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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George III (George William Frederick; 4 June 1738 – 29 January 1820) was King of Great Britain and Ireland from 25 October 1760 until his death in 1820. The Acts of Union 1800 unified Great Britain and Ireland into the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, with George as its king. He was concurrently Duke and Prince-elector of Hanover in the Holy Roman Empire before becoming King of Hanover on 12 October 1814. He was a monarch of the House of Hanover, who, unlike his two predecessors, was born in Great Britain, spoke English as his first language, and never visited Hanover.
George was born during the reign of his paternal grandfather, King George II, as the first son of Frederick, Prince of Wales, and Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha. Following his father's death in 1751, Prince George became heir apparent and Prince of Wales. He succeeded to the throne on George II's death in 1760. The following year, he married Princess Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, with whom he had 15 children. George III's life and reign were marked by a series of military conflicts involving his kingdoms, much of the rest of Europe, and places farther afield in Africa, the Americas and Asia. Early in his reign, Great Britain defeated France in the Seven Years' War, becoming the dominant European power in North America and India. However, Britain lost 13 of its North American colonies in the American War of Independence. Further wars against revolutionary and Napoleonic France from 1793 concluded in the defeat of Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. In 1807, the transatlantic slave trade was banned from the British Empire. (Full article...) -
"Barge of the Dead" is an episode of the American science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager. It is the third episode of the sixth season and was first broadcast by UPN on October 6, 1999. "Barge of the Dead" was developed from a story by Ronald D. Moore and Bryan Fuller, who wrote the teleplay, and was directed by Mike Vejar. Set in the 24th century, the series follows the adventures of the Starfleet and Maquis crew of the starship USS Voyager after they are stranded in the Delta Quadrant, far from the rest of the Federation.
In this episode, the half-Klingon, half-human B'Elanna Torres (Roxann Dawson) has a near-death experience and appears to be sent to the Klingon version of Hell known as Gre'thor. There she encounters her Klingon mother Miral (Karen Austin), who is damned because of Torres' refusal to fully accept her own identity as a Klingon. After being resuscitated by the Voyager crew, Torres becomes intent on revisiting Gre'thor to save her mother. The episode also guest stars Eric Pierpoint as Kortar, who ferries the souls of the dishonored on the Barge of the Dead, and Sherman Augustus as the dead Klingon Hij'Qa. (Full article...) -
Jerome is a town in the Black Hills of Yavapai County in the U.S. state of Arizona. Founded in the late 19th century on Cleopatra Hill overlooking the Verde Valley, Jerome is approximately 100 miles (160 km) north of Phoenix along State Route 89A between Sedona and Prescott. Supported in its heyday by rich copper mines, it was home to more than 10,000 people in the 1920s. As of the 2020 census, its population was 464.
The town owes its existence mainly to two ore bodies that formed about 1.75 billion years ago along a ring fault in the caldera of an undersea volcano. Tectonic plate movements, plate collisions, uplift, deposition, erosion, and other geologic processes eventually exposed the tip of one of the ore bodies and pushed the other close to the surface, both near Jerome. In the late 19th century, the United Verde Mine, developed by William A. Clark, extracted ore bearing copper, gold, silver, and other metals from the larger of the two. The United Verde Extension UVX Mine, owned by James Douglas Jr., depended on the other huge deposit. In total, the copper deposits discovered in Jerome's vicinity were among the richest ever found. (Full article...) -
John Bullock Clark Sr. (April 17, 1802 – October 29, 1885) was a militia officer and politician who served as a member of the United States Congress and Confederate Congress. Born in Kentucky, Clark moved with his family to Missouri in 1818 and studied law. He opened a legal practice in Fayette, Missouri, in 1824. He held several positions in the local government in the 1820s and 1830s. Clark was also involved in the state militia, serving as a colonel in the Black Hawk War in 1832 and eventually rising to the rank of major general. In 1838, during the Missouri Mormon War, Clark was the recipient of Governor Lilburn Boggs's infamous Mormon Extermination Order, and was involved in the ending stages of the conflict. He was the Whig candidate in the 1840 Missouri gubernatorial election. Clark was accused of conspiring to commit electoral fraud in the election and as a result almost fought a duel with Claiborne Fox Jackson, later a Governor of Missouri.
