Disaster relief became an instrument of U.S. foreign policy in the Gilded Age and Progressive Era. The "progressive presidents" particularly utilized aid for American interests, sparking a trend. Prof. Julia Irwin joins me to discuss her upcoming book on this very topic.

Essential Reading:

Julia Irwin, Making the World Safe: The American Red Cross and a Nation's Humanitarian Awakening (2013).

Julia Irwin, "Our Climatic Moment: Hazarding a History of the United States and the World," Diplomatic History 45, no. 3 (June 2021): 421-44.

Recommended Reading:

Cynthia Kierner, Inventing Disaster: The Culture of Calamity from the Jamestown Colony to the Johnstown Flood (2019). 

Ted Steinberg, Acts of God: The Unnatural History of Natural Disaster in America (2000).

Olivier Zunz, Philanthropy in America: A History (2012).

Heather Curtis, Holy Humanitarians: American Evangelicals and Global Aid (2018). 

William N. Tilchin, “Theodore Roosevelt, Anglo-American Relations, and the Jamaica Incident of 1907,” Diplomatic History 19, no. 3 (1995): 385-405   

Salvatore LaGumina, The Great Earthquake: America Comes to Messina’s Rescue (2008).

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