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Introduction

Flag of the United States of America

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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  Sheet music cover (1897)

  
  "On the Banks of the Wabash, Far Away" is a song written and composed by the American songwriter Paul Dresser in 1897. It is among the best-selling songs of the 19th century, earning over $100,000 from sheet-music revenues. Written and composed by American songwriter Paul Dresser, it was published by the Tin Pan Alley firm of Howley, Haviland and Company in October 1897. The lyrics of the ballad reminisce about life near Dresser's childhood home by the Wabash River in Indiana, United States. The song remained popular for decades, and the Indiana General Assembly adopted it as the official state song on March 14, 1913. The song was the basis for a 1923 film of the same title. Its longtime popularity led to the emergence of several lyrical versions, including an 1898 anti-war song and a Swedish version that was a number-one hit.
  
  The song was composed during a transitory time in musical history when songs first began to be recorded for the phonograph. It was among the earliest pieces of popular music to be recorded. Dresser's inability to control the distribution of phonograph cylinders led him and his company to join other composers to petition the United States Congress to expand federal copyright protections over the new technology. (Full article...)
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  Eastern spp. in Florida

  
  The mourning dove (Zenaida macroura) is a member of the dove family, Columbidae. The bird is also known as the American mourning dove, the rain dove, the chueybird, colloquially as the turtle dove, and it was once known as the Carolina pigeon and Carolina turtledove. It is one of the most abundant and widespread North American birds and a popular gamebird, with more than 20 million birds (up to 70 million in some years) shot annually in the U.S., both for sport and meat. Its ability to sustain its population under such pressure is due to its prolific breeding; in warm areas, one pair may raise up to six broods of two young each in a single year. The wings make an unusual whistling sound upon take-off and landing, a form of sonation. The bird is a strong flier, capable of speeds up to 88 km/h (55 mph).
  
  Mourning doves are light gray and brown and generally muted in color. Males and females are similar in appearance. The species is generally monogamous, with two squabs (young) per brood. Both parents incubate and care for the young. Mourning doves eat almost exclusively seeds, but the young are fed crop milk by their parents. (Full article...)
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  55 Wall Street in 2012

  
  55 Wall Street, formerly the National City Bank Building, is an eight-story building on Wall Street between William and Hanover streets in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City, New York, United States. The lowest three stories were completed in either 1841 or 1842 as the four-story Merchants' Exchange and designed by Isaiah Rogers in the Greek Revival style. Between 1907 and 1910, McKim, Mead & White removed the original fourth story and added five floors to create the present building. Since 2006, the banking room has functioned as an event venue called the Cipriani Wall Street, while the upper stories have been a condominium development known as the Cipriani Club Residences.
  
  55 Wall Street's granite facade includes two stacked colonnades facing Wall Street, each with twelve columns. Inside is a cruciform banking hall with a 60-foot (18 m) vaulted ceiling, Corinthian columns, marble floors and walls, and an entablature around the interior. The banking hall was among the largest in the United States when it was completed. The offices of Citibank's predecessor National City Bank were in the corners of the banking hall, while the fourth through eighth floors were used as office space. The facade and part of the interior are New York City designated landmarks, and the building is listed on both the New York State Register of Historic Places and the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) as a National Historic Landmark. It is also a contributing property to the Wall Street Historic District, listed on the NRHP. (Full article...)
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  John C. Breckinridge by Mathew Brady

  
  The political career of John C. Breckinridge included service in the state government of Kentucky, the Federal government of the United States, as well as the government of the Confederate States of America. In 1857, 36 years old, he was inaugurated as Vice President of the United States under James Buchanan. He remains the youngest person to ever hold the office. Four years later, he ran as the presidential candidate of a dissident group of Southern Democrats, but lost the election to the Republican candidate Abraham Lincoln.
  
  A member of the Breckinridge political family, John C. Breckinridge became the first Democrat to represent Fayette County in the Kentucky House of Representatives, and in 1851, he was the first Democrat to represent Kentucky's 8th congressional district in over 20 years. A champion of strict constructionism, states' rights, and popular sovereignty, he supported Stephen A. Douglas's Kansas–Nebraska Act as a means of addressing slavery in the territories acquired by the U.S. in the Mexican–American War. Considering his re-election to the House of Representatives unlikely in 1854, he returned to private life and his legal practice. He was nominated for vice president at the 1856 Democratic National Convention, and although he and Buchanan won the election, he enjoyed little influence in Buchanan's administration. (Full article...)
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  Leon Czolgosz shoots President McKinley with a revolver concealed under a cloth rag on September 6, 1901, depicted in an illustration by Achille Beltrame.

