McKenzie Long – The UncommonWealth

Was the First Filipino American Citizen Naturalized in Norfolk County?

While working on records in the Naturalization Records Digital Collection, I came across one that made me stop and do a double-take. It was the…

McKenzie LongMay 14, 2025

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Are You Smarter than a Literacy Test?

In 1920, Cora Cottman joined scores of other American women applying to vote for the very first time following the ratification of the 19th Amendment.…

McKenzie LongSeptember 23, 2024

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Whatever Happened to Virginia’s Black Patriots? Stories from the Declarations for Revolutionary War Pensions

Crispus Attucks, Peter Salem, James Lafayette. The first person to die in the American Revolution at the Boston Massacre, a soldier responsible for killing a…

McKenzie LongAugust 7, 2024

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How Not to Be a Confederate Soldier: Civil War Writs of Habeas Corpus from Richmond City and Petersburg

Why didn’t men fight in the Civil War? It’s not the most popular question that gets brought up during discussions of America’s bloodiest war, but…

McKenzie LongJune 7, 2023

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Syphilis, Steamboats, and Scientific Evidence: A Lancaster County Divorce Suit

When you hear about a case that hinges on “medical evidence,” what is the first image that pops into your head? It’s probably something serious…

McKenzie LongAugust 3, 2022

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“Being Southern in Position” : The Division of the Methodist Episcopal Church in Alexandria

Picture a church with the front doors firmly locked, and the keys kept away from the congregation. Then picture a part of the congregation illegally…

McKenzie LongMarch 2, 2022

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A Marriage Divided: The Post-Civil War Divorce of Sarah and George Field

"I hate secession and all its hateful helpers. Cursed be the hand that raised its bloody flag to make desolate homes and wretched women,” wrote…

McKenzie LongSeptember 22, 2021

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Kidnapped into Slavery: The Freedom Suit of Francis Jackson

The 2013 film 12 Years a Slave adapted the historical memoirs of Solomon Northup, a free African American from New York who was kidnapped and…

McKenzie LongApril 7, 2021