In 1850, Clark was elected as a Whig to the Missouri House of Representatives and served into 1851. He was elected in 1857 to fill a vacancy in one of Missouri's seats in the United States House of Representatives. With the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861, Clark, a wealthy owner of 160 slaves, became a leading secessionist in Missouri. After the pro-secessionist Missouri State Guard (MSG) was formed in May 1861, he was appointed by Jackson as a brigadier general commanding the MSG's 3rd Division. After leading his troops against Federal forces in the Battle of Carthage, Missouri on July 5, Clark was expelled from the House of Representatives for fighting against the United States. On August 10, he led his division in the Battle of Wilson's Creek, in which he was wounded. (Full article...) -
Tara Kristen Lipinski (born June 10, 1982) is an American former competitive figure skater, actress, sports commentator, and documentary film producer. A former competitor in women's singles, she is the 1998 Olympic champion, the 1997 World champion, a two-time Champions Series Final champion (1997–1998) and the 1997 U.S. national champion. Until 2019, she was the youngest single skater to win a U.S. Nationals and the youngest to become an Olympic and World champion in figure skating history. She is the first woman to complete a triple loop-triple loop combination, her signature jump element, in competition. Starting in 1997, Lipinski had a rivalry with fellow skater Michelle Kwan, which was played up by the American press, and culminated when Lipinski won the gold medal at the 1998 Olympics in Nagano.
Lipinski retired from competitive figure skating in 1998. She performed in live shows before retiring from figure skating in 2002. Lipinski, along with sports commentator Terry Gannon and fellow figure skater and good friend Johnny Weir, became NBC's primary figure skating commentators in 2014. (Full article...) -
Youngstown Ohio Works (1906), with pitcher Roy Castleton seated in second row, second from left
The Youngstown Ohio Works baseball team was a minor league club that was known for winning the premier championship of the Ohio–Pennsylvania League in 1905, and for launching the professional career of pitcher Roy Castleton a year later. A training ground for several players and officials who later established careers in Major League Baseball, the team proved a formidable regional competitor and also won the 1906 league championship.
During its brief span of activity, the Ohio Works team faced challenges that reflected common difficulties within the Ohio–Pennsylvania League, including weak financial support for teams. Following a dispute over funding, the team's owners sold the club to outside investors, just a few months before the opening of the 1907 season. (Full article...) -
John Tyler (March 29, 1790 – January 18, 1862) was the tenth president of the United States, serving from 1841 to 1845, after briefly holding office as the tenth vice president in 1841. He was elected vice president on the 1840 Whig ticket with President William Henry Harrison, succeeding to the presidency following Harrison's death 31 days after assuming office. Tyler was a stalwart supporter and advocate of states' rights, including regarding slavery, and he adopted nationalistic policies as president only when they did not infringe on the states' powers. His unexpected rise to the presidency posed a threat to the presidential ambitions of Henry Clay and other Whig politicians and left Tyler estranged from both of the nation's major political parties at the time.
Tyler was born into a prominent slaveholding Virginia family. He became a national figure at a time of political upheaval. In the 1820s, the Democratic-Republican Party, at the time the nation's only political party, split into several factions. Initially a Jacksonian Democrat, Tyler opposed President Andrew Jackson during the nullification crisis as he saw Jackson's actions as infringing on states' rights and criticized Jackson's expansion of executive power during Jackson's veto on banks. This led Tyler to ally with the southern faction of the Whig Party. He served as a Virginia state legislator and governor, U.S. representative, and U.S. senator. Tyler was a regional Whig vice-presidential nominee in the 1836 presidential election; they lost. He was the sole nominee on the 1840 Whig presidential ticket as William Henry Harrison's running mate. Under the campaign slogan "Tippecanoe and Tyler Too", the Harrison–Tyler ticket defeated incumbent president Martin Van Buren. (Full article...) -
Infinity Science Fiction was an American science fiction magazine, edited by Larry T. Shaw, and published by Royal Publications. The first issue, which appeared in November 1955, included Arthur C. Clarke's "The Star", a story about a planet destroyed by a nova (an exploding star) that turns out to have been the Star of Bethlehem; it won the Hugo Award for that year. Shaw obtained stories from some of the leading writers of the day, including Brian Aldiss, Isaac Asimov, and Robert Sheckley, but the material was of variable quality. In 1958 Irwin Stein, the owner of Royal Publications, decided to shut down Infinity; the last issue was dated November 1958.
The title was revived a decade later by Stein's publishing house, Lancer Books, as a paperback anthology series. Five volumes were published between 1970 and 1973, edited by Robert Hoskins; a sixth was prepared but withdrawn after Lancer ran into financial problems at the end of 1973. (Full article...) -
John Gould Stephenson (March 1, 1828 – November 11, 1883) was an American physician and soldier who served as Librarian of Congress from 1861 to 1864. Born in Lancaster, New Hampshire, to a prominent merchant family, he attended the Dartmouth Medical College and Castleton Medical College, where he received his M.D in 1849. Stephenson moved to Terre Haute, Indiana, in the early 1850s, where he became active in the temperance movement and the nascent Republican Party. He campaigned for Abraham Lincoln in the 1859 Senate race in Illinois and the 1860 presidential election. He pursued an appointment as Librarian of Congress immediately following Lincoln's election, possibly due to his brother's work as a librarian in Cincinnati. After a lengthy pressure campaign from prominent Republicans, Lincoln appointed Stephenson as Librarian of Congress, replacing long-term incumbent John Silva Meehan despite opposition from the Joint Committee on the Library.