  
  William McKinley, the 25th president of the United States, was shot on the grounds of the Pan-American Exposition in the Temple of Music in Buffalo, New York, on September 6, 1901, six months into his second term. He was shaking hands with the public when an anarchist, Leon Czolgosz, shot him twice in the abdomen. McKinley died on September 14 of gangrene caused by the wounds. He was the third American president to be assassinated, following Abraham Lincoln in 1865 and James A. Garfield in 1881.
  
  McKinley enjoyed meeting the public and was reluctant to accept the security available to his office. Secretary to the President George B. Cortelyou feared that an assassination attempt would take place during a visit to the Temple of Music and took it off the schedule twice, but McKinley restored it each time. (Full article...)
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  John Adair (January 9, 1757 – May 19, 1840) was an American pioneer, slave trader, soldier, and politician. He was the eighth Governor of Kentucky and represented the state in both the U.S. House and Senate. A native of South Carolina, Adair enlisted in the state militia and served in the Revolutionary War, during which he was twice captured and held as a prisoner of war by the British. Following the War, he was elected as a delegate to South Carolina's convention to ratify the United States Constitution.
  
  After moving to Kentucky in 1786, Adair participated in the Northwest Indian War, including a skirmish with the Miami Chief Little Turtle near Fort St. Clair in 1792. Popular for his service in two wars, he entered politics in 1792 as a delegate to Kentucky's constitutional convention. Adair was elected to a total of eight terms in the state House of Representatives between 1793 and 1803. He served as Speaker of the Kentucky House in 1802 and 1803, and was a delegate to the state's Second Constitutional Convention in 1799. He ascended to the United States Senate to fill the seat vacated when John Breckinridge resigned to become Attorney General of the United States in the Cabinet of Thomas Jefferson, but failed to win a full term in the subsequent election due to his implication in a treason conspiracy involving Vice President Aaron Burr. After a long legal battle, he was acquitted of any wrongdoing; and his accuser, General James Wilkinson, was ordered to issue an apology. The negative publicity kept him out of politics for more than a decade. (Full article...)
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  The McKinley Birthplace Memorial gold dollar was a commemorative coin struck by the United States Bureau of the Mint in 1916 and 1917, depicting the 25th President of the United States, William McKinley. The coin's obverse was designed by Charles E. Barber, Chief Engraver of the Mint, and the reverse by his assistant, George T. Morgan. As McKinley had appeared on a version of the 1903-dated Louisiana Purchase Exposition dollar, the 1916 release made him the first person to appear on two issues of U.S. coins.
  
  The coins were to be sold at a premium to finance the National McKinley Birthplace Memorial at Niles, Ohio, and were vended by the group constructing it. The issue was originally proposed as a silver dollar; this was changed when it was realized it would not be appropriate to honor a president who had supported the gold standard with such a piece. The coins were poorly promoted, and did not sell well. Despite an authorized mintage of 100,000, only about 30,000 were minted. Of these, 20,000 were sold, many of these at a reduced price to Texas coin dealer B. Max Mehl. The remaining 10,000 pieces were returned to the Mint for melting. (Full article...)
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  Elk at the Opal Terrace at Mammoth Hot Springs, Yellowstone National Park

  
  The Leopold Report, officially known as Wildlife Management in the National Parks, is a 1963 paper composed of a series of ecosystem management recommendations that were presented by the Special Advisory Board on Wildlife Management to United States Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall. Named for its chairman and principal author, zoologist and conservationist A. Starker Leopold, the report proved influential for future preservation mandates.
  
  After several years of public controversy regarding the forced reduction of the elk population in Yellowstone National Park, Udall appointed an advisory board to collect scientific data to inform future wildlife management of the national parks. The committee observed that culling programs at other national parks had been ineffective, and recommended different management of Yellowstone's elk population. In addressing the goals, policies, and methods of managing wildlife in the parks, the report suggested that in addition to protection, wildlife populations should be managed and regulated to prevent habitat degradation. Touching upon predator control, fire ecology, and other issues, the report suggested that the National Park Service (NPS) hire scientists to manage the parks using current scientific research. (Full article...)
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  Evans in Washington, D.C., 1925

  
  Hiram Wesley Evans (September 26, 1881 – September 14, 1966) was an American dentist and political activist who served as the Imperial Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, an American white supremacist group, from 1922 to his resignation in 1939.
  
