Inspired by the Bicentennial Freedom Train, the Freedom Plane National Tour will make original documents fundamental to America's founding accessible to Americans across the country as part of the commemoration of America's 250th anniversary.
Check out American history with Landon Myers for Unimaginable Election Shenanigans: Voting in Early America. While modern elections are the most secure in our history, voting in early America was rife with election fraud. We'll dive into the history of voting in the United States in the 19th century, from stuffed ballot boxes, counterfeit ballots, and the tools developed to combat fraud. Landon is the Program Manager for the Initiative for Democracy & Civic Empowerment at the University of Michigan. He is fascinated by the mechanics of elections and has been collecting antique voting machines, ballot boxes, and other election materials for more than five years.
On July 8 at 6:00 PM, communities across the country will simultaneously read the Declaration of Independence aloud — marking the exact date and time of its first public reading in 1776. Americans in all 50 States and 16 Territories of the United States will read the Declaration of Independence as part of 'Sharing the Spirit of America.'At the University of Michigan, the event will take place on the Diag. The reading will start promptly at 6:00 p.m. -- arrive early to get a red, white, and blue popsicle and U-M U.S. at 250 stickers!
Hear the Declaration of Independence brought to life through a public read-aloud in celebration of its 250th anniversary. With many voices sharing the text, this program highlights the power of words meant to be heard—then and now.
Today, debate rages over how to interpret the United States Constitution, especially what role history should play in that practice. When the generation that adopted the Constitution in the late eighteenth century first interpreted the document, what defined their debates? How do those debates compare to the ones structuring American constitutional law today? Join author and professor Jonathan Gienapp for a lecture exploring how to read the Constitution through lenses past and present and reflecting on what the creators can teach us about the Constitution today. A book signing and dessert reception will follow the program.
Join the Michigan State Capitol Education & History Department throughout 2026 as we commemorate our nation's 250th anniversary. Our monthly program series, Rise & Progress, will explore a range of America 250 themes and examine how our Capitol—and the community of people connected to it—fit within the larger American story.
On the cusp of America's semiquincentennial, leadership is being tested by unprecedented global and local pressures—from budget contractions and climate change to shifting institutional cultures. This panel explores how executive leaders navigate an era of significant polarization and social backlash while building sustainable coalitions. The discussion will investigate the strategies required to lead amidst deliberate attempts to undo key aspects of the transgenerational Black freedom movement while honoring the legacy of Juneteenth and charting a path forward.
Kelsey Museum of Archeology
Upjohn Wing
Patio and Galleries
Join us at the Kelsey Museum for fun, activities, and food in celebration of our nation's 250th Birthday! Learn how the ancient world played a key part in the founding of the United States. Games and activities for kids and gallery tours will be provided.
1776Music and lyrics by Sherman Edwards, book by Peter Stone Directed by David Kiley The Ann Arbor Civic Theatre is presenting the musical 1776 to mark the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States.
Gerald Ford Jr. grew up in a region of the nation heavily shaped by the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. Ford Presidential Foundation Executive Director Gleaves Whitney will unpack the significance of this jewel among America's forgotten founding documents and discuss its impact on the civic and political culture in which our 38th President worked.
Join the Michigan State Capitol Education & History Department throughout 2026 as we commemorate our nation's 250th anniversary. Our monthly program series, Rise & Progress, will explore a range of America 250 themes and examine how our Capitol—and the community of people connected to it—fit within the larger American story.
Many of our Tribal Nations are located in rural areas that lack vital legal resources. Should courts shift their practices to accommodate this reality?
In Accommodating the Republic: Use of Taverns in the Early United States, Kirsten Wood explores how Americans' use taverns in their pursuits of happiness helped flesh out the evolving meaning of citizenship in the young United States. In this talk, she looks at the years following the Revolutionary War, when Americans continued to use their neighborhood taverns as sites for gathering and political mobilization.
The claim is that the American Revolution was about independence and freedom. The Declaration of Independence called Indigenous people "merciless Indian savages" for trying to protect their homeland. History shows us it was truly about the land and who could control it. The claim is that the American Revolution was about independence and freedom. The Declaration of Independence called Indigenous people "merciless Indian savages" for trying to protect their homeland. History shows us it was truly about the land and who could control it.
Join us on Wednesday, February 25 at 4PM in the Tappan Room at the Michigan Union for a talk with Professor Omar Valerio-Jiménez (University of Texas at San Antonio), who will explore how memories of the U.S.-Mexico War have shaped Mexican American civil rights, public rituals, and storytelling. He will discuss his latest book, Remembering Conquest: Mexican Americans, Memory, and Citizenship (2024), and share insights from his research on educational reform, textbook inclusion, and the preservation of Mexican American histories in the U.S. Southwest.