Believing the library had fallen into neglect under Meehan's administration, Stephenson began a mass change of staff soon after taking office, firing all but one assistant. He hired journalist Ainsworth Rand Spofford, a friend of his brother, as assistant librarian in August 1861. Although never formally commissioned, Stephenson began serving in the Union Army soon after his appointment as Librarian of Congress. He briefly served as an acting naval surgeon to the 19th Indiana Infantry in 1861, before serving as an aide-de-camp in the Indiana militia, where he achieved the rank of colonel. In 1863, he served as the aide-de-camp of Solomon Meredith, commander of the Iron Brigade, and saw action at the battles of Chancellorsville and Gettysburg. He resigned as librarian for unclear reasons in December 1864, and was succeeded by Spofford. He served in various positions as a legal clerk during the 1870s, and was appointed as a medical examiner at the Bureau of Pensions in Washington in the early 1880s. He died after a period of illness and was buried in the Congressional Cemetery. (Full article...) -
Malcolm X (born Malcolm Little, later el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz; May 19, 1925 – February 21, 1965) was an African American revolutionary, Muslim minister and human rights activist who was a prominent figure during the civil rights movement until his assassination in 1965. A spokesman for the Nation of Islam (NOI) until 1964, after which he left the movement, he was a vocal advocate for Black empowerment and the promotion of Islam within the African American community. He is also a celebrated figure within African American and Muslim communities for his pursuit of racial justice.
Malcolm spent his adolescence living in a series of foster homes and with various relatives, after his father's death and his mother's hospitalization. He committed various crimes, being sentenced to eight to ten years in prison in 1946 for larceny and burglary. In prison, he joined the Nation of Islam, adopting the name Malcolm X to symbolize his unknown African ancestral surname while discarding "the white slavemaster name of 'Little'", and after his parole in 1952, he quickly became one of the organization's most influential leaders. He was the public face of the organization for 12 years, advocating Black empowerment and separation of Black and White Americans, as well as criticizing Martin Luther King Jr. and the mainstream civil rights movement for its emphasis on non-violence and racial integration. Malcolm X also expressed pride in some of the Nation's social welfare achievements, such as its free drug rehabilitation program. From the 1950s onward, Malcolm X was subjected to surveillance by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). (Full article...) -
Steamtown, U.S.A., was a steam locomotive museum that ran steam excursions out of North Walpole, New Hampshire, and Bellows Falls, Vermont, from the 1960s to 1983. The museum was founded by millionaire seafood industrialist F. Nelson Blount. The non-profit Steamtown Foundation took over operations following his death in 1967. Because of Vermont's air quality regulations restricting steam excursions, declining visitor attendance, and disputes over the use of track, some pieces of the collection were relocated to Scranton, Pennsylvania in the mid-1980s and the rest were auctioned off. After the move, Steamtown continued to operate in Scranton but failed to attract the expected 200,000–400,000 visitors. Within two years the tourist attraction was facing bankruptcy, and more pieces of the collection were sold to pay off debt.
In 1986, the United States House of Representatives, under the urging of Pennsylvania Representative Joseph M. McDade, voted to approve $8 million to study the collection and to begin the process of making it a National Historic Site. As a result, the National Park Service (NPS) conducted historical research on the equipment that remained in the Foundation's possession. This research was used as a Scope of Collections Statement for the Steamtown National Historic Site. The scope was published in 1991 under the title Steamtown Special History Study. The report provided concise histories of each piece of equipment and made recommendations as to whether or not each piece belonged in the soon-to-be government-funded collection. (Full article...) -
The Liberty Bell, previously called the State House Bell or Old State House Bell, is an iconic symbol of American independence located in Philadelphia. Originally placed in the steeple of Pennsylvania State House, now known as Independence Hall, the Liberty Bell today is located across the street from Independence Hall in the Liberty Bell Center in Independence National Historical Park.
