Eulogies, Letters, and the Ideals of Northern Statesmanship with Rachel Wiedman
This episode will be published on 15 June 2026.
In this episode of Historians & Their Histories, we speak with Rachel Wiedman. She discusses her dissertation research on gender and political culture in the Civil War era North, tracing a shift in how Northerners evaluated political leadership from an ideal of restrained manhood that valued moderation and compromise to one of martial manhood that prized principle, moral courage, and confrontation. At the MHS, Rachel has been working with letters written by constituents to figures such as John Quincy Adams, Daniel Webster, and Massachusetts Governor John A. Andrew, revealing how ordinary Northerners used the language of manhood to praise and condemn their political representatives.
Rachel Wiedman is a recipient of the Marc Friedlaender Fellowship from the MHS.
To learn more about MHS fellowships and how to apply, please visit this page.
Episode Special Guest:
Rachel Elise Wiedman is a PhD candidate in the History Department at University of Tennessee, Knoxville interested in political culture and gender in the Civil War era North. Her dissertation examines how changing ideals of manhood altered values embedded in northern political culture, shifting how northerners thought about statesmanship, citizenship, and political participation.
This episode uses materials from:
Colocate by Podington Bear (Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported)
