Five Questions with Lindsay Schakenbach Regele, author of “Flowers, Guns, and Money: Joel Roberts Poinsett and the Paradoxes of American Patriotism”

“The Christmas flower,” the poinsettia, has become a ubiquitous symbol of the holidays, but its origins in this country do not evoke the joy and goodwill of the season. Joel Roberts Poinsett, a South Carolina investor, enslaver, ambitious congressman, and the ...