  A native of Alabama, Evans attended Vanderbilt University studying dentistry. He operated a small, moderately successful practice in Texas until 1920, when he joined the Klan's Dallas chapter. He quickly rose through the ranks and was part of a group that ousted William Joseph Simmons from the position of Imperial Wizard, the national leader, in November 1922. Evans succeeded him and sought to transform the group into a political power. (Full article...)
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  Cora Agnes Benneson, pictured in Julia Ward Howe's Sketches of Women of New England (1904)

  
  
  Cora Agnes Benneson (June 10, 1851 – June 8, 1919) was an American attorney, lecturer, and writer. She was one of the first women to practice law in New England. Benneson was raised in Quincy, Illinois, to parents involved in local politics, religious organizing, and philanthropy; her parents regularly invited prominent guests to their home, including the writers and philosophers Amos Bronson Alcott and Ralph Waldo Emerson. Benneson began her university studies in 1875 at the University of Michigan, where she earned a Bachelor of Arts in 1878, a Bachelor of Laws in 1880, and a Master of Arts in 1883. After earning her master's degree, she was admitted to the bars of Illinois and Michigan.
  
  From 1883 to 1885, Benneson traveled the world to learn about legal cultures, and in particular how they affected women; however, she often took a nativist and racist or stereotypical view of those cultures. When she returned to the United States, Benneson undertook a nationwide lecture tour to speak about her travels and observations. In 1886, she briefly worked as an editor of West Publishing's law reports before taking up a history fellowship at Bryn Mawr College under then-professor Woodrow Wilson. (Full article...)
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  Bottled maple syrup

  
  Maple syrup is a sweet syrup made from the sap of maple trees. In cold climates, these trees store starch in their trunks and roots before winter; the starch is then converted to sugar that rises in the sap in late winter and early spring. Maple trees are tapped by drilling holes into their trunks and collecting the sap, which is processed by heating to evaporate much of the water, leaving the concentrated syrup.
  
  Maple syrup was first made by the Indigenous peoples of Northeastern North America. The practice was adopted by European settlers, who gradually changed production methods. Technological improvements in the 1970s further refined syrup processing. Almost all of the world's maple syrup is produced in Canada and the United States. (Full article...)
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  Condor #534 soaring over the Grand Canyon in 2006

  
  The California condor (Gymnogyps californianus) is a New World vulture and the largest North American land bird. It became extinct in the wild in 1987 when all remaining wild individuals were captured, but has since been reintroduced to northern Arizona and southern Utah (including the Grand Canyon area and Zion National Park), the coastal mountains of California, and northern Baja California in Mexico. It is the only surviving member of the genus Gymnogyps, although four extinct members of the genus are also known. The species is listed by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature as Critically Endangered, and similarly considered Critically Imperiled by NatureServe.
  
  The plumage is black with patches of white on the underside of the wings; the head is largely bald, with skin color ranging from gray on young birds to yellow and bright orange on breeding adults. Its 3.0 m (9.8 ft) wingspan is the widest of any North American bird, and its weight of up to 12 kg (26 lb) nearly equals that of the trumpeter swan, the heaviest among native North American bird species. The condor is a scavenger and eats large amounts of carrion. It is one of the world's longest-living birds, with a lifespan of up to 60 years. (Full article...)
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  Graham in 1959

  
  Otto Everett Graham Jr. (December 6, 1921 – December 17, 2003) was an American professional football quarterback who played for the Cleveland Browns in the All-America Football Conference (AAFC) and National Football League (NFL) for 10 seasons. Graham is regarded by critics as one of the most dominant players of his era and one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time, having taken the Browns to league championship games every year between 1946 and 1955, making ten championship appearances, and winning seven of them. With Graham at quarterback, the Browns posted a record of 105 wins, 17 losses, and 4 ties, including a 9–3 win–loss record in the AAFC and NFL playoffs. He holds the NFL record for career average yards gained per pass attempt, with 8.63. He also holds the record for the highest career winning percentage for an NFL starting quarterback, at 81.0%. Long-time New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, a friend of Graham's, once called him "as great of a quarterback as there ever was."
  
  Graham grew up in Waukegan, Illinois, the son of music teachers. He entered Northwestern University in 1940 on a basketball scholarship, but football soon became his main sport. After a brief stint in the military at the end of World War II, Graham played for the Rochester Royals of the National Basketball League (NBL), winning the 1945–46 championship. Paul Brown, Cleveland's coach, signed Graham to play for the Browns, where he thrived. Graham's 1946 NBL and AAFC titles made him the first of only two people to have won championships in two of the four major North American sports (the second was Gene Conley). After he retired from playing football in 1955, Graham coached college teams in the College All-Star Game and became head football coach for the Coast Guard Bears at the United States Coast Guard Academy. After seven years there, he was hired as head coach of the Washington Redskins in 1966. Following three unsuccessful years with them, he resigned and returned to the Coast Guard Academy, where he served as athletic director until his retirement in 1984. He was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1965. (Full article...)
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  Strom Thurmond, c. 1961

  
  On August 28, 1957, Strom Thurmond, a Democratic United States senator from South Carolina, began a filibuster intended to prevent the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1957. The filibuster—an extended speech designed to stall legislation—began at 8:54 p.m. and lasted until 9:12 p.m. the following day, a duration of 24 hours and 18 minutes. This makes the filibuster the longest single-person filibuster in United States Senate history as of 2025. It was also the longest single-person Senate speech until 2025, when the record was broken by Cory Booker of New Jersey, with Booker speaking for twenty-five hours and five minutes.
  