The bell was commissioned in 1752 by the Pennsylvania Provincial Assembly from the London-based firm Lester and Pack, later renamed the Whitechapel Bell Foundry, and was cast with the lettering "Proclaim LIBERTY Throughout all the Land unto all the Inhabitants Thereof", a Biblical reference from the Book of Leviticus (25:10). The bell first cracked when rung after its arrival in Philadelphia, and was twice recast by local workmen John Pass and John Stow, whose surnames appear on the bell. In its early years, the bell was used to summon lawmakers to legislative sessions and to alert citizens to public meetings and proclamations. (Full article...) -
Dame Angela Brigid Lansbury (October 16, 1925 – October 11, 2022) was an Irish-British and American actress, producer, and comedian. In a career spanning 80 years, she played various roles on stage and screen. Among her numerous accolades were five Tony Awards, six Golden Globe Awards, a Laurence Olivier Award as well as nominations for three Academy Awards, 18 Primetime Emmy Awards, a BAFTA Award, and a Grammy Award. She was honored with the National Medal of Arts in 1997, the Kennedy Center Honors in 2000, and the Academy Honorary Award in 2013.
Lansbury was born into an upper-middle-class family in central London, the daughter of Irish actress Moyna Macgill and English politician Edgar Lansbury. To escape the Blitz, she moved to the United States in 1940, studying acting in New York City. Proceeding to Hollywood in 1942, she signed with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Despite being largely seen as a B-list star, she received three Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress nominations for her roles in Gaslight (1944), The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), and The Manchurian Candidate (1962). (Full article...) -
The American goldfinch (Spinus tristis) is a small North American bird in the finch family. It is migratory, ranging from mid-Alberta to North Carolina during the breeding season, and from just south of the Canada–United States border to Mexico during the winter.
The only finch in its subfamily to undergo a complete molt, the American goldfinch displays sexual dichromatism: the male is a vibrant yellow in the summer and an olive color during the winter, while the female is a dull yellow-brown shade which brightens only slightly during the summer. The male displays brightly colored plumage during the breeding season to attract a mate. (Full article...) -
Joseph Desha (December 9, 1768 – October 11, 1842) was an American politician who was a U.S. Representative from Kentucky from 1807 to 1819 and the ninth governor of Kentucky from 1824 to 1828. First known as an Indian fighter from Middle Tennessee, Desha settled in Mason County, Kentucky, where he parlayed his military record into several terms in the state legislature.
In 1807, Desha was elected to the first of six consecutive terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. A Democratic-Republican, he was considered a war hawk, supporting the War of 1812. In 1813, he volunteered to serve in the war and commanded a division at the Battle of the Thames. Returning to Congress after the war, he was the only member of the Kentucky congressional delegation to oppose the unpopular Compensation Act of 1816. Nearly every other member of the delegation was defeated for reelection after the vote, but Desha's opposition to the act helped him retain his seat. He did not seek reelection in 1818, and made an unsuccessful run for governor in 1820, losing to John Adair. By 1824, the Panic of 1819 had ruined Kentucky's economy, and Desha made a second campaign for the governorship almost exclusively on promises of relief for the state's large debtor class. He was elected by a large majority, and debt relief partisans captured both houses of the General Assembly. After the Kentucky Court of Appeals overturned debt relief laws favored by Desha and the majority of the legislature, the legislators abolished the court and created a replacement court, to which Desha appointed several debt relief partisans. The existing court refused to acknowledge the legitimacy of the move, and during a period known as the Old Court – New Court controversy, two courts of last resort existed in the state. (Full article...) -
Malcolm Scott Carpenter (May 1, 1925 – October 10, 2013) was an American naval officer and aviator, test pilot, aeronautical engineer, astronaut, and aquanaut. He was one of the Mercury Seven astronauts selected for NASA's Project Mercury in April 1959. Carpenter was the second American (after John Glenn) to orbit the Earth and the fourth American in space, after Alan Shepard, Gus Grissom, and John Glenn.
Commissioned into the U.S. Navy in 1949, Carpenter became a naval aviator, flying a Lockheed P-2 Neptune with Patrol Squadron 6 (VP-6) on reconnaissance and anti-submarine warfare missions along the coasts of the Soviet Union and China during the Korean War and the Cold War. In 1954, he attended the U.S. Naval Test Pilot School at NAS Patuxent River, Maryland, and became a test pilot. In 1958, he was named Air Intelligence Officer of USS Hornet, which was then in dry dock at the Bremerton Navy Yard. (Full article...) -
The 2006 Subway 500 was the 32nd stock car race of the 2006 NASCAR Nextel Cup Series and the sixth in the ten-race Chase for the Nextel Cup. It was held on October 22, 2006, before a crowd of 65,000, at Martinsville Speedway in Ridgeway, Virginia, a short track that holds NASCAR races. Hendrick Motorsports driver Jimmie Johnson won the 500‑lap race starting from the ninth position; Denny Hamlin of Joe Gibbs Racing finished second, and Petty Enterprises' Bobby Labonte was third.
