Portal:United States

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Parent Portals: Geography / North America / United States

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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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  The Liberty Bell outside Independence Hall in Philadelphia in April 2017

  
  The Liberty Bell, previously called the State House Bell or Old State House Bell, is an iconic symbol of American independence located in Philadelphia. Originally placed in the steeple of Pennsylvania State House, now known as Independence Hall, the Liberty Bell today is located across the street from Independence Hall in the Liberty Bell Center in Independence National Historical Park.
  
  The bell was commissioned in 1752 by the Pennsylvania Provincial Assembly from the London-based firm Lester and Pack, later renamed the Whitechapel Bell Foundry, and was cast with the lettering "Proclaim LIBERTY Throughout all the Land unto all the Inhabitants Thereof", a Biblical reference from the Book of Leviticus (25:10). The bell first cracked when rung after its arrival in Philadelphia, and was twice recast by local workmen John Pass and John Stow, whose surnames appear on the bell. In its early years, the bell was used to summon lawmakers to legislative sessions and to alert citizens to public meetings and proclamations. (Full article...)
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  Lawrence in 2016

  
  Jennifer Shrader Lawrence (born August 15, 1990) is an American actress and producer. She is known for starring in both action film franchises and independent dramas, and her films have grossed over $6 billion worldwide. The world's highest-paid actress in 2015 and 2016, she appeared in Time's 100 most influential people in the world list in 2013 and the Forbes Celebrity 100 list from 2013 to 2016.
  
  Lawrence began her career as a teenager with guest roles on television. Her first major role was as a main cast member on the sitcom The Bill Engvall Show (2007–2009). She made her film debut with a supporting role in the drama Garden Party (2008) and had her breakthrough playing a poverty-stricken teenager in the independent film Winter's Bone (2010). Lawrence gained stardom portraying the mutant Mystique in the X-Men film series (2011–2019) and Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games film series (2012–2015). The latter made her the highest-grossing action heroine. (Full article...)
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  1875 illustration of the engagement by William Bainbridge Hoff

  
  The action of 1 January 1800 was fought in the Gulf of Gonâve during the Quasi-War between the United States and France. A force of 14 armed barges from the French colony of Saint-Domingue unsuccessfully attacked a convoy of four American merchantmen escorted by the United States Navy schooner USS Experiment under Lieutenant William Maley. André Rigaud, a Black general in Saint-Domingue who became embroiled in the War of the South against his rival Toussaint Louverture in June 1799, had ordered his forces to attack all foreign shipping within their range of operations. At the same time, the U.S. had been involved in an undeclared naval war with France since July 1798, resulting in American merchant convoys being escorted by warships to protect them from attacks by French ships.
  
  Once the American convoy neared the gulf, Rigaud's barges attacked it under heavy fire, being repeatedly driven off. Two U.S. merchantmen, Daniel and Mary and Washington, drifted away from the convoy and were abandoned before being captured. Experiment managed to prevent the other two merchantmen of the convoy, Mary and Sea Flower, from being captured and escorted them to a friendly port. On the American side, the captain of Mary was killed and a civilian and Lieutenant David Porter were injured, while Rigaud's forces lost three barges and suffered heavy casualties. Despite their significant losses during the engagement, ships under Rigaud's command continued to attack American merchant shipping in the region, with such attacks only ceasing after Louverture's army defeated Rigaud and forced him to go into exile in France by July 1800. (Full article...)
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  Leelah Alcorn (November 15, 1997 – December 28, 2014) was an American transgender girl whose suicide attracted international attention. Prior to her death, she had posted a suicide note to her Tumblr blog about societal standards affecting transgender people and expressing the hope that her death would create a dialogue about discrimination, abuse, and lack of support for transgender people.
  
  Born and raised in Kings Mills, Ohio, Alcorn was assigned male at birth and grew up in a family affiliated with the Churches of Christ movement. At age 14, she came out as transgender to her parents, Carla and Doug Alcorn, who refused to accept her female gender identity. When she was 16, they denied her request to undergo transition treatment, instead sending her to Christian-based conversion therapy with the intention of convincing her to reject her gender identity and accept the sex that she was assigned at birth. After she revealed her attraction toward males to her classmates, her parents removed her from school and revoked her access to social media. In her suicide note, Alcorn cited loneliness and alienation as key reasons for her decision to end her life and blamed her parents for causing these feelings. (Full article...)
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  The Eisenhower dollar, with the double date 1776–1976

  
  The United States Bicentennial coinage is a set of circulating commemorative coins, consisting of a quarter, half dollar and dollar struck by the United States Mint in 1975 and 1976. Regardless of when struck, each coin bears the double date 1776–1976 on the normal obverses for the Washington quarter, Kennedy half dollar and Eisenhower dollar. No coins dated 1975 of any of the three denominations were minted.
  
