Portal:United States
Parent Portals: Geography / North America / United States
Introduction
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The United States of America is a federal republic of 50 states, a federal district and 14 territories. It is located mostly in central North America. The U.S. has three land borders, two with Canada and one with Mexico, and has sea borders with Cuba, the Bahamas, the Dominican Republic, Bermuda and Russia, and is otherwise bounded by the Pacific Ocean, the Bering Sea, the Arctic Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean. Of the 50 states, only Alaska and Hawaii are not contiguous with any other state. The U.S. also has a collection of districts, territories, and possessions in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean. Each state has a high level of autonomy according to the system of federalism. The U.S. traces its national origin to the declaration by 13 British colonies in 1776 that they were one free and independent state. They were recognized as such by the Treaty of Paris in 1783. Since then, the nation has grown to become a superpower and exerts a high level of economic, political, military, and cultural influence.
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David Alexander Johnston (December 18, 1949 – May 18, 1980) was an American United States Geological Survey (USGS) volcanologist who was killed by the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens in the U.S. state of Washington. A principal scientist on the USGS monitoring team, Johnston was killed in the eruption while manning an observation post six miles (10 km) away on the morning of May 18, 1980. He was the first to report the eruption, transmitting "Vancouver! Vancouver! This is it!" before he was swept away by a lateral blast; despite a thorough search, Johnston's body was never found, but state highway workers discovered remnants of his USGS trailer in 1993.
Johnston's career took him across the United States, where he studied the Augustine Volcano in Alaska, the San Juan volcanic field in Colorado, and long-extinct volcanoes in Michigan. Johnston was a meticulous and talented scientist, known for his analyses of volcanic gases and their relationship to eruptions. This, along with his enthusiasm and positive attitude, made him liked and respected by many co-workers. After his death, other scientists lauded his character, both verbally and in dedications and letters. Johnston felt scientists must do what is necessary, including taking risks, to help protect the public from natural disasters. His work, and that of fellow USGS scientists, convinced authorities to close Mount St. Helens to the public before the 1980 eruption. They maintained the closure despite heavy pressure to re-open the area; their work saved thousands of lives. His story became intertwined with the popular image of volcanic eruptions and their threat to society, and a part of volcanology's history. To date, Johnston, along with his mentee Harry Glicken, is one of two American volcanologists known to have died in a volcanic eruption. (Full article...) -
Head over Heels is an American television sitcom created by Jeff Franklin that aired on United Paramount Network (UPN) from August 26 to October 28, 1997. It is set in the eponymous video dating agency based in Miami Beach, Florida, run by brothers Jack and Warren Baldwin (played by Peter Dobson and Mitchell Whitfield, respectively). The remainder of the cast consists of their employees, played by Eva LaRue, Patrick Bristow, and Cindy Ambuehl. Connie Stevens was initially cast as the Baldwins' mother, but never appeared in the show after the pilot was rewritten. Andrew Gottlieb was a co-producer, and Vince Cheung and Ben Montanio were consulting producers.
The sitcom was the lowest-performing series tracked by Nielsen Holdings for the 1997–1998 television season. Since UPN primarily marketed its programming to African American audiences, critics questioned the show's lack of a black main character. With its inclusion of Ian, Head over Heels was one of 30 U.S. programs to feature a gay, lesbian or bisexual character that television season. It received a negative response from commentators, who criticized its sex comedy and characters. (Full article...) -
The 2011 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup Final was a soccer match between the Seattle Sounders FC and the Chicago Fire, played on October 4, 2011, at CenturyLink Field in Seattle, Washington. The match was the culmination of the 2011 U.S. Open Cup, a tournament open to amateur and professional soccer teams affiliated with the United States Soccer Federation (U.S. Soccer). This was the 98th edition of the U.S. Open Cup, the oldest ongoing competition in American soccer. The Seattle Sounders FC won by defeating the Chicago Fire 2–0 with goals scored by Fredy Montero and Osvaldo Alonso. The attendance was 36,615, breaking the record for the final set the previous year when Seattle also won and hosted. Seattle became the first team since 1968 to win three consecutive U.S. Open Cup championships and the fourth team ever to do so in the 98-year history of the tournament.
Sounders FC automatically qualified for the third round of the U.S. Open Cup tournament by finishing among the top six in the 2010 Major League Soccer season. The Fire did not automatically qualify, and had to play through two qualification rounds before entering the official tournament. Prior to the final, Chicago and Seattle had met twice in 2011, with Seattle winning one game and the other ending in a draw. (Full article...) -
The Battle of Saipan was an amphibious assault launched by the United States against the Empire of Japan during the Pacific campaign of World War II between 15 June and 9 July 1944. The initial invasion triggered the Battle of the Philippine Sea, which effectively destroyed Japanese carrier-based airpower, and the battle resulted in the American capture of the island. Its occupation put the major cities of the Japanese home islands within the range of B-29 bombers, making them vulnerable to strategic bombing by the United States Army Air Forces. It also precipitated the resignation of Hideki Tōjō, the prime minister of Japan.
