Jack Daniel’s stands as one of the most iconic American brands and most popular spirits in the world. Yet while the whiskey and its eponymous founder have become dominant names in American liquor lore, the person perhaps most responsible for its success—an enslaved man named ...read more

Las Vegas was a small railroad town when Nevada formally established it in 1905. Five years after its founding, the U.S. census recorded only 800 residents. Yet by the 1950s, it was known as a gambling tourist haven, where visitors could see a show with celebrities like Frank ...read more

Anthony Comstock knew obscenity when he saw it, and the famous anti-vice crusader saw it everywhere. From the 1870s into the early 20th century, the dry goods salesman-turned-self-appointed-censor was a man on a mission—to impose his sense of morality on what Americans read, saw ...read more

When James Buchanan gave his inaugural address on March 4, 1857, he was remarkably optimistic that the United States’ debate over slavery was about to end. Knowing that the Supreme Court would soon rule against Dred Scott—a man who’d escaped enslavement in the south only to be ...read more

Two days after Germany invaded Poland in September 1939, Britain and France declared war on Germany, and World War II erupted. Dozens of countries, still recovering from the horrors of World War I, tried to remain neutral to avoid invasion and more bloodshed. But a declaration ...read more

It remains one of the most mythologized images of the Spanish-American war: Theodore Roosevelt charging on horseback, leading his Rough Rider volunteers up Cuba’s San Juan Hill through the smoke and chaos of battle to claim a decisive victory. Carefully crafted by Roosevelt ...read more

In November 1945, just a few months after atomic bombs were dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II, U.S. military leaders began planning additional nuclear weapons tests. The first location that they picked to stage a blast was a ...read more

Executive orders aren’t mentioned once in the U.S. Constitution, but presidents starting with George Washington have used executive orders and proclamations in order to bypass Congress and quickly exercise the independent power of their office. Franklin D. Roosevelt is the ...read more

Theodore Roosevelt is known as the “conservation president” for his undaunted efforts, at the dawn of the 20th century, to shield wildlife and public lands from development. His efforts helped establish America’s national park and forestry services, putting more than 200 million ...read more

As advisor to President John F. Kennedy, then national security advisor (1969-75) and secretary of state (1973-77) to President Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger was responsible for making major decisions related to the Vietnam War. He kept the U.S. bombing of Cambodia a secret from ...read more

Madame Stephanie St. Clair was a Harlem entrepreneur with a head for numbers and a skill for minting cash—even during the Great Depression. But like most African Americans in the early 20th century, she found herself barred from traditional, white-dominated financial businesses ...read more

When the Supreme Court of the United States agrees to hear a case, the only part of the process that’s open to the public are the oral arguments. The rest of the deliberations happen behind closed doors between the nine justices and their teams of law clerks. So how exactly do ...read more