  Given past abuses in the system, the Mint advocated against the issuance of commemorative coins starting in the 1950s. Beginning in 1971, members of Congress introduced bills to authorize coins to honor the United States Bicentennial, which would occur in 1976. The Mint, through its director, Mary Brooks, initially opposed such proposals, but later supported them, and Congress passed legislation requiring the temporary redesign of the reverse of the quarter, half dollar and dollar. (Full article...)
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  Marines take cover behind an M4 Sherman tank while clearing Japanese forces in northern Saipan, 8 July 1944.

  
  The Battle of Saipan was an amphibious assault launched by the United States against the Empire of Japan during the Pacific campaign of World War II between 15 June and 9 July 1944. The initial invasion triggered the Battle of the Philippine Sea, which effectively destroyed Japanese carrier-based airpower, and the battle resulted in the American capture of the island. Its occupation put the major cities of the Japanese home islands within the range of B-29 bombers, making them vulnerable to strategic bombing by the United States Army Air Forces. It also precipitated the resignation of Hideki Tōjō, the prime minister of Japan.
  
  Saipan was the first objective in Operation Forager, the campaign to occupy the Mariana Islands that got underway at the same time the Allies were invading France in Operation Overlord. After a two-day naval bombardment, the U.S. 2nd Marine Division, 4th Marine Division, and the Army's 27th Infantry Division, commanded by Lieutenant General Holland Smith, landed on the island and defeated the 43rd Infantry Division of the Imperial Japanese Army, commanded by Lieutenant General Yoshitsugu Saitō. Organized resistance ended when at least 3,000 Japanese soldiers died in a mass gyokusai attack, and afterward about 1,000 civilians committed suicide. (Full article...)
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  United States Marine Corps General Victor Krulak

  
  The Krulak–Mendenhall mission was a fact-finding expedition dispatched by the Kennedy administration to South Vietnam in early September 1963. The stated purpose of the expedition was to investigate the progress of the war by the South Vietnamese regime and its US military advisers against the Viet Cong insurgency. The mission was led by Victor Krulak and Joseph Mendenhall. Krulak was a major general in the United States Marine Corps, while Mendenhall was a senior Foreign Service Officer experienced in dealing with Vietnamese affairs. Civil unrest gripped South Vietnam as Buddhist demonstrations against the religious discrimination of President Ngô Đình Diệm's Catholic regime escalated. Following the raids on Buddhist pagodas on August 21 that left a death toll ranging up to a few hundred, the US had authorized investigations into a possible coup through a cable to US Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.
  
  The four-day whirlwind trip was launched on September 6, 1963, the same day as a National Security Council (NSC) meeting, and came in the wake of increasingly strained relations between the United States and South Vietnam. In their submissions to the NSC, Krulak presented an optimistic report on the progress of the war, while Mendenhall presented a bleak picture of military failure and public discontent. Krulak disregarded the popular support for the Viet Cong, feeling that the Vietnamese soldiers' efforts in the field would not be affected by the public's unease with Diệm's policies. Mendenhall focused on gauging the sentiment of urban Vietnamese and concluded that Diệm's policies increased the possibility of religious civil war, and were causing the South Vietnamese to believe that life under the Viet Cong would improve the quality of their lives. The divergent reports led US President John F. Kennedy to ask his two advisers "You two did visit the same country, didn't you?" (Full article...)
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  The U.S. Navy ferries troops across the Rhine at Oberwesel.

  
  American logistics in the Western Allied invasion of Germany supported the American and French operations in Northwest Europe during the Second World War from 26 January 1945 until the end of World War II in Europe on 8 May 1945.
  
  By the end of January 1945, the American forces had recovered from the disruption to the supply system and the large losses of materiel inflicted by the German offensives in the Ardennes and Alsace. Sixty-eight ships loaded with replacement ordnance were dispatched from the United States. Casualties were harder to replace, and about 49,000 men were transferred from service units to the infantry branch. The Allied forces had to advance across the Rhineland, which was in the grip of thaws, rains and floods. They were then confronted by the Rhine, the most formidable barrier to the Allied advance since the English Channel. The river was crossed and bridged, and railways and pipelines were run across it. Most supplies were delivered by rail, and five railway bridges over the Rhine supported the final American advance into the heart of Germany. (Full article...)
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  Keenan performing with A Perfect Circle in 2018

  
  Maynard James Keenan (born James Herbert Keenan; April 17, 1964) is an American singer, songwriter, philanthropist, record producer, and winemaker. He is best known as the singer and primary lyricist of the rock bands Tool, A Perfect Circle, and Puscifer.
  
  Having grown up in Ohio and Michigan, Keenan joined the U.S. Army after graduating from high school. After his service, he attended the Kendall College of Art and Design in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He relocated to Los Angeles in 1988 to pursue a career in interior design and set construction, and formed Tool with Adam Jones shortly thereafter. (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 Enterprise maneuvering radically under aerial attack and afire on 24 August 1942. Anti-aircraft shell bursts are visible above the carrier.