  Thurmond's filibuster focused primarily on asserting that the bill in question, which provided for expanded federal protection of African American voting rights, was both unnecessary and unconstitutional, and Thurmond recited from documents including the election laws of each U.S. state, Supreme Court decisions, and George Washington's Farewell Address. Thurmond focused on a particular provision in the bill that dealt with certain court cases, but opposed the entirety of the bill. The bill passed two hours after the filibuster and was signed into law by President Dwight D. Eisenhower within two weeks. (Full article...)
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  Jolie in 2024

  
  Angelina Jolie (/dʒoʊˈliː/ joh-LEE; born Angelina Jolie Voight, /ˈvɔɪt/; June 4, 1975) is an American actress, filmmaker, and humanitarian. The recipient of numerous accolades, including two Academy Awards, a Tony Award and three Golden Globe Awards, she has been named Hollywood's highest-paid actress multiple times.
  
  Jolie made her screen debut as a child alongside her father, Jon Voight, in Lookin' to Get Out (1982). Her film career began in earnest a decade later with the low-budget production Cyborg 2 (1993), followed by her first leading role in Hackers (1995). After starring in the television films George Wallace (1997) and Gia (1998), Jolie won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for the 1999 drama Girl, Interrupted. Her portrayal of the titular heroine in Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001) established her as a leading lady. Jolie's success continued with roles in the action films Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005), Wanted (2008), and Salt (2010), as well as in the fantasy film Maleficent (2014) and its 2019 sequel. She also had voice roles in the animated films Shark Tale (2004) and Kung Fu Panda franchise (2008–2016), and gained praise for her dramatic performances in A Mighty Heart (2007), Changeling (2008), which earned her a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress, and Maria (2024). (Full article...)
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  An illustration depicting Excalibur firing at three nearby targets. In most descriptions, each could fire at dozens of targets, which would be hundreds or thousands of kilometers away.

  
  Project Excalibur was a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) Cold War–era research program to develop an X-ray laser system as a ballistic missile defense (BMD) for the United States. The concept involved packing large numbers of expendable X-ray lasers around a nuclear device, which would orbit in space. During an attack, the device would be detonated, with the X-rays released focused by each laser to destroy multiple incoming target missiles. Because the system would be deployed above the Earth's atmosphere, the X-rays could reach missiles thousands of kilometers away, providing protection over a wide area.
  
  Anti-ballistic missile (ABM) systems of the time only attacked the enemy nuclear warheads after they were released by ICBMs. A single ICBM could carry as many as a dozen warheads, so dozens of defense missiles were required per attacking missile. A single Excalibur device contained up to fifty lasers and could potentially destroy a corresponding number of missiles, with all of the warheads still on board. A single Excalibur could thus destroy dozens of ICBMs and hundreds of warheads for the cost of a single nuclear bomb, dramatically reversing the cost-exchange ratio that had previously doomed ABM systems. (Full article...)
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  Grant c. 1870–1880

  
  Ulysses S. Grant (born Hiram Ulysses Grant; April 27, 1822 – July 23, 1885) was the 18th president of the United States, serving from 1869 to 1877. In 1865, as commanding general, Grant led the Union Army to victory in the American Civil War.
  
  Grant was born in Ohio and graduated from the United States Military Academy (West Point) in 1843. He served with distinction in the Mexican–American War, but resigned from the army in 1854 and returned to civilian life impoverished. In 1861, shortly after the Civil War began, Grant joined the Union Army and rose to prominence after securing victories in the western theater. In 1863, he led the Vicksburg campaign that gave Union forces control of the Mississippi River and dealt a major strategic blow to the Confederacy. President Abraham Lincoln promoted Grant to lieutenant general and command of all Union armies after his victory at Chattanooga. For thirteen months, Grant fought Robert E. Lee during the high-casualty Overland Campaign which ended with the capture of Lee's army at Appomattox, where he formally surrendered to Grant. In 1866, President Andrew Johnson promoted Grant to General of the Army. Later, Grant broke with Johnson over Reconstruction policies. A war hero, drawn in by his sense of duty, Grant was unanimously nominated by the Republican Party and then elected president in 1868. (Full article...)
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  John William Beschter SJ (born Johann Wilhelm Beschter; German: [ˈjoːhan ˈvɪlhɛlm ˈbɛʃtɐ]; May 20, 1763 – January 6, 1842) was a Catholic priest and Jesuit from the Duchy of Luxembourg in the Austrian Netherlands. He emigrated to the United States as a missionary in 1807, where he ministered in rural Pennsylvania and Maryland. Beschter was the last Jesuit pastor of St. Mary's Church in Lancaster, as well as the pastor of St. John the Evangelist Church in Baltimore, Maryland. He was also a priest at several other German-speaking churches in Pennsylvania.
  