Jeff Burton was the driver who led the Drivers' Championship going into the race with a 45-point margin over Matt Kenseth in second. Kurt Busch won the pole position with the fastest lap time in qualifying. He was immediately passed by Jeff Gordon at the start of the race. Gordon held the lead for 143 laps, until Johnson took the lead for one lap. Gordon regained the lead on the next lap, only to lose it to Johnson again on the 153rd lap. Labonte moved into the lead on lap 406 and held it with 55 laps remaining when he was passed by Johnson. At the race's final restart on lap 495, Hamlin challenged Johnson for the lead, but the latter held off Hamlin's passing maneuver and won the race. There were 18 cautions and 16 lead changes by five different drivers during the race. (Full article...) -
David Cloud Berman (born David Craig Berman; January 4, 1967 – August 7, 2019) was an American musician, singer-songwriter and poet. In 1989, he founded – and was the only constant member of – the indie rock band Silver Jews with Pavement's Stephen Malkmus and Bob Nastanovich.
With Malkmus, he developed the simple country-rock sound that characterized the early lo-fi recordings of both Pavement and Silver Jews. He worked extensively on his lyrics whose themes overlapped with his poetry, of which he only published one volume; his lyrics concerned many subjects, including his depression, which culminated in Berman attempting suicide in 2003. Afterward, he underwent rehabilitation, engaged with Judaism and toured for the first time, but soon dissolved the band. (Full article...) -
The Simpsons is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening and developed by Groening, James L. Brooks and Sam Simon for the Fox Broadcasting Company. It is a satirical depiction of American life, epitomized by the Simpson family, which consists of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, and Maggie. Set in the fictional town of Springfield, in an unspecified location in the United States, it caricatures society, Western culture, television and the human condition.
The family was conceived by Groening shortly before a solicitation for a series of animated shorts with producer Brooks. He created a dysfunctional family and named the characters after his own family members, substituting Bart for his own name; he thought Simpson was a funny name in that it sounded similar to "simpleton". The shorts became a part of The Tracey Ullman Show on April 19, 1987. After three seasons, the sketch was developed into a half-hour prime time show and became Fox's first series to land in the Top 30 ratings in a season (1989–1990). (Full article...) -
The Bougainville counterattack, also known as the Second Battle of Torokina, was an unsuccessful Japanese offensive against the Allied base at Cape Torokina on Bougainville Island during the Pacific Theater of World War II. The Japanese attack began on 8 March 1944 after months of preparation and was repulsed by United States Army forces in fighting which lasted until 25 March. The attack was hampered by inaccurate intelligence and poor planning and was pushed back by the well-prepared Allied defenders, who greatly outnumbered the Japanese force. The Japanese suffered severe casualties, while Allied losses were light.
The goal of the offensive was to destroy the Allied beachhead, which accommodated three strategically important airfields. The Japanese mistakenly believed that their forces were about as large as the units deployed to defend the Allied positions. The Allies detected Japanese preparations for the attack shortly after they began in early 1944 and strengthened the base's defenses. None of the three Japanese forces which conducted the attack was able to penetrate far into the Allied perimeter, although there was intense fighting for several positions. (Full article...) -
The 1916 Texas hurricane was an intense and quick-moving tropical cyclone that caused widespread damage in Jamaica and South Texas in August 1916. A Category 4 hurricane upon landfall in Texas, it was the strongest tropical cyclone to strike the United States in three decades. Throughout its eight-day trek across the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico, the hurricane caused 37 fatalities and inflicted $11.8 million in damage.
Weather observations were limited for most of the storm's history, so much of its growth has been inferred from scant data analyzed by the Atlantic hurricane reanalysis project in 2008. The precursor disturbance organized into a small tropical storm by August 12, shortly before crossing the Lesser Antilles into the Caribbean Sea. The storm skirted the southern coast of Jamaica as a hurricane on August 15, killing 17 people along the way. No banana plantation was left unscathed by the hours-long onslaught of strong winds. Coconut and cocoa trees also sustained severe losses. The southern parishes saw the severest effects, incurring extensive damage to crops and buildings; damage in Jamaica amounted to $10 million (equivalent to $289 million in 2024). The storm then traversed the Yucatán Channel into the Gulf of Mexico and intensified further into the equivalent of a major hurricane on the modern-day Saffir–Simpson scale. (Full article...) -
Mercy Point is an American science fiction medical drama, created by Trey Callaway, David Simkins, and Milo Frank, which originally aired for one season on United Paramount Network (UPN) from October 6, 1998, to July 15, 1999. With an ensemble cast led by Joe Morton, Maria del Mar, Alexandra Wilson, Brian McNamara, Salli Richardson, Julia Pennington, Gay Thomas, Jordan Lund, and Joe Spano, the series focuses on the doctors and nurses in a 23rd-century hospital space station located in deep space. The executive producers were Trey Callaway, Michael Katleman, Lee David Zlotoff, Joe Voci, and Scott Sanders.
