E. Park excavates the brief, tragic life of a lost Mormon city, demonstrating that the Mormons are ...

The first major history of Mormonism in a decade, drawing on newly available sources to reveal a profoundly divided faith that has nevertheless shaped the nation.The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was founded by Joseph Smith in 1830 in the so-called "burned-over district" of upstate New York, which was producing seers and prophets daily. Most of the new creeds flamed out; Smith's would endure, becoming the most significant homegrown religion in America...

Few people in recent memory have dedicated themselves as devotedly to the story of twentieth-century American music as Rob Kapilow, the composer, conductor, and host of the hit NPR music radio program, What Makes It Great? Now, in Listening for America, he turns his keen ear to the Great American Songbook, bringing many of our favorite classics to life through the songs and stories of eight of the twentieth century's most treasured American composers—Kern, Porter, Gershwi...

Since the end of the Second World War, the United States has sunk hundreds of billions of dollars into foreign economies in the hope that its investments would help remake the world in its own image—or, at the very least, make the world "safe for democracy." So far, the returns have been disappointing, to say the least. Pushing for fair and free elections in undemocratic countries has added to the casualty count, rather than taken away from it, and trying to eliminate corruption entirely h...

The first biography of the great Shawnee leader in more than twenty years, and the first to make clear that his misunderstood younger brother, Tenskwatawa, was an equal partner in the last great pan-Indian alliance against the United States.Until the Americans killed Tecumseh in 1813, he and his brother Tenskwatawa were the co-architects of the broadest pan-Indian confederation in United States history. In previous accounts of Tecumseh's life, Tenskwatawa has been ...

A chilling account of seventy years of nuclear catastrophes, by the author of the “definitive” (Economist) Cold War history, Nuclear Folly.Nuclear energy was embraced across the globe at the height of the nuclear industry in the 1960s and 1970s; today, there are 440 nuclear reactors operating throughout the world, with nuclear power providing ten percent of world electricity. Yet as the world seeks to reduce carbon emissions to combat climate chan...

During a sixty-eight year career, conductor Arturo Toscanini (1867–1957) was famed for his fierce dedication, photographic memory, explosive temper, and impassioned performances. At various times he dominated La Scala, the Metropolitan Opera, the New York Philharmonic, the NBC Symphony, and the Bayreuth, Salzburg, and Lucerne festivals. His reforms influenced generations of musicians, and his opposition to Nazism and Fascism made him a model for artists of conscience. Thanks to unprecedent...