Saipan was the first objective in Operation Forager, the campaign to occupy the Mariana Islands that got underway at the same time the Allies were invading France in Operation Overlord. After a two-day naval bombardment, the U.S. 2nd Marine Division, 4th Marine Division, and the Army's 27th Infantry Division, commanded by Lieutenant General Holland Smith, landed on the island and defeated the 43rd Infantry Division of the Imperial Japanese Army, commanded by Lieutenant General Yoshitsugu Saitō. Organized resistance ended when at least 3,000 Japanese soldiers died in a mass gyokusai attack, and afterward about 1,000 civilians committed suicide. (Full article...) -
The Redwood National and State Parks (RNSP) are a complex of one United States national park and three California state parks located along the coast of northern California. The combined RNSP contain Redwood National Park, Del Norte Coast Redwoods State Park, Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park, and Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park. The parks' 139,000 acres (560 km2) preserve 45 percent of all remaining old-growth coast redwood forests.
Located in Del Norte and Humboldt counties, the four parks protect the endangered coast redwood (Sequoia sempervirens)—the tallest, among the oldest, and one of the most massive tree species on Earth—which thrives in the humid temperate rainforest. The park region is highly seismically active and prone to tsunamis. The parks preserve 37 miles (60 km) of pristine coastline, indigenous flora, fauna, grassland prairie, cultural resources, waterways, as well as threatened animal species, such as the Chinook salmon, northern spotted owl, and Steller's sea lion. (Full article...) -
The 1954 Guatemalan coup d'état (Golpe de Estado en Guatemala de 1954) deposed the democratically elected Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz and marked the end of the Guatemalan Revolution. The coup installed the military dictatorship of Carlos Castillo Armas, the first in a series of U.S.-backed authoritarian rulers in Guatemala. The coup was precipitated by a CIA covert operation code-named PBSuccess.
The Guatemalan Revolution began in 1944, after a popular uprising toppled the military dictatorship of Jorge Ubico. Juan José Arévalo was elected president in Guatemala's first democratic election. He introduced a minimum wage and near-universal suffrage. Arévalo was succeeded in 1951 by Árbenz, who instituted land reforms which granted property to landless peasants. The Guatemalan Revolution was disliked by the U.S. federal government, which was predisposed during the Cold War to see it as communist. This perception grew after Árbenz had been elected and formally legalized the communist Guatemalan Party of Labour. The U.S. government feared that Guatemala's example could inspire nationalists wanting social reform throughout Latin America. The United Fruit Company (UFC), whose highly profitable business had been affected by the softening of exploitative labor practices in Guatemala, engaged in an influential lobbying campaign to persuade the U.S. to overthrow the Guatemalan government. U.S. President Harry Truman authorized Operation PBFortune to topple Árbenz in 1952, which was a precursor to PBSuccess. (Full article...) -
USS Connecticut (BB-18), the fourth United States Navy ship to be named after the state of Connecticut, was the lead ship of her class of six pre-dreadnought battleships. Her keel was laid on 10 March 1903; launched on 29 September 1904, Connecticut was commissioned on 29 September 1906, as the most advanced ship in the US Navy.
Connecticut served as the flagship for the Jamestown Exposition in mid-1907, which commemorated the 300th anniversary of the founding of the Jamestown colony. She later sailed with the Great White Fleet on a circumnavigation of the Earth to showcase the US Navy's growing fleet of blue-water-capable ships. After completing her service with the Great White Fleet, Connecticut participated in several flag-waving exercises intended to protect American citizens abroad until she was pressed into service as a troop transport at the end of World War I to expedite the return of American Expeditionary Forces from France. (Full article...) -
Fight Club is a 1999 American film directed by David Fincher and starring Brad Pitt, Edward Norton, and Helena Bonham Carter. It is based on the 1996 novel Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk. Norton plays the unnamed narrator, who is discontented with his white-collar job. He forms a "fight club" with a soap salesman, Tyler Durden (Pitt), and becomes embroiled with an impoverished but beguiling woman, Marla Singer (Bonham Carter).
Palahniuk's novel was optioned by Fox 2000 Pictures producer Laura Ziskin, who hired Jim Uhls to write the film adaptation. Fincher was selected because of his enthusiasm for the story. He developed the script with Uhls and sought screenwriting advice from the cast and others in the film industry. It was filmed in and around Los Angeles from July to December 1998. He and the cast compared the film to Rebel Without a Cause (1955) and The Graduate (1967), with a theme of conflict between Generation X and the value system of advertising. (Full article...) -
Hands Across Hawthorne was a rally held at the Hawthorne Bridge in the American West Coast city of Portland, Oregon, on May 29, 2011. The demonstration was in response to an attack, one week earlier, on Brad Forkner and Christopher Rosevear, a gay male couple who had been holding hands while walking across the bridge. According to the couple and the Portland Police Bureau, a group of five men followed Forkner and Rosevear along the bridge before physically assaulting them. The assault was condemned by Portland's mayor, Sam Adams, and its police chief, Mike Reese, and news of the attack spread throughout the Pacific Northwest and the United States. The attack prompted volunteers from the Q Center, a nonprofit organization that supports the LGBTQ community, to form street patrols as a means of monitoring Portland's downtown area.