  Beschter's ministerial work was punctuated by a time as master of novices at the new Jesuit novitiate at White Marsh Manor, as well as a brief term as president of Georgetown College in 1829. While in Maryland, he aligned himself with the Continental European Jesuits in the United States, who endorsed a monarchist view of ecclesiastical leadership. After his presidency, Beschter remained at Georgetown for a year as a professor of German, before returning to Paradise, Pennsylvania, where he lived out the last twelve years of his life as a priest. (Full article...)
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  Chad Harris-Crane is a fictional character on the American soap opera Passions, which aired on NBC from 1999 to 2007 and on DirecTV in 2007–08. Developed by the soap's creator and head writer James E. Reilly, Chad was portrayed by two actors over the course of the show: Donn Swaby (1999 to 2002) and Charles Divins (2002 to 2007). Swaby left the show to pursue roles outside daytime television and was replaced by Divins. The role was the first time that either actor had worked on a television series.
  
  Chad is a member of the Crane family. The illegitimate son of the evil patriarch Alistair Crane, Chad is introduced as a music producer from Los Angeles who is searching for his biological family. Chad becomes involved in a love triangle with sisters Whitney and Simone Russell. His romance with Whitney is complicated by the possibility they may be engaging in an incestuous relationship as Chad is initially believed to be her half-brother, and later revealed to be her adoptive cousin. Chad's later storylines focus on his confusion over his sexual identity, and his sexual relationship with tabloid reporter Vincent Clarkson. Chad attempts to reconcile with Whitney, after his affair with Vincent is revealed, before being killed by his father Alistair while trying to protect his best friend, Ethan Winthrop. (Full article...)
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  The 2010 Sylvania 300 was a stock car racing competition that took place on September 19, 2010. Held at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon, New Hampshire, the 300-lap race was the twenty-seventh in the 2010 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, as well as the first in the ten-race Chase for the Sprint Cup, which ended the season. Clint Bowyer of the Richard Childress Racing team won the race; Denny Hamlin finished second and Jamie McMurray came in third.
  
  Brad Keselowski won the pole position, although he was almost immediately passed by Tony Stewart at the start of the race. Many Chase for the Sprint Cup participants, including Jimmie Johnson, Kurt Busch, and Hamlin, were in the top ten for most of the race, although some encountered problems in the closing laps. Stewart was leading the race with two laps remaining but ran out of fuel, giving the lead, and the win, to Bowyer. There were twenty-one lead changes among eight different drivers, as well as eight cautions during the race. (Full article...)
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  The last picture ever taken of Johnston, 13 hours before his death at the eruption site

  
  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...)
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  USS Minneapolis at Tulagi with torpedo damage, 1 December 1942

  
  The Battle of Tassafaronga, sometimes referred to as the Fourth Battle of Savo Island or in Japanese sources as the Battle of Lunga Point (ルンガ沖夜戦, "Night Battle off Lunga"), was a nighttime naval battle that took place on 30 November 1942 between United States Navy and Imperial Japanese Navy warships during the Guadalcanal campaign. The battle took place in Ironbottom Sound near Tassafaronga Point on Guadalcanal.
  
  In the battle, a US force of five cruisers and four destroyers under the command of Rear Admiral Carleton H. Wright intercepted eight Japanese destroyers attempting to deliver food to their forces on Guadalcanal. The US destroyers waited four minutes after radar contact for permission to launch torpedoes and missed the optimal firing position; the torpedoes all missed, and the destroyers retired. The US cruisers opened fire and sank one destroyer. The muzzle flash exposed the US cruisers' positions. Under the command of Rear Admiral Raizō Tanaka, Japanese destroyers quickly launched Type 93 "Long Lance" torpedoes, sinking one US cruiser and heavily damaging three others. The rest of Tanaka's force escaped undamaged but failed to complete the intended supply mission. (Full article...)
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  Conan the Barbarian is a 1982 American epic sword-and-sorcery film directed by John Milius and written by Milius and Oliver Stone. Based on Robert E. Howard's Conan, the film stars Arnold Schwarzenegger and James Earl Jones, and tells the story of a barbarian warrior named Conan (Schwarzenegger) who seeks vengeance for the death of his parents at the hands of Thulsa Doom (Jones), the leader of a snake cult.
  
