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History / U.S. History

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Document Deep Dive

John Smith Coined the Term New England on This 1616 Map

After Jamestown, Smith pushed the English to settle the northeast, identifying Plymouth as a suitable harbor four years before the Pilgrims landed there

The Horrific Sand Creek Massacre Will Be Forgotten No More

The opening of a national historic site in Colorado helps restore to public memory one of the worst atrocities ever perpetrated on Native Americans

From the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Udvar-Hazy Center

Why the SR-71 Blackbird is the Epitome of Cold War Spycraft

The sleek and shadowy plane still commands awe 50 years after its first test flight

As Prohibition shut bars, an ad touted the family’s coffeehouse as a place to linger.

The Roosevelt Family Built a New York Coffee Chain 50 Years Before Starbucks

Teddy Roosevelt’s children brought fresh-roasted beans and European coffeehouse culture to Manhattan

Middle-class families scooped up affordable and speedy Model Ts. As they began to race through the streets, they ran headlong into pedestrians—with lethal results.

When Pedestrians Ruled the Streets

The driverless car may take a while to catch on—just as the automobile did a century ago

After Bing Cros­by turned down “Rudolph,” Gene Autry’s recording became an all-time best seller.

It Could Have Been Reginald the Red-Nosed Reindeer

Inside the very shiny life of a marketing gimmick from 1939

The Oswald family—with Marguerite Oswald second from right—sit next to Lee Harvey Oswald's casket.

When Lee Harvey Oswald Shot the President, His Mother Tried to Take Center Stage

Marguerite Oswald had a series of bizarre reactions to her son’s transgression, forever making her a famous mother to history

National Museum of Natural History physical anthropologists Lucille St. Hoyme, J. Lawrence Angel and Thomas Dale Stewart hold Hans Langseth's beard upon its arrival to the Smithsonian in 1967.

The World’s Longest Beard Is One Of The Smithsonian’s Strangest Artifacts

Kept in storage at the National Museum of Natural History, the world’s longest beard measures over 17 feet in length

Vice President Al Gore, with President George Bush and Vice President Richard Cheney

How the Office of the Vice Presidency Evolved from Nothing to Something

Vice President John Adams once said “In this I am nothing, But I may be everything.” A new book tells how the office has moved from irrelevance to power

An illustration from Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper that depicts soldiers raiding an illegal distillery in Brooklyn in 1869.

The Whiskey Wars That Left Brooklyn in Ruins

Unwilling to pay their taxes, distillers in New York City faced an army willing to go to the extreme to enforce the law

John Chapman, known as Johnny Appleseed, planted orchards across the frontier.

The Real Johnny Appleseed Brought Apples—and Booze—to the American Frontier

The apples John Chapman brought to the frontier were very different than today’s apples—and they weren’t meant to be eaten

Oakland police use Mace during Oakland's "Stop the Draft Week" October 16, 1967, the largest anti-Vietnam war protest in the San Francisco bay area to that date, in downtown Oakland.

The Forgotten History of Mace, Designed by a 29-Year-Old and Reinvented as a Police Weapon

When riots shook America, mace became a tool of crowd control instead of private protection

Wide Awake Republican political club from 1860, comprised of young men who dressed in uniforms and marched at night by torchlight for Lincoln.

Whigs Swigged Cider and Other Voter Indicators of the Past

Throughout most of American history, what someone wore indicated their political affiliations as loudly as a Prius or a Hummer might today

The installation, "A Room of Her Own: An Altar for My Mother," is on view through January 2015.

Halloween

An Awe-Inspiring Altar Remembers One Latino Artist’s Guiding Spirit

At the American History Museum, an installation reimagines the life story of a Latina artist and writer

A yellow fever epidemic may have planted the seeds of inspiration for Washington Irving's iconic tale of the a headless horseman.

Halloween

What “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” Tells Us About Contagion, Fear and Epidemics

Washington Irving fled New York because of a yellow fever epidemic. Twenty-two years later, his classic story spoke to the chaos of his youth

Dr. Linda Hazzard’s Washington State Penitentiary mug shots.

The Doctor Who Starved Her Patients to Death

Linda Hazzard killed as many as a dozen people in the early 20th century, and they paid willingly for it

The trope of the beautiful witch was popular between 1905 and 1915.

Halloween

Women of the Early 1900s Rallied Behind Beautiful, Wartless Witches

Women looking to work, vote and marry whomever they wanted turned the Halloween icon into a powerful symbol

One of the greatest inland waterways disasters in the history of the United States took place in the Chicago River, Chicago, Ill., July 24, 1915, when the steamship Eastland capsized with a loss of near 850 lives. The photo shows the ill-fated ship after it had turned "turtle."

The Eastland Disaster Killed More Passengers Than the Titanic and the Lusitania. Why Has It Been Forgotten?

Chicago’s working poor were expecting a day in luxury. They instead faced a horrific calamity on Lake Michigan

2014 Ingenuity Awards

Coming to Terms With One of America’s Greatest Natural Disasters

Documentary filmmaker Bill Morrison plunges us into the Great Flood of 1927

The History of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, 50 Years After Its Construction

Built in 1964, the span still stands as Americas’ largest suspension bridge

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