Callaway adapted Mercy Point from his original screenplay, "Nightingale One". It was picked up by Mandalay Television, and the concept was eventually revised as a television project and renamed Mercy Point; production on the film project had ended due to the poor commercial performance of the 1997 film Starship Troopers. The television show was part of a three-million-dollar deal between Mandalay and Columbia TriStar Television to produce 200 hours of material. It was filmed in Vancouver to reduce production costs, the hospital sets being constructed on a series of sound stages. Director Joe Napolitano has praised the show for its use of a complete set to allow for more intricate directing. Despite Callaway envisioning Mercy Point as a companion to Star Trek: Voyager, it was paired with Moesha and Clueless as its lead-in on Tuesday nights. Initially focused on ethical and medical cases, the show's storylines gradually shifted toward relating the characters' personal relationships, to better fit UPN's primarily teen viewership. (Full article...) -
Mom and Dad is a 1945 American sexploitation film directed by William Beaudine, and largely produced by the exploitation film maker and presenter Kroger Babb. Mom and Dad is considered the most successful film within its genre of "sex hygiene" films. Although it faced numerous legal challenges and was condemned by the National Legion of Decency, it became one of the highest-grossing films of the 1940s.
The film is regarded as an exploitation film as it was repackaged controversial content designed to establish an educational value that might circumvent U.S. censorship laws. Babb's marketing of his film incorporated old-style medicine show techniques, and used unique promotions to build an audience. These formed a template for his later works, which were imitated by his contemporary filmmakers. In 2005, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". The Academy Film Archive preserved Mom and Dad in 2010. (Full article...) -
Podokesaurus is a genus of coelophysoid dinosaur that lived in what is now the eastern United States during the Early Jurassic Period. The first fossil was discovered by the geologist Mignon Talbot near Mount Holyoke, Massachusetts, in 1910. The specimen was fragmentary, preserving much of the body, limbs, and tail. In 1911, Talbot described and named the new genus and species Podokesaurus holyokensis based on it. The full name can be translated as "swift-footed lizard of Holyoke". This discovery made Talbot the first woman to find and describe a non-bird dinosaur. The holotype fossil was recognized as significant and was studied by other researchers, but was lost when the building it was kept in burned down in 1917; no unequivocal Podokesaurus specimens have since been discovered. It was made state dinosaur of Massachusetts in 2022.
Estimated to have been about 1 m (3 ft) in length and 1–40 kg (2–90 lb) in weight, Podokesaurus was lightly constructed with hollow bones, and would have been similar to Coelophysis, being slender, long-necked, and with sharp, recurved teeth. The vertebrae were very light and hollow, and some were slightly concave at each end. The cervical (neck) vertebrae were relatively large in length and diameter compared to the dorsal (back) vertebrae, and the caudal (tail) vertebrae were long and slender. The humerus (upper-arm bone) was small and delicate, less than half the length of the femur (thigh-bone). The pubis (pubic bone) was very long, expanding both at the front and hind ends. The femur was slender, nearly straight, had thin walls, and was expanded at the back side of its lower end. The three metatarsals of the lower leg were closely appressed together forming a compact structure. (Full article...) -
Franklin Knight Lane (July 15, 1864 – May 18, 1921) was an American progressive politician from California. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as United States Secretary of the Interior from 1913 to 1920. He also served as a commissioner of the Interstate Commerce Commission, and was the Democratic nominee for Governor of California in 1902, losing a narrow race in what was then a heavily Republican state.
Lane was born July 15, 1864, near Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, in what was then a British colony but is now part of Canada, and in 1871, his family moved to California. After attending the University of California while working part-time as a reporter, Lane became a New York correspondent for the San Francisco Chronicle, and later became editor and part owner of a newspaper. Elected City Attorney of San Francisco in 1898, a post he held for five years, Lane ran in 1902 for governor and in 1903 for mayor of San Francisco, losing both races. In 1903, he received the support of the Democratic minority in the California State Legislature during the legislature's vote to elect a United States Senator from California. (Full article...)
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Did you know (auto-generated) -
- ... that an Ohio radio station's satellite dish was vandalized twice in 1991, believed by the station manager to be due to the outspoken conservative stances of one of the station's hosts?
- ... that only 130 personnel joined the United States Army's Slavic Legion?
- ... that as of 2017, New York City was spending $500,000 per year on bus tickets and airfare for homeless people to leave New York?
- ... that Mary Arthur McElroy was never given formal recognition as First Lady of the United States out of respect for Nell Arthur, the deceased wife of then-president Chester A. Arthur?
- ... that college debates in the United States were originally conducted entirely in Latin?
- ... that Pete Johnson was the first Republican to hold statewide office in Mississippi since the Reconstruction era?