  Ideas for a Conan film were proposed as early as 1970; executive producer Edward R. Pressman and associate producer Edward Summer began a concerted effort to get the film made in 1975. It took them two years to obtain the film rights, after which they recruited Schwarzenegger for the lead role and Stone to draft a script. Pressman lacked capital for the endeavor. In 1979, after having his proposals for investments rejected by the major studios, he sold the project to Dino De Laurentiis; his daughter Raffaella produced the film. Milius was appointed as director and he rewrote Stone's script. The final screenplay integrated elements from various Howard stories, as well as the Japanese films Seven Samurai (1954) and Kwaidan (1965). Filming took place in Spain over five months in the regions around Madrid and the province of Almería. The sets, designed by Ron Cobb, were based on Dark Age cultures and Frank Frazetta's paintings of Conan. Milius eschewed optical effects, preferring to realize his ideas with mechanical constructs and optical illusions. Schwarzenegger performed most of his own stunts, and two types of sword, costing $10,000 each, were forged for his character. The editing process took over a year, and several violent scenes were cut out. (Full article...)
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  Anne Hutchinson on Trial by Edwin Austin Abbey

  
  Anne Hutchinson (née Marbury; July 1591 – August 1643) was an English-born religious figure who was an important participant in the Antinomian Controversy which shook the infant Massachusetts Bay Colony from 1636 to 1638. Her strong religious formal declarations were at odds with the established Puritan clergy in the Boston area and her popularity and charisma helped create a theological schism that threatened the Puritan religious community in New England. She was eventually tried and convicted, then banished from the colony with many of her supporters.
  
  Hutchinson was born in Alford, Lincolnshire, the daughter of Francis Marbury, an Anglican cleric and school teacher who gave her a far better education than most other girls received. She lived in London as a young adult, and there married a friend from home, William Hutchinson. The couple moved back to Alford where they began following preacher John Cotton in the nearby port of Boston, Lincolnshire. Cotton was compelled to emigrate in 1633, and the Hutchinsons followed a year later with their 15 children and soon became well established in the growing settlement of Boston in New England. Hutchinson was a midwife and helpful to those needing her assistance, as well as forthcoming with her personal religious understandings. Soon she was hosting women at her house weekly, providing commentary on recent sermons. These meetings became so popular that she began offering meetings for men as well, including the young governor of the colony, Henry Vane. (Full article...)
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  Lawrence Winchester Wetherby (January 2, 1908 – March 27, 1994) was an American politician who served as Lieutenant Governor and Governor of Kentucky. He was the first of only two Kentucky governors born in Jefferson County, despite the fact that Louisville (the county seat) is the state's most populous city. The second governor born in Jefferson County is the incumbent governor, Andy Beshear, who grew up in the Lexington area. Two other governors have been elected when residents of Jefferson: Augustus Willson, 1907–11, and Matt Bevin, 2015-19.
  
  After graduating from the University of Louisville, Wetherby held several offices in the Jefferson County judicial system before being elected lieutenant governor in 1947 as the choice of 2nd District U.S. Rep. Earle C. Clements, D-Morganfield, who won the primary for the top job. Wetherby was called Kentucky's first "working" lieutenant governor because Clements had him to carry out duties beyond his constitutional responsibility to preside over the state Senate, such as preparing the state budget and attending the Southern Governors Conference. In 1950, Clements was elected to the U.S. Senate, elevating Wetherby to governor. Wetherby won immediate acclaim by calling a special legislative session to increase funding for education and government benefits from the state's budget surplus. In 1951, campaigning as a "Middletown farmer" in a largely rural state, he won a four-year full term as governor, during which he continued and expanded many of Clements' programs, including increased road construction and industrial diversification. He endorsed the Supreme Court's 1954 desegregation order in the case of Brown v. Board of Education and appointed a biracial commission to oversee the successful integration of the state's schools. As chairman of the Southern Governors Conference in 1954 and 1955, he encouraged other Southern governors to accept and implement desegregation. (Full article...)

