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History / Biography

John Glenn by Henry C. Caselli, Jr., 1998 is in the collections of the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery.

Why John Glenn Couldn’t Escape the Hero Label

A new book explores the man who would serve his country as a fighter pilot, an astronaut and a U.S. Senator

An engraving of James A. Garfield's assassination, published in Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper

The Garfield Assassination Altered American History, But Is Woefully Forgotten Today

A newly installed historical marker recognizes the site where Charles Guiteau shot the president in 1881

Roberto Clemente made the National League All-Star team 11 times in his 18 seasons.

Roberto Clemente: The King of Béisbol

The sports superstar and humanitarian transcended baseball’s borders

The first volume of the delightful children's series by author Michael Bond appeared on October 13, 1958.

The Much-Loved Paddington Bear Turns Sixty

Celebrating the October 1958 publication of A Bear Called Paddington, Smithsonian Libraries takes a look at several pop-up books

Ben Kingsley stars as Adolf Eichmann in Operation Finale

Based on a True Story

The True Story of “Operation Finale”

Director Chris Weitz explores the 1960 hunt for Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann in the new feature film

P.D. East (above as a young man) proclaimed that his Petal Paper was “a sheet designed to keep everyone happy.” That did not last.

Secrets of American History

What Made P.D. East the Fearless Wit of Forrest County

The newspaper man’s bravery rocked the racist establishment of the South—and heralded a new era of political satire

An American flag sits atop a gravestone in the cemetery of Oak Mountain Baptist Church in Shelby County, Alabama.

Secrets of American History

The Wild Road Trip That Launched the Populist Conservative Movement

How a fiery preacher and a maverick Army general took the nation by storm

The couch on which Freud’s patients lay became identified with psychoanalysis itself. He shipped it to London when he left Vienna.

Secrets of American History

What Drove Sigmund Freud to Write a Scandalous Biography of Woodrow Wilson?

The founder of psychoanalysis collaborated with a junior American diplomat to lambaste the former president

Robert Smalls, memorialized in a bust at Beaufort’s Tabernacle Baptist Church, was sent to work in Charleston at age 12 after he started defying the strictures of slavery.

Secrets of American History

Terrorized African-Americans Found Their Champion in Civil War Hero Robert Smalls

The formerly enslaved South Carolinian declared that whites had killed 53,000 African-Americans, but few took the explosive claim seriously—until now

Ad Astra per Astra by America Meredith

The Innovative Spirit fy17

Meet the Little-Known Math Genius Who Helped America Reach the Stars

It’s time for Mary Golda Ross to be remembered as an aerospace pioneer

Early 20th century poster of magician Howard Thurston's spirit box illusion

Howard Thurston, the Magician Who Disappeared

Overshadowed by more famous contemporaries, the visionary behind “The Wonder Show of the Universe” left a far-reaching legacy

Luisa Moreno, born to a wealthy Guatemalan family, struck out on her own at a young age, eager to alter the world around her for the better.

Guatemalan Immigrant Luisa Moreno Was Expelled From the U.S. for Her Groundbreaking Labor Activism

The little-known story of an early champion of workers’ rights receives new recognition

The image on the left is a wood engraving that was likely commissioned by a popular magazine hostile to abolitionism and happy to render Angelina strangely distorted. This is the first time that it has been published next to the photo on the right, on which it was based and which was likely taken in the 1840s.

The South Carolina Aristocrat Who Became a Feminist Abolitionist

After moving to Philadelphia and joining the Quakers, Angelina Grimké rededicated her life to fighting for racial equality

The Epic Quest to Ride the World’s Biggest Wave

Welcome to the new Mt. Everest of surfing, a notoriously dangerous break off the coast of Portugal

In the foreground stand foundation remnants of a house where soldiers once searched for Jews. The family hid refugees in a secret compartment constructed between the interior walls.

The Dispossessed

This French Town Has Welcomed Refugees for 400 Years

For centuries, the people of the mountain village of Chambon-sur-Lignon have opened their arms to the world’s displaced

Standing Rock #2: Oil-pipeline protester Mychal Thompson in North Dakota, in November 2016. Her quote, in Navajo, reads, “To be of the people means you must have reverence and love for all of the resources and all of the beauties of this world.”

The Dispossessed

Pushed to the Margins, These Brave People Are Pushing Back

From the American West to the Middle East, the powerless face stark choices when confronted by the powerful

The Russian Imperial Family on the steps of the Catherine Palace

Russian Revolution

A Century Ago, the Romanovs Met a Gruesome End

Helen Rappaport’s new book investigates if the family could have been saved

Debs campaigning for the presidency before a freight-yard audience in 1912.

World War I: 100 Years Later

When America’s Most Prominent Socialist Was Jailed for Speaking Out Against World War I

After winning 6 percent of the vote in the 1912 presidential election, Eugene Debs ran afoul of the nation’s new anti-sedition laws

Monticello's main house and South Wing

Putting Enslaved Families’ Stories Back in the Monticello Narrative

An oral history project deepens our understanding of U.S. history by sharing accounts of the community owned by Thomas Jefferson

John Mackay made a fortune in the mining industry.

The Mining Millionaire Americans Couldn’t Help But Love

Unlike the other one-percenters of his age, John Mackay gained his countrymen’s admiration. But in an ironic twist, it means he’s little known today

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