Coffee is among the most common goods traded and consumed worldwide, and so omnipresent its popularity is often taken for granted. But even everyday habits have a history. When and why coffee became part of North American daily life is at the center of the recently published book, Coffee Nation: How One Commodity Transformed the Early United States, by Michelle Craig McDonald. Using a wide range of archival, quantitative, and material evidence, McDonald follows coffee from the slavery-based plantations of the Caribbean and South America, through the balance sheets of Atlantic world merchants, into the coffeehouses, stores, and homes of colonial North Americans, and ultimately to the growing import/export businesses of the early nineteenth-century United States that rebranded this exotic good as an American staple. The result is a sweeping history that explores how coffee shaped the lives of enslaved laborers and farmers, merchants and retailers, consumers and advertisers.
Join Ford School Dean Celeste Watkins-Hayes and Wynton Marsalis in a public conversation reflecting on America at 250, the role of music in our culture and society, and the ways that artists help shape our future. Register at ums.org/wynton250 for email reminders. Presented in partnership with the Ford School of Public Policy.In October 2022, UMS hosted an intensive weeklong residency with Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra that included two concerts, a School Day Performance, multiple residency activities on and off campus, and a halftime performance at the Michigan football game. While a February residency precludes an appearance on the 50-yard line, UMS is thrilled that Wynton and his Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra will return for another distinctive UMS residency this year featuring multiple performances and this talk.
As America celebrates the 250th anniversary of its founding, the religious dimensions of America's origins are being widely discussed and debated. In the Center's kickoff event for 2026, historian John Fea will examine the idea of America as a Christian nation, the role the Bible played in the American Revolution, the religious beliefs of the Founders, and how those beliefs may or may not have influenced their work as statesmen. Join us for this critical conversation.John Fea is Distinguished Professor of American History at Messiah University in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. He is the author of six books, including Was America Founded as a Christian Nation?: A Historical Introduction, one of three finalists for the George Washington Book Prize.
Guest artist and curator Julie Ault will lead a conversation about her new project American Sampler: Activating the Archive. This research-driven, immersive exhibition in UMMA's Vertical Gallery is a collaboration with the Joseph A. Labadie Collection of anarchism, protest, and social movements housed in the U-M Library's Special Collections Research Center.The exhibition centers on 1950s–1970s movements for Black freedom, civil rights, and antiwar activism, clarifying the aspirations and effects as well as the violent opposition these movements encountered. American Sampler invites visitors to examine how legacies of grassroots organizing and protest in U.S. history shape the present. This ambitious project is the inaugural collaboration of the new Labadie Collection and UMMA Fellowship Program.Free and open to the public, registration required.
Join us for a powerful conversation between artist and curator Julie Ault and archivist Julie Herrada as we celebrate the opening of American Sampler: Activating the Archive, UMMA's new landmark exhibition. Together, they'll discuss how archival research, curatorial practice, and artistic vision come together in the exhibition to illuminate histories of dissent that continue to influence the social landscape of the United States.
This talk, building on Jordan's 2025 book The Invention of Rum: Creating the Quintessential Atlantic Commodity, will present a new story of how rum was invented, made, sold, and consumed in the Atlantic world, and how those developments intersected with the American Revolution. He will introduce the audience to a commodity that itself revolutionized the Atlantic world in large part due to its ubiquity and affordability. He will then home in on various moments in the leadup, course, and aftermath of the American Revolution when the market for—and meanings embedded within—rum shaped the age of revolutions.
As part of the University of Michigan's MLK Symposium, please join us for a conversation with journalist and sports commentator David Dennis Jr. and his father, civil rights movement veteran David Dennis Sr. Authors of "The Movement Made Us: A Father, A Son and the Legacy of a Freedom Ride," a moving memoir of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, Dennis Jr. and Sr. will discuss the political and personal legacies of the movement and its historical relevance for the challenges facing American society in the present. Matthew Countryman, associate professor of Afroamerican Studies and History, will serve as moderator for the eve
Thomas Paine's Common Sense, first published on January 10, 1776, with only 1,000 copies, quickly became one of the most influential works of the American Revolution. Students in Revolutionary Political Thought in Early America and Beyond co-curated the exhibition Revolutionary Paine using materials from the Clements Library to explore its rapid and far-reaching impact.
Helen H. Newberry Residence
Audre Lorde Multicultural Lounge
Join the Betsy Barbour and Helen Newberry Diversity Peer Educators in recognizing Native American Heritage Month by learning about Indigenous history and participating in a guided craft!
Ted Gayer, President of the Niskanen Center, will describe the ideas behind the emerging abundance movement and how they connect to Niskanen’s broader mission of strengthening American institutions.
