Hours of research by our editors, distilled into minutes of clarity.
The Great Plains Shelterbelt—also called the "Prairie States Forestry Project"—was a complex tree-planting project in the central United States during the 1930s. The project aimed to fight the devastating soil erosion and dust storms of the Dust Bowl by creating long "walls" of trees across the Great Plains.
How did a raccoon intended for the Thanksgiving dinner table end up a beloved presidential pet? History teacher Sharon McMahon’s podcast "Here’s Where It Gets Interesting" takes an episode to delve into some of the more unusual Thanksgivings at the White House, including the Great Cranberry Scare of 1959 and the story of Calvin Coolidge and his "first raccoon," Rebecca.
This interactive documentary explores the Stonewall Riots, a five-day-long series of protests by the LGBTQ community against discriminatory police practices. On June 28, 1969, New York City police raided the Stonewall Inn, a mafia-owned bar that had become a haven for a queer community long subjected to oppressive prejudice. Police attempted to arrest patrons and shut down the bar when the community fought back, starting what one newspaper at the time called "the first gay riots in history" and sowing the seeds for the modern gay rights movement.
One US presidential election quirk is that it’s possible for the winning candidate to be the one who wins the least number of nationwide votes. This History Channel overview explains why that’s the case—because of the Electoral College system—and details the five times in US history it's happened (through the 2020 presidential election).
The capital city of the United States famously was built in a swampy area, with dozens of memorials, monuments, and more spanning its vast and complex design. This video explores five monuments that were either built or were rejected as alternatives in the sprawling District of Columbia on the banks of the Potomac River.
For centuries, the Great Lakes have provided vital access to the Midwest from the Atlantic Ocean, allowing the establishment of key trading outposts and ultimately the growth of major cities in the region. An estimated 6,000 vessels were lost on the Great Lakes with approximately 1,500 of these ships located in Michigan waters. Explore the deadly legacy of the region with resources pulled together by the Michigan History Center.
After the massive devastation and scorched earth wartime methods of the Civil War, the US entered its Reconstruction era. Listen to this podcast to learn what that entailed and who was affected.
Generations of American civil rights leaders have drawn on the language of the Declaration of Independence to push for expanded rights—and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was no exception. This article from the Museum of the American Revolution explores how King used the founding ideals of the Revolution to spotlight the ongoing fight for equality in America.
The IRS arrested top mob bosses during Prohibition after the Supreme Court ruled illegally-made income could be taxed. The IRS’s biggest catch was Al Capone, who was charged with tax evasion and sentenced to 11 years in prison. But Capone wasn’t the only bootlegger the IRS nabbed for tax evasion during this era. This resource details an interesting moment in the IRS’s history.
Today, you can see the original United States Constitution, Declaration of Independence, and more at the National Archives in Washington, DC. For the first 150 years of their existence, these docs dwelled elsewhere, managed for a long time by the State Department, and then moved for a few decades to the Library of Congress. Learn the story of how preservationists advocated to have an exhibit built into the new National Archives building in the 1930s to showcase these docs, and how it became one of the most popular sites in the capital.
Pay transparency laws in the US are evolving quickly, as some states introduce them for the first time and others update existing legislation. This resource has an updated list of key pay transparency legislation in states across the country, as well as general explainers about what each of those laws dictate. Check it out here.
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