Did you know (auto-generated) -

• ... that a filing for a temporary restraining order to stop the release of Get Up and Dance in the United States by the publisher of the Just Dance series was denied?
• ... that The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763–1789 has been the first, second, and third volume of the Oxford History of the United States?
• ... that journalist Isaac Saul was named as one of the 16 people who had the greatest influence in the 2016 U.S. election?
• ... that anti-refugee activist Ann Corcoran has claimed that refugees are a Muslim plot to colonize the United States?
• ... that the ongoing infant formula shortage in the United States also affects non-infant medical patients who require nasogastric feeding?
• ... that the center squeeze has been blamed for costing Gary Johnson the 2016 US presidential election?
• ... that the United States Conciliation Service, which was part of the U.S. Department of Labor, came to an end because the writers of the Taft–Hartley Act thought that the service was too partial to labor?
• ... that City Pier A's clock tower was the first memorial to World War I casualties in the United States, according to a New York City government spokesperson?

Selected society biography -

Winfield Scott Hancock was a career U.S. Army officer and the Democratic nominee for President of the United States in 1880. He served with distinction in the Army for four decades, including service in the Mexican–American War and as a Union general in the American Civil War. Known to his Army colleagues as "Hancock the Superb", he was noted in particular for his personal leadership at the Battle of Gettysburg in 1863. One military historian wrote, "No other Union general at Gettysburg dominated men by the sheer force of their presence more completely than Hancock." As another wrote, "his tactical skill had won him the quick admiration of adversaries who had come to know him as the 'Thunderbolt of the Army of the Potomac.'" His military service continued after the Civil War, as Hancock participated in the military Reconstruction of the South and the Army's presence at the Western frontier.

After the Civil War, Hancock's reputation as a soldier and his dedication to conservative constitutional principles made him a quadrennial Presidential possibility. His noted integrity was a counterpoint to the corruption of the era. This nationwide popularity led the Democrats to nominate him for President in 1880. Although he ran a strong campaign, Hancock was defeated by Republican James Garfield by the closest popular vote margin in American history.

Selected image -

• 
  United States Constitution

  Document: Constitutional Convention; scan: National Archives

  The 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
• 
  Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk

  Photograph credit: Aaron Allmon II

  The Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk is a semi-retired American single-seat, twin-engine stealth and attack aircraft that was developed by Lockheed's secretive Skunk Works division and operated by the United States Air Force. Its maiden flight took place in 1981, and it was the first operational aircraft to be designed around stealth technology. This F-117 was photographed flying over Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada.
• 
  Yellowstone National Park

  Photo credit: Daniel Mayer

  Yellowstone 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.
• 
  American Airlines Flight 77

  Photo: Tech. Sgt. Cedric H. Rudisill, USAF

  Damage 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.
• 
  William H. Seward

  Photograph: Unknown; Restoration: Adam Cuerden

  William H. Seward (1801–1872) was United States Secretary of State from 1861 to 1869, and earlier served as Governor of New York and United States Senator. A determined opponent of the spread of slavery in the years leading up to the American Civil War, he was a dominant figure in the Republican Party in its formative years, and was generally praised for his work on behalf of the Union as Secretary of State during the American Civil War. His firm stance against foreign intervention in the Civil War helped deter Britain and France from entering the conflict, which might have led to the independence of the Confederate States. His contemporary Carl Schurz described Seward as "one of those spirits who sometimes will go ahead of public opinion instead of tamely following its footprints."
• 
  Bison skull pile

  Photograph: Unknown; Restoration: Chick Bowen

  A 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.
• 
  Battle of Churubusco

  Artist: John Cameron; Restoration: Lise Broer

  The Battle of Churubusco took place on August 20, 1847, in Churubusco (now a suburb of Mexico City) during the Mexican–American War. Three Mexican battalions—including the Saint Patrick's Battalion made up of immigrants—took up defensive positions inside a convent and were able to repulse the American attacks until they ran out of ammunition.
• 
  Andrew Johnson

  Engraving: Bureau of Engraving and Printing; restoration: Andrew Shiva

  Andrew 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.
• 
  Construction of Mount Rushmore

  Photo credit: Rise Studio

  The 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.
• 
  Art and engraving on United States banknotes

  Engraving credit: W. W. Rice, after Robert Walter Weir; restored by Andrew Shiva

  Artists producing art and engraving on United States banknotes 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 vignette, engraved by W. W. Rice, appeared on certain United States fifty-dollar bills issued in 1875. Produced for the Department of the Treasury's Bureau of Engraving and Printing, the engraving is of Robert Walter Weir's painting Embarkation of the Pilgrims, which hangs in the United States Capitol rotunda. It depicts the Pilgrims on the deck of the ship Speedwell as they depart Delfshaven in South Holland on July 22, 1620. They met additional colonists at Southampton, England, and transferred to the Mayflower before sailing to the New World.
• 
  Virginia Opossum

  Photo credit: Cody Pope

  The Virginia Opossum (Didelphis virginiana) is the only marsupial found in North America. A solitary and nocturnal animal about the size of a domestic cat, it is a successful opportunist and is found throughout North America from coast to coast (introduced to California in 1910), and from Central America and Mexico to southern Canada.
• 
  Engrossed copy of the United States Declaration of Independence

  Document: Thomas Jefferson et al.