Several LGBTQ and human rights organizations sponsored Hands Across Hawthorne in response to the attack, with the purpose of linking hands across the entire span of the Hawthorne Bridge to show solidarity. More than 4,000 people attended the rally, which had been publicized on a single Facebook page 72 hours previously. Forkner, Rosevear, Mayor Adams, and other community leaders spoke at the rally. The event received attention throughout the United States. On June 5, residents of Spokane, Washington, held a similar hand-holding rally called "Hands Across Monroe", crossing the Monroe Street Bridge in Riverfront Park. (Full article...) -
The Roanoke Island, North Carolina, half dollar (also Roanoke Island half dollar) is a commemorative coin issued by the United States Bureau of the Mint in 1937. The coin commemorated the 350th anniversary of the Roanoke Colony, depicting Sir Walter Raleigh on one side, and on the other Eleanor Dare, holding her child, Virginia Dare, the first child of English descent born in an English colony in the Americas.
The Roanoke Island half dollar was one of many commemorative issues authorized by Congress in 1936. Since it was intended to commemorate the 350th anniversary of the colony, founded in 1587, the coins were not struck until 1937. William Marks Simpson, a sculptor who created several commemorative coins of the era, designed the Roanoke Island issue. His work required only slight modification at the recommendation of the Commission of Fine Arts. (Full article...) -
The Battle of the Alamo (February 23 – March 6, 1836) was a pivotal event and military engagement in the Texas Revolution. Following a 13-day siege, Mexican troops under President General Antonio López de Santa Anna reclaimed the Alamo Mission near San Antonio de Béxar (modern-day San Antonio, Texas, United States). About one hundred Texians were garrisoned at the mission at the time, with around a hundred subsequent reinforcements led by eventual Alamo co-commanders James Bowie and William B. Travis. On February 23, approximately 1,500 Mexicans marched into San Antonio de Béxar as the first step in a campaign to retake Texas. In the early morning hours of March 6, the Mexican Army advanced on the Alamo. After repelling two attacks, the Texians were unable to fend off a third attack. As Mexican soldiers scaled the walls, most of the Texian fighters withdrew into interior buildings. Those who were unable to reach these points were slain by the Mexican cavalry as they attempted to escape. Almost all of the Texian inhabitants were killed.
Several noncombatants were sent to Gonzales to spread word of the Texian defeat. The news sparked both a strong rush to join the Texian army and a panic, known as "The Runaway Scrape", in which the Texian army, most settlers, and the government of the new, self-proclaimed but officially unrecognized Republic of Texas fled eastward toward the U.S. ahead of the advancing Mexican Army. Santa Anna's execution of surrendering soldiers during the battle inspired many Texians and Tejanos to join the Texian Army. The Texians defeated the Mexican Army at the Battle of San Jacinto, on April 21, 1836, ending the conquering of the Mexican state of Coahuila y Tejas by the newly formed Republic of Texas. (Full article...) -
Two South Carolina-class battleships, also known as the Michigan class, were built for the United States Navy in the early twentieth century. Named South Carolina and Michigan, they were the first American dreadnoughts—powerful warships whose capabilities far outstripped those of the world's older battleships.
At the turn of the twentieth century, the prevailing theory of naval combat was that battles would continue to be fought at relatively close range using many small, fast-firing guns. As such, each of the ships in the United States' previous Connecticut-class battleships carried many medium-sized weapons alongside four large guns. This paradigm was soon to be subverted, as American naval theorists proposed that a ship mounting a homogeneous battery of large guns would be more effective in battle. (Full article...) -
The Susan B. Anthony dollar is a United States dollar coin minted from 1979 to 1981, when production was suspended due to poor public acceptance, and then again in 1999. Intended as a replacement for the larger Eisenhower dollar, the new smaller one-dollar coin went through testing of several shapes and compositions, but all were opposed by the vending machine industry, a powerful lobby affecting coin legislation. Finally, a round planchet with an eleven-sided inner border was chosen for the smaller dollar.
The original design for the smaller dollar coin depicted an allegorical representation of Liberty on the obverse, but organizations and individuals in Congress called for the coin to depict a real woman. Several proposals were submitted, and social reformer Susan B. Anthony was selected as the design subject. The reverse design of the Eisenhower dollar was retained, an engraving of the Apollo 11 mission insignia showing an eagle landing on the Moon. Both sides of the coin, as well as the rejected Liberty design, were created by Frank Gasparro, the Chief Engraver of the United States Mint. (Full article...) -
Jack Leonard Warner (born Jacob Warner; August 2, 1892 – September 9, 1978) was a Canadian-born American film executive, who was the president and driving force behind the Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank, California. Warner's career spanned over 55 years, surpassing that of any other of the pioneering Hollywood studio moguls.