- ... that a 1940s pin-up photograph (shown) of dancer and actress Martha Holliday reportedly "created a near-panic in the United States Senate"?
- ... that in a rapid decline, Computer Applications, Inc. went from the second-largest independent software firm in the United States to being bankrupt and subject to liquidation?
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Boone was a militia officer during the American Revolutionary War, which in Kentucky was fought primarily between settlers and British-allied American Indians. Boone was captured by Shawnees in 1778 and adopted into the tribe, but he escaped and continued to help defend the Kentucky settlements. He was elected to the first of his three terms in the Virginia General Assembly during the war, and fought in the Battle of Blue Licks in 1782, one of the last battles of the American Revolution. Boone worked as a surveyor and merchant after the war, but he went deep into debt as a Kentucky land speculator. Frustrated with legal problems resulting from his land claims, in 1799 Boone resettled in Missouri, where he spent his final years.
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Photo: Tech. Sgt. Cedric H. Rudisill, USAFDamage caused by American Airlines Flight 77 to the Pentagon as a result of the September 11 attacks. The flight was one of four commercial airliners hijacked that day, and the perpetrators crashed it into the building, causing 189 deaths, including all 64 on board the plane. The damaged sections were rebuilt in 2002. -
Photograph: George C. Cox; restoration: Adam CuerdenWalt Whitman (1819–1892) was an American poet, essayist and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among the most influential poets in the American canon, often called the father of free verse. His work was very controversial in its time, particularly his poetry collection Leaves of Grass (first published in 1855, but continuously revised until Whitman's death), which was described as obscene for its overt sexuality. -
Photograph: Unknown; Restoration: Chick BowenA pile of American bison skulls, waiting to be ground for fertilizer; a man stands atop the pile, with another in front of it. Bison, long a staple of Plains Indian tribal culture, were aggressively hunted by European settlers in the United States, nearly leading to the extinction of the species. -
Artist: George Munger; Restoration: Lise BroerIn the evening hours of August 24, 1814, during the War of 1812, British forces attacked Washington, D.C., setting fire to the White House and the unfinished Capitol Building (damage to latter shown here), among other buildings. This was the second and last time in United States history that a foreign power has captured and occupied the United States capital. -
Engraving: Bureau of Engraving and Printing; restoration: Andrew ShivaAndrew Johnson (December 29, 1808 – July 31, 1875) was the 17th president of the United States, serving from 1865 to 1869. Johnson assumed the presidency as he was vice president of the United States at the time of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. A Democrat who ran with Lincoln on the National Union ticket, Johnson came to office as the Civil War concluded. The new president favored quick restoration of the seceded states to the Union. His plans did not give protection to the former slaves, and he came into conflict with the Republican-dominated Congress, culminating in his impeachment by the House of Representatives. He was acquitted in the Senate by one vote. Although his ranking has fluctuated over time, he is generally considered among the worst American presidents. -
Photo credit: Daniel MayerYellowstone National Park is a United States National Park located in the states of Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming. Yellowstone is the first and oldest national park in the world. The park is famous for its geothermal features and is home to grizzly bears, wolves, bison and elk. -
Check: Harriet Taylor Upton (image courtesy of the National Museum of American History)A check from the National American Woman Suffrage Association, payable to Rachel Foster Avery, which was filled out by hand by the Association's treasurer Harriet Taylor Upton and countersigned by Susan B. Anthony as president and Alice Stone Blackwell as recording secretary.
NAWSA, formed on February 18, 1890, to work for women's suffrage in the United States, was formally led by Anthony between 1892 and 1900. During her presidency, the small organization focused predominantly on women's rights at the state level—much to Anthony's chagrin. It also sent delegates to the World's Congress of Representative Women at the World's Columbian Exposition. -
Engraving credit: Bureau of Engraving and Printing; restored by Andrew ShivaAndrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was an American soldier and statesman who served as the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. He has been widely revered in the United States as an advocate for democracy and the common man, but many of his actions proved divisive, garnering both fervent support and strong opposition from different sectors of society. His reputation has suffered since the 1970s, largely due to his pivotal role in the forcible removal of Native Americans from their ancestral homelands; however, surveys of historians and scholars have ranked Jackson favorably among U.S. presidents. -
Engraving: Paul RevereA depiction of the Boston Massacre, an incident on March 5, 1770, in which British Army soldiers killed five male civilians and injured six others in Boston, Massachusetts. Eight soldiers, one officer, and four civilians were arrested and charged with murder, though all but two were acquitted; two soldiers were convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to branding. During the era of discontent that led to the American Revolution, this event was used for anti-British propaganda. -
Engraving credit: Bureau of Engraving and Printing; restored by Andrew ShivaTheodore Roosevelt (October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919) was the 26th president of the United States from 1901 to 1909. He had previously been the 33rd governor of New York, from 1899 to 1900, and then the 25th vice president of the United States, from March to September 1901. As a leader of the Republican Party, he became a driving force for the Progressive Era in the United States in the early 20th century. In 1912, he ran for a third term as president. When he could not secure the Republican nomination, he formed his own party, the Progressive or "Bull Moose" Party, which drew enough votes away from the Republican nominee, incumbent President William Howard Taft, to give their Democratic opponent Woodrow Wilson a large victory in the electoral vote. Roosevelt was a distant cousin of the 32nd president, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the uncle of Franklin's wife Eleanor Roosevelt. His face is depicted on Mount Rushmore, alongside George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln.