  
  The naval Battle of the Eastern Solomons (also known as the Battle of the Stewart Islands and in Japanese sources as the Second Battle of the Solomon Sea) took place on 24–25 August 1942 and was the third carrier battle of the Pacific campaign of World War II and the second major engagement fought between the United States Navy and the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) during the Guadalcanal campaign. As at the Battle of the Coral Sea and the Battle of Midway, the ships of the two adversaries were never within sight of each other. Instead, all attacks were carried out by carrier-based or land-based aircraft.
  
  After several damaging air attacks, the naval surface combatants from both America and Japan withdrew from the battle area. Although neither side secured a clear victory, the U.S. and its allies gained a tactical and strategic advantage. Japan's losses were greater and included dozens of aircraft and their experienced aircrews. Also, Japanese reinforcements intended for Guadalcanal were delayed and eventually delivered by warships rather than transport ships, giving the Allies more time to prepare for the Japanese counteroffensive and preventing the Japanese from landing heavy artillery, ammunition, and other supplies. (Full article...)
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  The Elgin, Illinois, Centennial half dollar was a fifty-cent commemorative coin issued by the United States Bureau of the Mint in 1936, part of the wave of commemoratives authorized by Congress and struck that year. Intended to commemorate the centennial of the founding of Elgin, the piece was designed by local sculptor Trygve Rovelstad. The obverse depicts an idealized head of a pioneer man. The reverse shows a grouping of pioneers, and is based upon a sculptural group that Rovelstad hoped to build as a memorial to those who settled Illinois, but which was not erected in his lifetime.
  
  Rovelstad had heard of other efforts to gain authorization for commemorative coins, which were sold by the Mint to a designated group at face value and then retailed to the public at a premium. In 1935, through his congressman, he had legislation introduced into the House of Representatives for a commemorative coin in honor of Elgin's centennial that year. Rovelstad hoped that the proposed coin would both depict and be a source of funds for his memorial to the pioneers. Texas coin dealer L.W. Hoffecker heard of the effort and contacted Rovelstad to offer his assistance—Hoffecker had been a force behind the Old Spanish Trail half dollar, issued in 1935 and distributed by him. (Full article...)
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  The Shield nickel was the first United States five-cent piece to be made out of copper-nickel, the same alloy of which American nickels are struck today. Designed by James B. Longacre, the coin was issued from 1866 until 1883, when it was replaced by the Liberty Head nickel. The coin takes its name from the motif on its obverse, and was the first five-cent coin referred to as a "nickel"—silver pieces of that denomination had been known as half dimes.
  
  Silver half dimes had been struck from the early days of the United States Mint in the late 18th century. Those disappeared from circulation, along with most other coins, in the economic turmoil of the Civil War. In 1864, the Mint successfully introduced low-denomination coins, whose intrinsic worth did not approach their face value. Industrialist Joseph Wharton advocated coins containing nickel—a metal in which he had significant financial interests. When the Mint proposed a copper-nickel five-cent piece, Congress required that the coin be heavier than the Mint had suggested, allowing Wharton to sell more of the metal to the government. (Full article...)
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  Operation PBFortune, also known as Operation Fortune, was a covert United States operation to overthrow the democratically elected Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz in 1952. The operation was authorized by U.S. President Harry Truman and planned by the Central Intelligence Agency. The United Fruit Company had lobbied intensively for the overthrow because land reform initiated by Árbenz threatened its economic interests. The US also feared that the government of Árbenz was being influenced by communists.
  
  The coup attempt was planned with the support of the United Fruit Company and of Anastasio Somoza García, Rafael Trujillo and Marcos Pérez Jiménez, the US-backed right-wing dictators of Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, and Venezuela respectively, who felt threatened by the democratic Guatemalan Revolution, and had sought to undermine it. The plan involved providing weapons to the exiled Guatemalan military officer Carlos Castillo Armas, who was to lead an invasion from Nicaragua. (Full article...)
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  Aftermath of the bombing

  
  The Oklahoma City bombing was a domestic terrorist truck bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, United States, on April 19, 1995. The bombing remains the deadliest act of domestic terrorism in U.S. history. Perpetrated by anti-government extremists Timothy McVeigh, the mastermind, and accomplice Terry Nichols, the bombing at 9:02 a.m. killed 168 people, injured 684, and destroyed more than a third of the building, which had to be demolished. The blast destroyed or damaged 324 other buildings and caused an estimated $652 million worth of damage. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) activated 11 of its Urban Search and Rescue Task Forces, consisting of 665 rescue workers. A rescue worker was killed by being struck on the head by falling debris after the bombing.
  
  Within 90 minutes of the explosion, McVeigh was stopped by Oklahoma Highway Patrolman Charlie Hanger for driving without a license plate and arrested for illegal weapons possession. Forensic evidence quickly linked McVeigh and Nichols to the attack; Nichols was arrested, and within days, both were charged. Michael and Lori Fortier were later identified as accomplices. McVeigh, a veteran of the Gulf War and a sympathizer with the U.S. militia movement, had detonated a Ryder rental truck full of explosives he parked in front of the building. Nichols had assisted with the bomb's preparation. Motivated by his dislike for the U.S. federal government and its handling of Ruby Ridge in 1992 and the Waco siege in 1993, McVeigh timed his attack to coincide with the second anniversary of the fire that ended the siege in Waco as well as the Battles of Lexington and Concord, the first engagements of the American Revolution. (Full article...)
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  Stone in 2024

  
  Emily Jean Stone (born November 6, 1988) is an American actress and film producer. Her accolades include two Academy Awards, two British Academy Film Awards, and two Golden Globe Awards. In 2017, she was the world's highest-paid actress and named by Time magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the world.
  