As co-head of production at Warner Bros. Studios, Warner worked with his brother, Sam Warner, to procure the technology for the film industry's first talking picture, The Jazz Singer (1927). After Sam's death, Jack clashed with his surviving older brothers, Harry and Albert Warner. He assumed exclusive control of the company in the 1950s when he secretly purchased his brothers's shares in the business after convincing them to participate in a joint sale of stocks. (Full article...) -
Caitlin Elizabeth Clark (born January 22, 2002) is an American professional basketball player for the Indiana Fever of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). Regarded as one of the greatest female collegiate players, Clark was twice named national female college basketball player of the year while playing for the Iowa Hawkeyes; she remains the NCAA Division I all-time leading scorer. She has helped popularize women's basketball, a phenomenon dubbed the "Caitlin Clark effect".
Clark attended Dowling Catholic High School in her hometown of West Des Moines, Iowa, where she was named a McDonald's All-American and rated the fourth-best player in her class by ESPN. In her freshman season with Iowa, she led the NCAA Division I in scoring and earned All-American honors. As a sophomore, Clark was a unanimous first-team All-American and became the first women's player to lead Division I in points and assists in a single season. In her junior season, she was the national player of the year and led Iowa to its first national championship game, again leading Division I in assists and setting Big Ten single-season marks in points and assists. As a senior, she repeated as national player of the year and helped Iowa return to the national title game. She also set the Division I women's career and single-season record in points and three-pointers, broke the conference record in assists, and led the nation in points and assists. (Full article...) -
Hurricane Andrew was a compact, but very powerful and devastating tropical cyclone that struck the Bahamas, Florida, and Louisiana in August 1992. It was the most destructive hurricane to ever hit Florida in terms of structures damaged or destroyed, and remained the costliest in financial terms until Hurricane Irma surpassed it 25 years later. Andrew was also the strongest landfalling hurricane in the United States in decades and the costliest hurricane to strike anywhere in the country, until it was surpassed by Katrina in 2005.
Andrew is one of only four tropical cyclones to make landfall in the continental United States as a Category 5, alongside the 1935 Labor Day hurricane, 1969's Camille, and 2018's Michael. While the storm also caused major damage in The Bahamas and Louisiana, the greatest impact was felt in South Florida, where the storm made landfall as a Category 5 hurricane, with 1-minute sustained wind speeds as high as 165 mph (266 km/h) and a gust as high as 174 mph (280 km/h). (Full article...) -
Black Moshannon State Park is a 3,480-acre (1,410 ha) Pennsylvania state park in Rush Township, Centre County, Pennsylvania, United States. It surrounds Black Moshannon Lake, formed by a dam on Black Moshannon Creek, which has given its name to the lake and park. The park is just west of the Allegheny Front, 9 miles (14 km) east of Philipsburg on Pennsylvania Route 504, and is largely surrounded by Moshannon State Forest. A bog in the park provides a habitat for diverse wildlife not common in other areas of the state, such as carnivorous plants, orchids, and species normally found farther north. As home to the "largest reconstituted bog in Pennsylvania", it was chosen by the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources for its "25 Must-see Pennsylvania State Parks" list.
Humans have long used the Black Moshannon area for recreational, industrial, and subsistence purposes. The Seneca tribe used it as hunting and fishing grounds. European settlers cleared some land for farming, then clear-cut the vast stands of old-growth white pine and eastern hemlock. Black Moshannon State Park rose from the ashes of a depleted forest which had been largely destroyed by wildfire in the years following the lumber era. The forests were rehabilitated by the Civilian Conservation Corps during the Great Depression in the 1930s. Many of the buildings built by the Civilian Conservation Corps stand in the park today and are protected on the list of National Register of Historic Places in three historic districts. (Full article...) -
Air Vice-Marshal Francis Masson Bladin, CB, CBE (26 August 1898 – 2 February 1978) was a senior commander in the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). Born in rural Victoria, he graduated from the Royal Military College, Duntroon, in 1920. Bladin transferred from the Army to the Air Force in 1923, and learned to fly at RAAF Point Cook, Victoria. He held training appointments before taking command of No. 1 Squadron in 1934. Quiet but authoritative, he was nicknamed "Dad" in tribute to the concern he displayed for the welfare of his personnel.