This picture is a line engraving of Roosevelt, 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. -
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. -
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. -
Photograph credit: Associated Press; restored by Adam CuerdenRosa Parks (February 4, 1913 – October 24, 2005) was an American activist in the civil rights movement, best known for her pivotal role in the Montgomery bus boycott. On December 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, Parks rejected a bus driver's order to relinquish her seat in the "colored section" to a white passenger after the whites-only section was filled, inspiring the African-American community to boycott the Montgomery buses for more than a year. Her act of defiance and the boycott became important symbols of the civil rights movement and resistance to racial segregation. After her conviction for disorderly conduct, her appeal became bogged down in the state courts, but the federal Montgomery bus lawsuit, Browder v. Gayle, succeeded in overturning bus segregation in November 1956. Upon her death, Parks became the first woman to lie in honor in the U.S. Capitol rotunda.
This photograph of Parks being fingerprinted was taken on February 22, 1956, when she was arrested again, along with 73 others, after a grand jury indicted 113 African Americans for organizing the Montgomery bus boycott. -
Seals of the U.S. states (1876)Image credit: A.J. Connell Litho.A lithograph from 1876, showing the seals of the then-47 U.S. states and territories as well as the District of Columbia. Some of these seals have changed since this image was created. -
Engraving: Bureau of Engraving and Printing; restoration: Andrew ShivaJohn Quincy Adams (1767–1848) was an American statesman who served as a diplomat, minister and ambassador to foreign nations, and treaty negotiator, United States Senator, Congressman from Massachusetts, and the sixth President of the United States from 1825 to 1829. Involved in negotiating the treaties of Ghent, 1818, and Adams–Onís, Adams has been called one of the United States' greatest diplomats and secretaries of state. As president, he sought to modernize the American economy and promote education, paying off much of the national debt despite being stymied by a Congress controlled by opponents and lacking patronage networks. Historians have generally ranked him as an above-average president.
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Selected culture biography -
Davis was the co-founder of the Hollywood Canteen, and was the first female president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress twice, was the first person to accrue 10 Academy Award nominations for acting, and was the first woman to receive a Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Film Institute. Her career went through several periods of eclipse, and she admitted that her success had often been at the expense of her personal relationships. Married four times, she was once widowed and thrice divorced, and raised her children as a single parent. Her final years were marred by a long period of ill health, but she continued acting until shortly before her death from breast cancer, with more than 100 films, television and theater roles to her credit. In 1999, Davis was placed second, after Katharine Hepburn, on the American Film Institute's list of the greatest female stars of all time.
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 15
- 1752 – Benjamin Franklin proves that lightning is electricity.
- 1836 – Arkansas is admitted as the 25th U.S. state.
- 1844 – Charles Goodyear receives a patent for vulcanization, a process to strengthen rubber.
- 1846 – The Oregon Treaty establishes the 49th parallel as the border (pictured) between the United States and Canada, from the Rocky Mountains to the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
- 1864 – Arlington National Cemetery is established when 200 acres (0.81 km2) around Arlington Mansion, formerly owned by Confederate General Robert E. Lee, are officially set aside as a military cemetery by U.S. Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton.
- 1916 – U.S. President Woodrow Wilson signs a bill incorporating the Boy Scouts of America, making them the only American youth organization with a federal charter.
Selected cuisines, dishes and foods -
The cuisine of Hawaii incorporates five distinct styles of food, reflecting the diverse food history of settlement and immigration in the Hawaiian Islands, primarily originating from Polynesian, North American and East Asian cuisines.[a] (Full article...)
Selected panorama -
1909 Panoramic view of Tulsa, Oklahoma.
More did you know? -
- ... that Operation Power Flite, in which three U.S. Air Force B-52s flew non-stop around the world (route pictured), was made to show that "the United States had the ability to drop a hydrogen bomb anywhere in the world"?
- ... that the United States Supreme Court has ruled that interscholastic athletic associations have police power?
- ... that the Bacon Deluxe sandwich from Wendy's topped a list of the five most unhealthful gourmet burgers sold by national fast food restaurant chains in the United States?
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