  Stone began acting as a child in a theater production of The Wind in the Willows in 2000. As a teenager, she relocated to Los Angeles and made her television debut in In Search of the New Partridge Family (2004), a reality show that produced only an unsold pilot. After small television roles, she appeared in a series of well-received teen comedy films, such as Superbad (2007), Zombieland (2009), and Easy A (2010), which was Stone's first leading role. Following this breakthrough, she starred in the romantic comedy Crazy, Stupid, Love (2011) and the period drama The Help (2011), and gained wider recognition as Gwen Stacy in the 2012 superhero film The Amazing Spider-Man and its 2014 sequel. (Full article...)
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  Head over Heels is an American television sitcom created by Jeff Franklin that aired on United Paramount Network (UPN) from August 26 to October 28, 1997. It is set in the eponymous video dating agency based in Miami Beach, Florida, run by brothers Jack and Warren Baldwin (played by Peter Dobson and Mitchell Whitfield, respectively). The remainder of the cast consists of their employees, played by Eva LaRue, Patrick Bristow, and Cindy Ambuehl. Connie Stevens was initially cast as the Baldwins' mother, but never appeared in the show after the pilot was rewritten. Andrew Gottlieb was a co-producer, and Vince Cheung and Ben Montanio were consulting producers.
  
  The sitcom was the lowest-performing series tracked by Nielsen Holdings for the 1997–1998 television season. Since UPN primarily marketed its programming to African American audiences, critics questioned the show's lack of a black main character. With its inclusion of Ian, Head over Heels was one of 30 U.S. programs to feature a gay, lesbian or bisexual character that television season. It received a negative response from commentators, who criticized its sex comedy and characters. (Full article...)
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  Portrait c. 1891

  
  William Dempster Hoard (October 10, 1836 – November 22, 1918) was an American politician, newspaper publisher, and agriculture advocate who was the 16th governor of Wisconsin from 1889 to 1891. Called the "father of modern dairying", Hoard's advocacy for scientific agriculture and the expansion of dairy farming has been credited with changing Wisconsin's agricultural economy. He promoted the use of silos and alfalfa for cattle feed, testing for bovine tuberculosis, and raising particular breeds of cattle for milk or meat in his magazine Hoard's Dairyman. His work with the Wisconsin Dairymen's Association led to the export of Wisconsin dairy products to the East Coast, and they earned national renown.
  
  As editor of his newspaper, the Jefferson County Union, Hoard defied trends of the time for small newspapers by expanding the coverage area of the paper and including a strongly voiced editorial page, which he used to advocate for improved farming practices and dairy farming. As governor of Wisconsin, Hoard established the Dairy and Food Commission—one of the first food inspection agencies in the United States—and signed a controversial, short-lived compulsory education law that required all students in the state to be taught in English as part of the Americanization process for immigrants. (Full article...)
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  The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr., often referred to as just Brisco or Brisco County, is an American weird western television series created by Jeffrey Boam and Carlton Cuse. It ran for 27 episodes on Fox from August 27, 1993 to May 20, 1994. Set in the American West of 1893, the series follows its title character, a Harvard-educated lawyer-turned-bounty hunter hired by a group of wealthy industrialists to track and capture outlaw John Bly and his gang. Bruce Campbell plays Brisco, who is joined by a colorful group of supporting characters, including Julius Carry as fellow bounty hunter Lord Bowler and Christian Clemenson as stick-in-the-mud lawyer Socrates Poole.
  
  While ostensibly a Western, the series routinely includes elements of the science fiction and steampunk genres. Humor is a large part of the show; the writers attempted to keep the jokes and situations "just under over-the-top". A large number of episodes involve the Orb, a powerful device from the future. John Astin plays Professor Wickwire, an inventor who assists Brisco with anachronistic technology including diving suits, motorcycles, rockets, and airships. The search for new technology and progressive ideas, what the writers of the show called "The Coming Thing", is a central theme throughout the series. (Full article...)
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  Landmarks in the vicinity of Vicksburg, Mississippi, from a river map published in 1863, showing Duckport and New Carthage