Ranked wing commander at the outbreak of World War II, by September 1941 Bladin had been raised to temporary air commodore. He became Air Officer Commanding North-Western Area in March 1942, following the first Japanese air raids on Darwin, Northern Territory. Personally leading sorties against enemy territory, he earned the United States Silver Star for gallantry. In July 1943, Bladin was posted to No. 38 Group RAF in Europe, where he was mentioned in despatches. He was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire the same year. (Full article...) -
The Trump International Hotel and Tower is a skyscraper condo-hotel in the Near North Side community area in downtown Chicago, Illinois. The building, named for Donald Trump, was designed by architect Adrian Smith of Skidmore, Owings and Merrill. Bovis Lend Lease built the 100-story structure, which reaches a height of 1,388 feet (423.2 m) including its spire, its roof topping out at 1,169 feet (356 m). It is next to the main branch of the Chicago River, with a view of the entry to Lake Michigan beyond a series of bridges over the river. The building received publicity when the winner of the first season of The Apprentice reality television show, Bill Rancic, chose to manage the construction of the tower over managing a Rancho Palos Verdes–based Trump National Golf Course & Resort in the Los Angeles metro area.
Trump announced in 2001 that the skyscraper would become the tallest building in the world, but after the September 11 attacks that same year, the architects scaled back the building's plans, and its design underwent several revisions. When topped out in 2009, it became the second-tallest building in the U.S. It surpassed the city's John Hancock Center as the building with the highest residence (apartment or condo) in the world, and briefly held this title until the completion of the Burj Khalifa. (Full article...) -
Maya Angelou (/ˈændʒəloʊ/ ⓘ AN-jə-loh; born Marguerite Annie Johnson; April 4, 1928 – May 28, 2014) was an American memoirist, poet, and civil rights activist. She published seven autobiographies, three books of essays, several books of poetry, and is credited with a list of plays, movies, and television shows spanning over 50 years. She received dozens of awards and more than 50 honorary degrees. Angelou's series of seven autobiographies focus on her childhood and early adult experiences. The first, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969), tells of her life up to the age of 17 and brought her international recognition and acclaim.
She became a poet and writer after a string of odd jobs during her young adulthood. These included fry cook, sex worker, nightclub performer, Porgy and Bess cast member, Southern Christian Leadership Conference coordinator, and correspondent in Egypt and Ghana during the decolonization of Africa. Angelou was also an actress, writer, director, and producer of plays, movies, and public television programs. In 1982, she was named the first Reynolds Professor of American Studies at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Angelou was active in the Civil Rights Movement and worked with Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. Beginning in the 1990s, she made approximately 80 appearances a year on the lecture circuit, something she continued into her eighties. In 1993, Angelou recited her poem "On the Pulse of Morning" (1993) at the first inauguration of Bill Clinton, making her the first poet to make an inaugural recitation since Robert Frost at the inauguration of John F. Kennedy in 1961. (Full article...) -
The gold dollar or gold one-dollar piece is a gold coin that was struck as a regular issue by the United States Bureau of the Mint from 1849 to 1889. The coin had three types over its lifetime, all designed by Mint Chief Engraver James B. Longacre. The Type 1 issue has the smallest diameter (0.5 inch =12.7mm) of any United States coin minted to date.
A gold dollar coin had been proposed several times in the 1830s and 1840s, but was not initially adopted. Congress was finally galvanized into action by the increased supply of bullion caused by the California gold rush, and in 1849 authorized a gold dollar. In its early years, silver coins were being hoarded or exported, and the gold dollar found a ready place in commerce. Silver again circulated after Congress in 1853 required that new coins of that metal be made lighter, and the gold dollar became a rarity in commerce even before federal coins vanished from circulation because of the economic disruption caused by the American Civil War. (Full article...) -
HMS Endeavour was a British Royal Navy research vessel that Lieutenant James Cook commanded to Tahiti, New Zealand and Australia on his first voyage of discovery from 1768 to 1771.
She was launched in 1764 as the collier Earl of Pembroke, with the Navy purchasing her in 1768 for a scientific mission to the Pacific Ocean and to explore the seas for the surmised Terra Australis Incognita or "unknown southern land". Commissioned as His Majesty's Bark Endeavour, she departed Plymouth in August 1768, rounded Cape Horn and reached Tahiti in time to observe the 1769 transit of Venus across the Sun. She then set sail into the largely uncharted ocean to the south, stopping at the islands of Huahine, Bora Bora, and Raiatea west of Tahiti to allow Cook to claim them for Great Britain. In September 1769, she anchored off New Zealand, becoming the first European vessel to reach the islands since Abel Tasman's Heemskerck 127 years earlier. (Full article...) -
Ruby Laffoon (January 15, 1869 – March 1, 1941) was an American attorney and politician who served as the 43rd governor of Kentucky from 1931 to 1935. A Kentucky native, at age 17, Laffoon moved to Washington, D.C., to live with his uncle, U.S. Representative Polk Laffoon. He developed an interest in politics and returned to Kentucky, where he compiled a mixed record of victories and defeats in elections at the county and state levels. In 1931, he was chosen as the Democratic gubernatorial nominee by a nominating convention, not a primary, making him the only Kentucky gubernatorial candidate to be chosen by a convention after 1903. In the general election, he defeated Republican William B. Harrison by what was then the largest margin of victory in Kentucky gubernatorial history.
