Lincoln Assassination in schools

[BettyO]

(09-03-2012 07:06 AM)LincolnMan Wrote:  Betty: that's interesting about the Northern point of view being left. Is that because the textbook itself left it out? Or did the teachers leave it out when they talked about? So, back then, textbooks used American public schools weren't the same for all students-whether in Detroit or Richmond?

Yes - it was mostly all a history of the Confederacy (Robert E Lee who had a semi-god status), and the Civil War from the Confederate viewpoint! It was the textbook - although the teacher used it as a Bible somewhat. Back in the early 1960s, (the Centennial of the Civil War), this was apparently the typical viewpoint of studying the Civil War in the south! Nothing of African American history; nothing of the Northern perspective other than that Lincoln passed the Emancipation Proclamation....nothing else at all! Oh, it DID mention that Lee surrendered to Grant on April 9, 1865!. Apparently the textbooks were different - but I didn't know of any difference at all.