  
  The Duckport Canal was an unsuccessful military venture by Union forces during the Vicksburg campaign of the American Civil War. Ordered built in late March 1863 by Major General Ulysses S. Grant, the canal stretched from the Mississippi River near Duckport, Louisiana, to New Carthage, Louisiana, and utilized a series of swampy bayous for much of its path. It was intended to provide a water-based supply route for a southward movement against the Confederate-held city of Vicksburg, Mississippi, as high water levels made overland travel difficult. Manual digging was provided by 3,500 soldiers from Grant's army and was finished on April 12. The next day, the levee separating the canal cut and the Mississippi River was breached, and water flowed into the canal. Trees that had grown up in the bayous and falling water levels that reached as shallow as 6 inches (15 cm) at one point hampered the use of the canal, and the project was abandoned on May 4. Grant moved men and supplies through the overland route, which had been made more accessible by the same falling water levels that doomed the canal. After some inland maneuvering and a lengthy siege, Vicksburg surrendered on July 4, marking a significant turning point in the war. (Full article...)
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  Neutral Milk Hotel performing in 2014

  
  Neutral Milk Hotel was an American band formed by Jeff Mangum in Ruston, Louisiana, in 1989. They were active until 1998, and then from 2013 to 2015. The band's music featured a deliberately low-quality sound, influenced by indie rock and psychedelic folk. Mangum wrote surreal and opaque lyrics that covered a wide range of topics, including love, spirituality, nostalgia, sex, and loneliness. He and the other band members played a variety of instruments, including non-traditional instruments like the singing saw and uilleann pipes.
  
  Neutral Milk Hotel began as one of Mangum's home recording projects. After graduating high school, Mangum lived as a vagabond and sporadically released music. In 1996, he worked with childhood friend Robert Schneider to record the album On Avery Island, which received modest reviews and sold around 5,000 copies. Mangum recruited musicians Julian Koster, Jeremy Barnes, and Scott Spillane for the band's second album, In the Aeroplane Over the Sea. Its 1998 release received mostly positive, but not laudatory reviews. (Full article...)
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  HMS Endeavour off the coast of New Holland
  by Samuel Atkins

  
  HMS Endeavour was a British Royal Navy research vessel that Lieutenant James Cook commanded to Tahiti, New Zealand and Australia on his first voyage of discovery from 1768 to 1771.
  
  She was launched in 1764 as the collier Earl of Pembroke, with the Navy purchasing her in 1768 for a scientific mission to the Pacific Ocean and to explore the seas for the surmised Terra Australis Incognita or "unknown southern land". Commissioned as His Majesty's Bark Endeavour, she departed Plymouth in August 1768, rounded Cape Horn and reached Tahiti in time to observe the 1769 transit of Venus across the Sun. She then set sail into the largely uncharted ocean to the south, stopping at the islands of Huahine, Bora Bora, and Raiatea west of Tahiti to allow Cook to claim them for Great Britain. In September 1769, she anchored off New Zealand, becoming the first European vessel to reach the islands since Abel Tasman's Heemskerck 127 years earlier. (Full article...)
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  Gaga at the inauguration of Joe Biden, 2021

  
  Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta (born March 28, 1986), known professionally as Lady Gaga, is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. Known for her image reinventions and versatility across the entertainment industry, she is an influential figure in popular music.
  
  After signing with Interscope Records in 2007, Gaga achieved global recognition with her debut album, The Fame (2008), and its reissue The Fame Monster (2009). The project scored a string of successful singles, including "Just Dance", "Poker Face", "Bad Romance", "Telephone", and "Alejandro". Her second full-length album, Born This Way (2011), explored electronic rock and techno-pop and sold more than one million copies first-week. Its title track became the fastest-selling song on the iTunes Store, with over one million downloads in less than a week. Following her electronic dance music-influenced third album, Artpop (2013), she pursued jazz on the album Cheek to Cheek (2014) with Tony Bennett, and delved into soft rock on the album Joanne (2016). (Full article...)
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  Possible portrait by Justus Engelhardt Kühn, c. 1700–1720

  
  Charles Carroll I (1661 – 1720), sometimes called Charles Carroll the Settler to differentiate him from his son and grandson, was an Irish-born planter and lawyer who spent most of his life in the English Province of Maryland. Carroll, a Catholic, is best known for his efforts to hold office in the Protestant-dominated colony which eventually resulted in the disfranchisement of Maryland's Catholics. The second son of Irish Catholic parents, Carroll was educated in France as a lawyer before returning to England, where he pursued the first steps in a legal career. Before that career developed, he secured a position as Attorney General of the young colony of Maryland. Its founder George Calvert, 1st Baron Baltimore and his descendants intended it as a refuge for persecuted Catholics.
  