Dubbed "the terrible Turk from Madisonville", Laffoon was confronted with the economic difficulties of the Great Depression. To raise additional revenue for the state treasury, he advocated the enactment of the state's first sales tax. This issue dominated most of his term in office and split the state Democratic Party and Laffoon's own administration. The lieutenant governor, A. B. "Happy" Chandler, led the fight against the tax in the legislature. After the tax was defeated in two regular legislative sessions and one specially called legislative session, Laffoon forged a bipartisan alliance to get the tax passed in a special session in 1934. (Full article...) -
The Grass Fight was a small battle during the Texas Revolution, fought between the Mexican Army and the Texian Army. The battle took place on November 26, 1835, just south of San Antonio de Béxar in the Mexican region of Texas. The Texas Revolution had officially begun on October 2 and by the end of the month the Texians had initiated a siege of Béxar, home of the largest Mexican garrison in the province. Bored with the inactivity, many of the Texian soldiers returned home; a smaller number of adventurers from the United States arrived to replace them. After the Texian Army rejected commander-in-chief Stephen F. Austin's call to launch an assault on Béxar on November 22, Austin resigned from the army. The men elected Edward Burleson their new commander-in-chief.
On November 26, Texian scout Deaf Smith brought news of a Mexican pack train, accompanied by 50–100 soldiers, that was on its way to Bexar. The Texian camp was convinced that the pack train carried silver to pay the Mexican garrison and purchase supplies. Burleson ordered Colonel James Bowie to take 45–50 cavalry and intercept the train. An additional 100 infantry followed. On seeing the battle commence, Mexican General Martín Perfecto de Cos sent reinforcements from Bexar. The Texans repulsed several attacks by Mexican soldiers, who finally retreated to Bexar. When the Texians examined the abandoned pack train they discovered that, instead of silver, the mules carried freshly cut grass to feed the Mexican Army horses. Four Texians were injured, and historian Alwyn Barr states that three Mexican soldiers were killed, although Bowie and Burleson initially claimed the number was much higher. (Full article...) -
The Liberty Head double eagle or Coronet double eagle is an American twenty-dollar gold piece struck as a pattern coin in 1849, and for commerce from 1850 to 1907. It was designed by Mint of the United States Chief Engraver James B. Longacre.
The largest denomination of United States coin authorized by the Mint Act of 1792 was the eagle, or ten-dollar piece. The large amount of bullion being brought east after the discovery of gold in California in the 1840s caused Congress to consider new denominations of gold coinage. The gold dollar and double eagle were the result. After considerable infighting at the Philadelphia Mint, Chief Engraver James B. Longacre designed the double eagle, and it began to be issued for commerce in 1850. Only one 1849 double eagle is known to survive and it rests in the National Numismatic Collection at the Smithsonian. (Full article...)
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Did you know (auto-generated) -
- ... that The Source was the highest-selling music magazine on the newsstands in the United States?
- ... that 16 Montana youths are plaintiffs in the lawsuit Held v. Montana, the first constitutional climate change lawsuit to go to trial in the United States?
- ... that most or all of the inhabitants of Moneka, Kansas, were abolitionists?
- ... that Nathaniel Coe declined nomination to the United States Senate, instead choosing to serve as an inspector for the United States Postal Service?
- ... that the case Lewis Galoob Toys, Inc. v. Nintendo of America, Inc. was considered essential to the future of video game modding in the United States in 1992?
- ... that the first-ever mass message to the U.S. government's two million employees was an enticement for them to resign?
- ... that Bishop John Dunn continued to celebrate Mass after a fire broke out in the choir loft of St. Cecilia Cathedral during the Sixth National Eucharistic Congress?
- ... that in the essay "Toward European Unity" George Orwell presumed that one of the greatest obstacles to a federal Europe would be economic pressure by the United States?
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Surrounded by Boston's literary elite—which included friends such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and James Russell Lowell—Holmes made an indelible imprint on the literary world of the 19th century. Many of his works were published in The Atlantic Monthly, a magazine that he named. For his literary achievements and other accomplishments, he was awarded numerous honorary degrees from universities around the world. Holmes's writing often commemorated his native Boston area, and much of it was meant to be humorous or conversational. Some of his medical writings, notably his 1843 essay regarding the contagiousness of puerperal fever, were considered innovative for their time. He was often called upon to issue occasional poetry, or poems written specifically for an event, including many occasions at Harvard. Holmes also popularized several terms, including "Boston Brahmin" and "anesthesia".
