By Ben Jealous

(Trice Edney Wire) – We just fell back. The season of darkness is coming on. But this year, more than any I can remember, that darkness feels existential, not just seasonal.

As a professor, I’ve watched it settle over my students throughout 2025 like fog. They talk about despair as if it’s wrapping its fingers around their throat. They talk about how the news makes them want to pull the covers over their heads every day.

What do I say to them?

History—that patient teacher, that relentless witness—has something to say about tomorrows.

My family has been taking notes for four hundred years. American centuries follow hundred-year cycles. Within those cycles, every “20s” decade is a crucible of cruelty. Every “70s” brings bold rays of light breaking through.

The 1620s were

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