  Carroll supported Charles Calvert, 3rd Baron Baltimore, the colony's Catholic proprietor, in an unsuccessful effort to prevent the Protestant majority from gaining political control over Maryland. Following the overthrow of the Calvert proprietorship and the subsequent exclusion of Catholics from colonial government, Carroll turned his attention to owning slave plantations, law, business, and various offices in the proprietor's remnant organization. He was the wealthiest man in the colony by the time of his death. In the last years of his life, Carroll attempted to regain some vestige of political power for Catholics in the colony, but the Protestant colonial assembly and Governor John Hart disfranchised them. His son, Charles Carroll II of Annapolis, became a wealthy planter and his grandson, Charles Carroll III of Carrollton, also wealthy, was the only Catholic signer of the United States Declaration of Independence. (Full article...)
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  Eastern raccoon (P. l. lotor), Central Park in New York City

  
  The raccoon (/rəˈkuːn/ or US: /ræˈkuːn/ ^ⓘ, Procyon lotor), sometimes called the North American, northern or common raccoon (also spelled racoon) to distinguish it from other species of raccoon, is a mammal native to North America. It is the largest of the procyonid family, having a body length of 40 to 70 cm (16 to 28 in), and a body weight of 5 to 26 kg (11 to 57 lb). Its grayish coat mostly consists of dense underfur, which insulates it against cold weather. The animal's most distinctive features include its extremely dexterous front paws, its facial mask, and its ringed tail, which are common themes in the mythologies of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas surrounding the species. The raccoon is noted for its intelligence, and studies show that it can remember the solution to tasks for at least three years. It is usually nocturnal and omnivorous, eating about 40% invertebrates, 33% plants, and 27% vertebrates.
  
  The original habitats of the raccoon are deciduous and mixed forests. Still, due to their adaptability, they have extended their range to mountainous areas, coastal marshes, and urban areas, where some homeowners consider them to be pests. As a result of escapes and deliberate introductions in the mid-20th century, raccoons are now also distributed across central Europe, the Caucasus, and Japan. (Full article...)

Did you know (auto-generated) -

• ... that the scenes set in the United States in the Taiwanese film Daughter's Daughter were nearly omitted during the writing process but were retained at the insistence of lead actress Sylvia Chang?
• ... that American Colossus, a history book that describes how a banker bailed out the U.S. government in 1895, was published around a time when the U.S. government bailed out banks?
• ... that Newark Liberty International Airport was the first commercial airport in the United States with a paved airstrip?
• ... that Americans received nearly 15 billion political text messages in 2022?
• ... that a future World War II aircraft carrier was used as a hotel during the 7th National Eucharistic Congress in 1935?
• ... that 16 Montana youths are plaintiffs in the lawsuit Held v. Montana, the first constitutional climate change lawsuit to go to trial in the United States?
• ... that Philadelphia's Washington Monument was unveiled at its dedication in 1897 by the president of the United States?
• ... that a pending case at the United States Supreme Court, Haaland v. Brackeen, "could completely erase tribal sovereignty"?

Selected society biography -

Lawrence Sullivan Ross (1838–1898) was the 19th Governor of Texas, a Confederate States Army general during the American Civil War, and a president of the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas. As a teenager, Ross attended Baylor University and Florence Wesleyan University. After graduation Ross became a Texas Ranger, and in 1860 led troops in the Battle of Pease River, where he rescued Cynthia Ann Parker, who had been captured by the Comanches as a child. When Texas joined the Confederacy, Ross joined the Confederate States Army. He participated in 135 battles and skirmishes and became one of the youngest Confederate generals. Following the Civil War, Ross briefly served as sheriff of McLennan County before resigning to participate in the 1875 Texas Constitutional Convention. With the exception of a two-year term as a state senator, Ross spent the next decade focused on his farm and ranch concerns. In 1887, he became the 19th governor of Texas. During his two terms, he oversaw the dedication of the new Texas State Capitol, resolved the Jaybird-Woodpecker War, and became the only Texas governor to call a special session to deal with a treasury surplus. Days after leaving office, Ross became president of the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas. After his death, the Texas legislature created Sul Ross State University in his honor.

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  Liliʻuokalani

  Photograph credit: James J. Williams; restored by Adam Cuerden

  Liliʻuokalani (September 2, 1838 – November 11, 1917) was the only queen regnant and the last sovereign monarch of the Hawaiian Kingdom. She ascended to the throne on January 29, 1891, nine days after the death of her brother King Kalākaua. During her reign, she attempted to draft a new constitution in 1893 that would restore the power of the monarchy and the voting rights of the economically disenfranchised. Threatened by her attempts to abrogate the 1887 Bayonet Constitution, pro-American elements in Hawaii overthrew the monarchy on January 17, 1893. She was placed under house arrest, was forced to abdicate the Hawaiian throne and lived the rest of her life as a private citizen. This photograph of Liliʻuokalani was signed by the queen herself and addressed to Josephus Daniels, United States Secretary of the Navy.
• 
  Internment of Japanese Americans

  Photograph: Dorothea Lange; Restoration: Bammesk

  The internment of Japanese Americans in the United States during World War II was the forced relocation and incarceration in concentration camps in the western interior of the country of between 110,000 and 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry, most of whom lived on the Pacific coast. Sixty-two percent of the internees were United States citizens. These actions were ordered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt shortly after Imperial Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.
  
