Happy Birthday, Mark Twain!
Today is Samuel Clemens’ 176th birthday. And, consequently, another reason for us to order dessert. Alyssa
About the Trip
A Northwestern University journalism student, professor and 2011 graduate are driving 13,500 miles around the United States between Sept. 18 and Dec. 11 for a project titled “Traveling with Twain in Search of America’s Identity.” The three will follow the path that a young Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) took by stagecoach, steamship and train during trips east to New York, south to New Orleans and west to San Francisco during the 1850s and 1860s; they will interview a variety of Americans about race, immigration-status and other current identity issues and talk with members of a representative American family, the Ghigliones, that first immigrated to the United States from northern Italy in the 1870s. Read more >>
Follow the Trip
Tri-State Defender celebrates its 60th anniversary of keeping the African-American voice alive in Memphis
We interview Bernal E. Smith II, publisher of the Tri-State Defender, the day before the Memphis weekly newspaper, which also serves nearby Arkansas and Mississippi, celebrates its sixtieth anniversary. Our conversation with Smith, which focuses on … Read more
Non-profit “Baby Steps” is a success story in mostly poor Okolona, Mississippi
After seven weeks of visiting places that remind us of America’s problems (prison, homeless camp, lynching site) we decide to search for places that are helping to solve the country’s problems. We discover Baby Steps, a … Read more
Trip update: We’ve recalculated our estimated distance
Original estimates pegged the Twain Trip as a 9,000-mile journey. Laughable! Our odometer probably knew this from the beginning, but 9,000 miles is much too conservative for a three-month road trip. We’ve hit 8,500 miles, and … Read more
Trying to pinpoint a spy from the Freedom Summer: Our visit to Rust College in Holly Springs, MS
In 1998, while directing the journalism program at Emory University, I received a chilling telephone call from Emory law professor David J. Garrow. Garrow said that my name showed up in the recently released, 134,000-page file … Read more
Featured Content
Twain's Evolution
- Natalie Sheppard discusses being a black Mormon in the Salt Lake City area
- Remembrances of death as well as life in Unionville
- Family history abounds in Kansas
- More in Twain's Evolution...
Immigration Stories
- What Julie Pham learned managing a Vietnamese newspaper in the Pacific Northwest
- From the Mekong to the Mississippi
- Alameda Ghigliones demonstrate the immigrant entrepreneurial spirit with produce business, trucking company
- More in Immigration Stories...
Race and Ethnicity
- What Julie Pham learned managing a Vietnamese newspaper in the Pacific Northwest
- From the Mekong to the Mississippi
- Natalie Sheppard discusses being a black Mormon in the Salt Lake City area
- More in Race and Ethnicity...
Gender Identity
- Before Occupy Wall Street there was The Greening of America
- Visiting the Matthew Shepard murder site, 13 years later
- Joanna Hernandez, president of Unity, tackles challenge of diversity in newsrooms
- More in Gender Identity...
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