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Photograph: Chuck KennedyThe first cabinet of Barack Obama, photographed in the White House East Room in September 2009. Consisting of the heads of the sixteen United States federal executive departments and seven additional members, the Cabinet of the United States acts as an advisory body to the President. Of the persons shown, five (Gary Locke, Peter R. Orszag, Christina Romer, Rahm Emanuel, and Robert Gates) left the Obama administration before the end of the president's first term. -
Engraving credit: Bureau of Engraving and Printing; restored by Andrew ShivaThe presidency of George Washington began on April 30, 1789, when he took office after the 1788–89 election, the United States' first quadrennial presidential election. He was unanimously re-elected in the 1792 presidential election. Having chosen to retire after two terms, he was succeeded by his vice president, John Adams of the Federalist Party, in 1797.
This picture is a line engraving of Washington, produced around 1902 by the Department of the Treasury's Bureau of Engraving and Printing (BEP) as part of a BEP presentation album of the first 26 presidents, which was reportedly given to Treasury Secretary Lyman J. Gage. Similar portraits of Washington have been used on designs for the $1 bill. -
Painting credit: John TrumbullJohn Trumbull's Declaration of Independence, a 12 by 18 feet (3.7 by 5.5 m) oil painting depicting the presentation of a draft of the United States Declaration of Independence to the Second Continental Congress. While this event did take place, it was not actually in the presence of all the people in the picture. The painting can be found in the rotunda of the United States Capitol. -
Photo credit: Antonio VernonBaseball pitcher Chris Young of the San Diego Padres practices his four-seam fastball before the June 16, 2007 game against the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field. During the game, Young hit Derrek Lee with a pitch, which led to a bench-clearing brawl. Both players were ejected from the game, which ended in a 1–0 victory for San Diego. The game took place a few weeks before Young was added to his first Major League Baseball All-Star Game roster via the All-Star Final Vote. The picture also depicts a Wrigley Field bullpen located in playable foul territory. In the background, the old-fashioned scoreboard and the 2005–06 reconstruction of the centerfield bleachers are visible.
March 25 is Opening Day for Major League Baseball. -
Phoenix, Arizona (1885)Image credit: C. J. DyerAn 1885 lithograph of a bird's-eye view of the city of Phoenix, Arizona, the fifth-most-populous city in the United States. The city was founded in 1868 on the site of lands formerly occupied by the Hohokam, who had abandoned the area roughly 400 years earlier. The name "Phoenix" was chosen as it described a city born from the ruins of a former civilization. -
Engraving credit: Charles Burt, after John Gadsby Chapman; restored by Andrew ShivaArtists producing art and engraving on United States banknotes transitioned to steel engraving, which enabled a rapid advance in banknote design and printing, during the 19th century. This vignette, engraved by Charles Burt for the Department of the Treasury's Bureau of Engraving and Printing, depicts the baptism of Pocahontas, and is a copy of an 1840 painting by John Gadsby Chapman on display in the United States Capitol rotunda. From 1875, the vignette was used on the reverse of twenty-dollar bills as part of the first issue of National Bank Notes. -
The mushroom cloud from the Ivy Mike nuclear test, one of two tests conducted as part of Operation Ivy at the Pacific Proving Grounds on Elugelab in the Marshall Islands. Mike was the first successful full-scale test of a multi-megaton thermonuclear weapon, and it left an underwater crater 6,240 ft (1,900 m) wide and 164 ft (50 m) deep where the island had been. -
Wes Brady, ex-slavePhotograph: Federal Writers' Project; restoration: Chick BowenA 1937 photograph of Wes Brady, a former slave. Born c. 1850, Brady had been owned by a farmer in Marshall, Texas before emancipation. As a young boy he worked the fields, picking cotton. He recalled "The rows was a mile long and no matter how much grass was in them, if you leaves one sprig on your row they beats you nearly to death."
This portrait is part of the Slave Narrative Collection, a massive compilation of slave narratives – containing 10,000 typed pages representing more than 2,000 interviews – which was undertaken by the US Federal Writers' Project of the Works Progress Administration from 1936 to 1938. -
Photo credit: Rise StudioThe construction of Mount Rushmore, a United States National Monument depicting the heads of four U.S. Presidents carved into the Black Hills of South Dakota, began on August 10, 1927, with the bust of George Washington. This first phase was completed in seven years (partial completion in 1932 shown here), culminating in its unveiling in 1934. The remaining three heads—Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt—took only an additional seven years to complete. -
Document: Constitutional Convention; scan: National ArchivesThe first page of the original handwritten text of the United States Constitution, which took almost four months to draft and over three years to ratify. The first Constitutional Convention began on May 25, 1787, with a quorum at the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia to revise the Articles of Confederation. Instead the delegates wrote a new constitution, finishing on September 17 of that year, but its ratification by all 13 states was not completed until January 10, 1791. Since then 27 amendments have been made.