  This picture shows members of the Mochida family in Hayward, California, waiting for an evacuation bus to take them to an internment center.
• 
  Stand in the Schoolhouse Door

  Photo credit: U.S. News & World Report

  Attempting to block racial integration at the University of Alabama, Governor George Wallace (left) stands defiantly at the door on June 11, 1963, in an incident known as the Stand in the Schoolhouse Door. Wallace moved aside after being ordered to do so by President John F. Kennedy; years later, he became a born-again Christian and recanted his segregationist views.
• 
  Compromise of 1850

  Artist: Peter F. Rothermel; Engraver: Robert Whitechurch; Restoration: Lise Broer and Jujutacular

  U.S. Senator Henry Clay gives a speech in the Old Senate Chamber calling for compromise on the issues dividing the United States. The result was the Compromise of 1850, a package of five bills, the first two of which were passed on September 9. Ironically, these led to a breakdown in the spirit of compromise in the years preceding the Civil War, particularly after the deaths of Clay and Daniel Webster.
• 
  James Madison

  Engraving credit: Bureau of Engraving and Printing; restored by Andrew Shiva

  James Madison (March 16, 1751 – June 28, 1836) was an American statesman, lawyer, diplomat and philosopher who served as the fourth president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. He is widely considered to be one of the most important Founding Fathers of the United States, and historians have generally ranked him as an above-average president.
  
  This picture is a line engraving of Madison, produced around 1902 by the Department of the Treasury's Bureau of Engraving and Printing (BEP) as part of a BEP presentation album of the first 26 presidents, which was reportedly given to Treasury Secretary Lyman J. Gage.
• 
  Great White Fleet

  Artist: William Allen Rogers; Restoration: Lise Broer

  An editorial cartoon from the New York Herald depicting (left to right) Uncle Sam, George Washington, and Theodore Roosevelt on a pier welcoming the Great White Fleet back into port. Roosevelt had ordered the fleet, which consisted of 16 battleships and various escort ships, to circumnavigate the globe as a demonstration of growing American military power and blue-water navy capability.
• 
  Check used for the Alaska Purchase

  Check: William H. Seward; scan: Our Documents initiative

  The check used for the Alaska Purchase, issued on August 1, 1868, and signed by US Secretary of State William H. Seward. For a total of $7.2 million, the United States government purchased Russian America from the Russian Empire (represented here by Russian Minister to the United States Eduard de Stoeckl). The lands involved became the modern state of Alaska in 1959.
• 
  Ansel Adams

  Photograph credit: J. Malcolm Greany

  Ansel Adams (February 20, 1902 – April 22, 1984) was an American landscape photographer and environmentalist, known for his black-and-white images of the American West. As a child, he visited Yosemite National Park with his family and was given his first camera. He was later tasked by the United States Department of the Interior to take photographs of national parks. For this work, and for his persistent advocacy, which helped expand the National Park system, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1980.
• 
  Heinrich C. Berann

  Painting credit: Heinrich C. Berann

  Heinrich C. Berann (1915–1999) was an Austrian painter and cartographer. He achieved world fame with his panoramic maps that combined modern cartography with classical painting. Towards the end of his life, he created four panoramic posters of national parks which were published by the U.S. National Park Service. This 1994 panorama shows Denali National Park and Preserve in central Alaska, with Denali, the highest mountain on the continent, and the glaciers on its southern flanks.
• 
  Chicago Theatre

  Photo: Daniel Schwen

  The Chicago Theatre is located on North State Street in the Loop area of Chicago. When it opened on October 26, 1921, the 3,880-seat theater was promoted as the "Wonder Theatre of the World". Its marquee, "an unofficial emblem of the city", appears frequently in film, television, artwork, and photography.
• 
  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.
• 
  National Child Labor Committee

  Photo credit: Lewis Wickes Hine; restored by Michel Vuijlsteke

  A 1908 photo of child laborers in a glass factory in Indiana, United States, taken by Lewis Hine for the National Child Labor Committee, which formed after the 1900 census revealed that about 1 in 6 children between the ages of five and ten were gainfully employed. Hine's photos of children working in industrial settings resulted in a wave of popular support for federal child labor regulations put forward by the NCLC.
• 
  Utah Territory

  Illustration credit: Henry Mitchell; restored by Andrew Shiva

  The Utah Territory was a U.S. territory in the Western United States that existed from its creation on September 9, 1850, to its admission to the Union on January 4, 1896 as the State of Utah. This picture shows the Utah Territory's historical coat of arms, as illustrated by American engraver Henry Mitchell in State Arms of the Union, published in 1876 by Louis Prang. The escutcheon depicts a beehive, representing the state's industrious and hard-working inhabitants, and sego lilies symbolizing peace.
• 
  Silver certificate

  Banknote design credit: Bureau of Engraving and Printing; photographed by Andrew Shiva

  Silver certificates are a type of representative money issued between 1878 and 1964 in the United States as part of its circulation of paper currency. This $10 silver certificate, part of the series of 1886, depicts Thomas A. Hendricks, an American politician and lawyer from Indiana who served as the 21st vice president of the United States from March to November 1885. The series is known for the ornate engraving on the reverse of the notes. This banknote is part of the National Numismatic Collection at the Smithsonian Institution.
  
