September 23, 1806: The Lewis & Clark Expedition Returns to St. Louis
One of the watershed events in American history was the famed Lewis & Clark Expedition, a 2+ year exploration of the western territories acquired by the United States from France under the terms...
Remembering Admiral Francois Joseph Paul de Grasse: Hero of the American Revolution
We’ve written about the famous “Battle of the Chesapeake” that took place on September 5, 1781, in which a French fleet defeated a smaller British fleet in a fierce sea battle that took place...
Remembering Euthanasia Sherman Meade, Frontier Physician and Niece of Civil War General William Tecumseh Sherman
When we think of courageous women of the 19th century, among the top ten would be Clara Barton, the Civil War-era nurse who served on the battlefields of the “war between the States,” and who...
September 7, 1857: The Mountain Meadows Massacre Takes Place, A Black Mark on the History of the American West
The history of the American West is replete with stories of atrocities committed by Native-Americans against white settlers, and vice-versa. There is no escaping that our U.S. government failed to...
September 5, 1781: The French Navy Defeats the British Navy in the Battle of the Chesapeake, Setting Up the American Victory at Yorktown
Most Americans know that the battle that effectively ended the American Revolution was the Battle of Yorktown, pitting British General Cornwallis against General George Washington and his French...
August 1876: Thomas Edison Receives the First Patent for “Automatic Printing,” the Precursor of the Mimeograph, and the Business World is Transformed
This month we commemorate the 150th anniversary of Thomas Edison’s invention of an “automatic pen,” which historians credit as the first step toward the invention of the mimeograph machine....
Wingfield’s War Reshapes Nevada Mining Industry, Following Labor Strife at the Goldfield Mines
Founded in 1902, the town of Goldfield, Nevada experienced a meteoric rise over the next five years to become a center of the mining industry In the United States. By the winter of 1907, Goldfield...
Collis P. Huntington: One of the Big Four” Tycoons of the Western Railroad Industry
Collis P. Huntington was an important American businessman and railroad leader during the 1800s – one of the “Big Four” tycoons of the western railroad industry. He was born in 1821 in...
The Proclamation to the People of the Territory of Arizona: August 1, 1861
After the expansion of the New Mexico Territory in 1853, the fate of the nearby Arizona Territory was in question. In 1856, a petition was presented to the U.S. Congress requesting organization of...
July 21, 1620: The Pilgrims Leave Leiden to Start Their Journey to North America
Most Americans know that the first Pilgrims came to North America in 1620 on the Mayflower. But how did the Pilgrims come to be on the Mayflower in the first place, and where did they come from? The...