Appalachian State University’s Department of History — with support from the College of Arts and Sciences — welcomes Dr. David K. Thomson for its 2024 Civil War Speaker Series.
Thomson will present “Bonds of War: How Civil War Financial Agents Sold the World on the Union” on Monday, Nov. 11, from 6 to 7:30 p.m. in Room 114 of Belk Library and Information Commons, located at 218 College St. in Boone.
Thomson is an associate professor of history at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Connecticut. His book, “Bonds of War,” received the 2023 Wiley-Silver Prize in Civil War History for the best first book published in Civil War History, as well as an honorable mention for the 2023 Organization of American Historians Civil War and Reconstruction Prize. His writing has also been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Bloomberg and The Boston Globe Magazine.
According to Thomson, his lecture will examine this question: How does one package and sell confidence in the stability of a nation riven by civil strife? This was the question that loomed before the Philadelphia financial house of Jay Cooke & Company, entrusted by the U.S. government with an unprecedented sale of bonds to finance the Union war effort in the early days of the American Civil War. How the government and its agents marketed these bonds revealed a version of the war the public was willing to buy and buy into, based not just in the full faith and credit of the United States but also in the success of its armies and its long-term vision for open markets.
The event is free and open to the public. For a disability accommodation, visit odr.appstate.edu. For more information about the Civil War Speaker Series, visit history.appstate.edu/events/civil-war-speaker-series.