Read further: Page 2, Page 3, Page 4 -
Engraving credit: Bureau of Engraving and Printing, after John Vanderlyn; restored by Andrew ShivaArtists producing banknotes in Colonial America began experimenting with copper plates as an alternative to wood engraving in the early 18th century. Applied to the production of paper currency, copper-plate engraving, and later steel engraving, enabled banknote design and printing to rapidly advance during the 19th century. This engraved vignette appeared on certain United States five-dollar bills issued in 1875. Produced for the Department of the Treasury's Bureau of Engraving and Printing, the engraving is of John Vanderlyn's painting Landing of Columbus, which hangs in the United States Capitol rotunda. It depicts Christopher Columbus landing on San Salvador Island on October 12, 1492, on the first of his voyages to the New World. -
Photograph credit: unknown; restored by Adam CuerdenPauline Adams (1874–1957) was an Irish-American suffragist. On 4 September 1917, she and twelve other activists were arrested for attempting to "flaunt their banners" in front of President Woodrow Wilson's reviewing stand before a Selective Service parade in Washington, D.C., and they chose prison rather than paying a 25-dollar fine. This photograph depicts Adams seated at a table, wearing prison uniform and holding a cup in her raised right hand. The image was published in the newspaper The Suffragist in 1919. -
Lithograph: Henderson Lithograph Company; restoration: TrialsanderrorsAn aerial view of the Tennessee Centennial and International Exposition, a belated celebration of the 100th anniversary of Tennessee's entry into United States held between May 1 and October 31, 1897, in what is now Centennial Park, Nashville. Various exhibits were held. For instance, the host city built a full-scale replica of the Greek Parthenon, whereas Memphis constructed a large pyramid. -
Lithograph: Thaddeus Mortimer Fowler; restoration: Adam CuerdenA bird's eye view of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in a 1902 lithograph by Thaddeus Mortimer Fowler. At this point in its history, Pittsburgh was an industrial and commercial powerhouse, with extensive railroad connections to the rest of the United States. Together with the rest of Allegheny County, it produced massive amounts of steel and steel products: by 1911 they reached 24% of the national output of pig iron, 34% of Bessemer steel, 44% of open hearth steel, 53% of crucible steel, 24% of steel rail, and 59% of structural shape. -
Poster: J. Hale Powers & Co. Fraternity & Fine Art Publishers; restoration: TrialsanderrorsAn 1873 print promoting the Grange, the oldest U.S. agricultural advocacy group with a national scope. In 2005 it had 160,000 members.
The central scene shows a farmer with one foot on his shovel, captioned "I Pay for All". From left to right, the top insets show a farmer's fireside and the Grange in session; the bottom ones show a harvest dance, a broken-down cabin signposted "Ignorance" and "Sloth", and a Biblical scene of the gleaners Ruth and Boaz.
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Selected culture biography -
Witherspoon married actor and Cruel Intentions co-star Ryan Phillippe in 1999; they have two children, Ava and Deacon. The couple separated at the end of 2006 and divorced in October 2007. Witherspoon owns a production company, Type A Films, and she is actively involved in children's and women's advocacy organizations. She serves on the board of the Children's Defense Fund (CDF), and was named Global Ambassador of Avon Products in 2007, serving as honorary chair of the charitable Avon Foundation.
Selected location -
Nearly 60% of Minnesota's residents live in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area known as the Twin Cities. The remainder of the state consists of western prairies now given over to intensive agriculture; eastern deciduous forests, also heavily farmed and settled; and the less populated northern boreal forest. The state's image of being populated by whites of Nordic and German descent has some truth, but diversity is increasing; substantial influxes of African, Asian, and Latin American immigrants have joined the descendants of European immigrants and of the original Native American inhabitants.
The extremes of the climate contrast with the moderation of Minnesota’s people. The state is known for its moderate-to-progressive politics and social policies, its civic involvement, and high voter turnout. It ranks among the healthiest states by a number of measures, and has one of the most highly educated and literate populations.
Selected quote -
Anniversaries for June 14
- 1775 – The Continental Army is established by the Continental Congress, marking the birth of the United States Army.
- 1777 – The Stars and Stripes is adopted by Congress as the Flag of the United States.
- 1811 – Harriet Beecher Stowe (pictured), author and abolitionist most famous for writing the novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, was born.
- 1900 – Hawaii becomes a United States territory.
- 1938 – Action Comics issue one is released, introducing Superman.
- 1954 – U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs a bill into law that places the words "under God" into the Pledge of Allegiance.
Selected cuisines, dishes and foods -
The Western United States has its cuisine, distinct in various ways from that of the rest of the country. States west of Texas, Kansas, Missouri, and Nebraska would be considered part of this area, as would, in some cases, western parts of adjoining states. (Full article...)
Selected panorama -
Panorama of Salt Lake City, Utah
More did you know? -
- ... that the domed atrium of Indiana's West Baden Springs Hotel (inside pictured) was the largest free-spanning dome in the United States for over 50 years and in the world from 1902 to 1913?
- ... that Nicholas Longworth built America's first commercially successful winery with a pink sparkling wine made from Catawba?
- ... that the phrase "more bang for the buck" was used to describe the United States' New Look policy of depending on nuclear weapons, rather than a large regular army, to keep the Soviet Union in check?
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