  

  Other denominations:
  '"`UNIQ--templatestyles-0000001D-QINU`"'
  

  
  * $1
  * $2
  * $5
  * $10
  * $20
  * $20
  * $50
  * $100
  * $500
  * $1000
  
• 
  Burning of Washington

  Artist: George Munger; Restoration: Lise Broer

  In the evening hours of August 24, 1814, during the War of 1812, British forces attacked Washington, D.C., setting fire to the White House and the unfinished Capitol Building (damage to latter shown here), among other buildings. This was the second and last time in United States history that a foreign power has captured and occupied the United States capital.

Selected culture biography -

William Gibson (born March 17, 1948) is an American-Canadian writer who has been called the "noir prophet" of the cyberpunk subgenre of science fiction. Gibson coined the term "cyberspace" in his short story "Burning Chrome" and later popularized the concept in his debut novel, Neuromancer (1984). In envisaging cyberspace, Gibson created an iconography for the Information Age before the ubiquity of the Internet in the 1990s. He is also credited with predicting the rise of reality television and with establishing the conceptual foundations for the rapid growth of virtual environments such as video games and the Web.

After expanding on Neuromancer with two more novels to complete the dystopic Sprawl trilogy, Gibson became a central figure to an entirely different science fiction subgenre – steampunk – with the 1990 alternate history novel The Difference Engine, written in collaboration with Bruce Sterling. In the 1990s he composed the Bridge trilogy of novels, which focused on sociological observations of near future urban environments and late-stage capitalism. His most recent novels – Pattern Recognition (2003) and Spook Country (2007) – are set in a contemporary world and have put Gibson's work onto mainstream bestseller lists for the first time.

To date, Gibson has written more than twenty short stories, nine novels (one in collaboration), a nonfiction artist's book, and has contributed articles to several major publications and collaborated extensively with performance artists, filmmakers and musicians.

Selected location -

Providence is the capital and the most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island, and one of the first cities established in the United States. It is the estimated third-largest city in the New England region. Despite having an estimated population of 175,255 as of 2006, it anchors the 35th-largest metropolitan population in the country, with an estimated MSA population of 1,612,989. Situated at the mouth of the Providence River, on Narragansett Bay, the city's small footprint is crisscrossed by seemingly erratic streets and a rapidly changing demographic using them.

Providence was founded in 1636 by Roger Williams, a religious exile from the Massachusetts Bay Colony. He named the area in honor of "God's merciful Providence" which he believed was responsible for his finding such a haven to settle. After being one of the first cities in the country to industrialize, Providence became noted for its jewelry and silverware industry. Today, Providence city proper alone is home to eight hospitals and seven institutions of higher learning, which has shifted the city's economy into service industries, though it still retains significant manufacturing work. The city was once nicknamed the "Beehive of Industry", while today "The Renaissance City" is more common, though as of 2000 census, its poverty rate was still among the ten highest for cities over 100,000.

Selected quote -

Anniversaries for April 29

• 1945 – The Dachau concentration camp is liberated by United States troops.
• 1967 – After refusing induction into the United States Army the day before, citing religious reasons, Muhammad Ali (pictured) is stripped of his boxing title.
• 1974 – President Richard Nixon announces the release of edited transcripts of White House tape recordings related to the Watergate Scandal.
• 1975 – Operation Frequent Wind, an evacuation the last American citizens from Saigon prior to an expected North Vietnamese takeover, is commenced. United States involvement in the Vietnam War comes to an end.
• 1992 – Riots in Los Angeles, California, follow the acquittal of police officers charged with excessive force in the beating of Rodney King. Over the next three days 54 people are killed and hundreds of buildings are destroyed.
• 2004 – Oldsmobile builds its final car, ending 107 years of production.

Selected cuisines, dishes and foods -

Campbell Soup Company is headquartered in Camden

The cuisine of New Jersey is derived from the state's long immigrant history and its close proximity to both New York City and Philadelphia. Due to its geographical location, New Jersey can generally be divided by New York City cuisine in the northern and central parts of the state and Philadelphia cuisine in the southern parts. Restaurants in the state often make use of locally grown ingredients such as asparagus, blueberries, cranberries, tomatoes, corn, and peaches. New Jersey is particularly known for its diners, of which there are approximately 525, the most of any state. Various foods invented in the state, such as the pork roll, and salt water taffy, remain popular there today. (Full article...)

Selected panorama -

San Gorgonio Pass Wind Farm.

San Gorgonio Pass Wind Farm in the Coachella Valley, California.

More did you know? -

• ... that the domed atrium of Indiana's West Baden Springs Hotel (inside pictured) was the largest free-spanning dome in the United States for over 50 years and in the world from 1902 to 1913?
• ... that Nicholas Longworth built America's first commercially successful winery with a pink sparkling wine made from Catawba?
• ... that the phrase "more bang for the buck" was used to describe the United States' New Look policy of depending on nuclear weapons, rather than a large regular army, to keep the Soviet Union in check?

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