  The engrossed copy of the United States Declaration of Independence, which was ratified on July 4, 1776, and signed over the following months.
  
  The history of this document is one of reverence and neglect. After being signed, it was moved several times, first with the Continental Congress and later with the Secretary of State. When the British razed Washington during the War of 1812, it was evacuated to Virginia. From 1841 to 1876, the document was on public display in conditions which caused it to fade drastically. Consequently, from 1892 to 1922 it was stored between two glass plates and exhibited only rarely. After a period at the Library of Congress, the engrossed copy is now held by the National Archives. It is exhibited in a titanium-aluminum case filled with argon.
• 
  Pauline Adams

  Photograph credit: unknown; restored by Adam Cuerden

  Pauline 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.
• 
  NAWSA check

  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.
• 
  The Great Presidential Puzzle

  Artist: James Albert Wales; Lithography: Mayer, Merkel, & Ottmann; Restoration: Jujutacular

  An 1880 political cartoon depicts Senator Roscoe Conkling over a "presidential puzzle" consisting of some of the potential Republican nominees as pieces of a newly invented sliding puzzle. Conkling held significant influence over the party during the 1880 Republican National Convention and attempted to use that to nominate Ulysses S. Grant, only to lose out to "dark horse" candidate James A. Garfield.

Selected culture biography -

Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis (April 5, 1908 – October 6, 1989) was an American actress of film, television and theater. Noted for her willingness to play unsympathetic characters, she was highly regarded for her performances in a range of film genres; from contemporary crime melodramas to historical and period films and occasional comedies, though her greatest successes were her roles in romantic dramas.

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 -

Interstate 15 in Arizona is part of Interstate 15 (I-15), a transcontinental Interstate Highway from San Diego, California, to the Canadian border. The highway segment passes through Mohave County in the far northwest corner of the U.S. state of Arizona. Despite its length of 29.43 miles (47.36 km) and isolation from the rest of the state in the remote Arizona Strip, it is notable for the scenic section through the Virgin River Gorge. The highway heads in a northeasterly direction from the Nevada border northeast of Mesquite, Nevada, to the Utah border southwest of St. George, Utah. The southern portion of the routing of I-15 was built close to the alignment of the old U.S. Route 91, but the northern section through the Virgin River Gorge was built along an alignment that previously had no road. The southern section of the highway was complete and opened in the early 1960s, while the section through the gorge did not open to traffic until 1973. When it opened, the portion of I-15 through the Virgin River Gorge was the most expensive section of rural Interstate per mile.

Selected quote -

Anniversaries for April 26

• 1607 – English colonists of the Jamestown Settlement (recreation pictured) make landfall at Cape Henry, Virginia.
• 1865 – Union cavalry troopers corner and shoot dead John Wilkes Booth, President Lincoln's assassin, in Virginia.
• 1865 – Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston surrenders his army to General William Tecumseh Sherman at the Bennett Place near Durham, North Carolina.
• 1956 – The first container ship leaves Port Newark, New Jersey for Houston, Texas.
• 1991 – Seventy tornadoes break out in the central United States. Before its end, Andover, Kansas would be devastated by the year's only F5 tornado.

Selected cuisines, dishes and foods -

Shrimp tostadas made with locally grown ingredients as served at Tacos Sinaloa in Berkeley, California

The cuisine of California reflects the diverse culture of California and is influenced largely by European American, Hispanic American (Mexican, Latin American, Spanish), East Asian and Oceanian influences (Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Filipino, Vietnamese, Thai, Hawaiian), and Western European influences (Italian, French, Portuguese), as well as the food trends and traditions of larger American cuisine. (Full article...)

Selected panorama -

Salt Lake City

Panorama of Salt Lake City, Utah

More did you know? -

• ... that Tower Optical coin-operated binoculars (pictured) can hold up to 2,000 US quarters and have kept their same distinctive look since first manufactured in 1932?
• ... that Bayne-Fowle House, a National Register of Historic Places registered property located at 811 Prince Street in Alexandra, Virginia, United States, served as a military hospital in 1864?
• ... that Arizona SB1070, the state's new immigration enforcement law, has attracted national attention as the broadest and strictest anti-illegal immigration measure in decades within the United States?

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