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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 deep fryer in the Imperial Food Products plant where the fire started

  
  On September 3, 1991, an industrial fire caused by a failed improvised repair to a hydraulic line destroyed the Imperial Food Products chicken processing plant in Hamlet, North Carolina. Despite three previous fires in 11 years of operation, the plant had never received a safety inspection. The fire killed 25 people and injured 54, many of whom were unable to escape due to locked exits. It was the second deadliest industrial disaster in North Carolina's history.
  
  Imperial Food Products was a corporation owned by Emmett Roe, who acquired the Hamlet facility in 1980 to produce chicken products. The company had a poor safety record at one of its other plants, and the Hamlet building lacked a fire alarm or an operational fire sprinkler system. For reasons that remain disputed, Roe ordered several exterior doors of the plant locked in the summer of 1991—including a labeled fire exit—in violation of federal safety regulations and without notifying most workers. In September, the plant's maintenance workers attempted to replace a leaking hydraulic line, attached to the conveyor belt which fed chicken tenders into a fryer in the processing room, with improvised parts. On September 3 at around 8:15 am, they turned on the conveyor belt after altering the line; it separated from its connection and spewed hydraulic fluid around the room. The fluid vaporized and was ignited by the fryer's flame. Fire engulfed the facility in minutes, severing telephone lines and filling the plant with hydrocarbon-charged smoke and carbon monoxide. (Full article...)
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  The Random Years is an American sitcom created by Michael Lisbe and Nate Reger that aired for four episodes on the United Paramount Network (UPN) in March 2002. The series centers on childhood friends Alex Barnes (Will Friedle), Wiseman (Joshua Ackerman), and Todd Mitchell (Sean Murray) and their lives after graduating college while living in Chinatown, Manhattan. Storylines focus on the characters' jobs and romantic relationships, often including their neighbor Casey Parker (Natalia Cigliuti) and their building superintendent Steve (Winston J. Rochas).
  
  Lisbe and Reger based The Random Years on their own experiences living in New York City. UPN produced the show, along with As If, as mid-season replacements for Roswell, which was not performing well with its ratings. Friedle was initially cast in Off Centre, a sitcom for The WB Television Network, but appeared in The Random Years after being replaced by Eddie Kaye Thomas in the former. (Full article...)
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  Chief U.S. Marshal James McShane (left) and U.S. Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights John Doar (right), escorting James Meredith to class at Ole Miss after the riot.

  
  The Ole Miss riot of 1962 (September 30 – October 1, 1962), also known as the Battle of Oxford, was a race riot that occurred at the University of Mississippi—commonly called Ole Miss—in Oxford, Mississippi, as segregationist rioters sought to prevent the enrollment of African American applicant James Meredith. President John F. Kennedy eventually quelled the riot by mobilizing more than 30,000 troops, the most for a single disturbance in United States history.
  
  In the wake of the Supreme Court's 1954 decision Brown v. Board of Education, Meredith tried to integrate Ole Miss by applying in 1961. When he informed the university that he was African-American, his admission was delayed and obstructed, first by school officials and then by Mississippi Governor Ross Barnett. In a bid to block his enrollment, Barnett had Meredith temporarily jailed. Multiple attempts by Meredith, accompanied by federal officials, to enroll were physically blocked. Hoping to avoid violence and ensure Meredith's enrollment, President Kennedy and Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy had a series of unproductive telephone negotiations with Barnett. (Full article...)
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  Photograph by Mathew Brady, 1865–1880

  
  John Sherman (May 10, 1823 – October 22, 1900) was an American politician from Ohio who served in federal office throughout the Civil War and into the late nineteenth century. A member of the Republican Party, he served in both houses of the U.S. Congress. He also served as Secretary of the Treasury and Secretary of State. Sherman sought the Republican presidential nomination three times, coming closest in 1888, but was never chosen by the party.
  
  Born in Lancaster, Ohio, Sherman later moved to Mansfield, Ohio, where he began a law career before entering politics. He was the younger brother of Union general William Tecumseh Sherman, with whom he had a close relationship. Initially a Whig, Sherman was among those anti-slavery activists who formed what became the Republican Party. He served three terms in the House of Representatives. As a member of the House, Sherman traveled to Kansas to investigate the unrest between pro- and anti-slavery partisans there. He rose in party leadership and was nearly elected Speaker in 1859. Sherman was elected to the Senate in 1861. As a senator, he was a leader in financial matters, helping to redesign the United States' monetary system to meet the needs of a nation torn apart by civil war. He also served as the Chair of the Senate Agriculture Committee during his 32 years in the Senate. After the war, he worked to produce legislation that would restore the nation's credit abroad and produce a stable, gold-backed currency at home. (Full article...)
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  John Adair (January 9, 1757 – May 19, 1840) was an American pioneer, slave trader, soldier, and politician. He was the eighth Governor of Kentucky and represented the state in both the U.S. House and Senate. A native of South Carolina, Adair enlisted in the state militia and served in the Revolutionary War, during which he was twice captured and held as a prisoner of war by the British. Following the War, he was elected as a delegate to South Carolina's convention to ratify the United States Constitution.
  
  After moving to Kentucky in 1786, Adair participated in the Northwest Indian War, including a skirmish with the Miami Chief Little Turtle near Fort St. Clair in 1792. Popular for his service in two wars, he entered politics in 1792 as a delegate to Kentucky's constitutional convention. Adair was elected to a total of eight terms in the state House of Representatives between 1793 and 1803. He served as Speaker of the Kentucky House in 1802 and 1803, and was a delegate to the state's Second Constitutional Convention in 1799. He ascended to the United States Senate to fill the seat vacated when John Breckinridge resigned to become Attorney General of the United States in the Cabinet of Thomas Jefferson, but failed to win a full term in the subsequent election due to his implication in a treason conspiracy involving Vice President Aaron Burr. After a long legal battle, he was acquitted of any wrongdoing; and his accuser, General James Wilkinson, was ordered to issue an apology. The negative publicity kept him out of politics for more than a decade. (Full article...)
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  Doc Savage was an American pulp magazine that was published from 1933 to 1949 by Street & Smith. It was launched as a follow-up to the success of The Shadow, a magazine Street & Smith had started in 1931, based around a single character. Doc Savage's lead character, Clark Savage, was a scientist and adventurer, rather than purely a detective. Lester Dent was hired to write the lead novels, almost all of which were published under the house name "Kenneth Robeson". A few dozen novels were ghost-written by other writers, hired either by Dent or by Street & Smith. The magazine was successful, but was shut down in 1949 as part of Street & Smith's decision to abandon the pulp magazine field completely.
  
  Dent's work was full of inventive ideas, and ranged across multiple genres. Science fictional gadgets were common, but there were also detective novels, westerns, fantasies, and straightforward adventures. Dent worked with Henry Ralston and (until 1943) John Nanovic, two editors at Street & Smith, to plot the novels, though in a few cases ghost-writers were given leeway to create their own plots without Dent's involvement. Early covers were painted by Walter Baumhofer; when Baumhofer left Street & Smith in 1936 he was replaced by R. G. Harris and then by Emery Clarke. (Full article...)
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  The 2012 Budweiser Shootout was the first exhibition stock car race of the 2012 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series. The 34th annual running of the Budweiser Shootout, it was held on February 18, 2012 at the Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach, Florida, before a crowd of 82,000 people. Kyle Busch of the Joe Gibbs Racing team won the 82-lap race. It was Busch's first victory in the event; Stewart-Haas Racing driver Tony Stewart finished second with Richard Petty Motorsports racer Marcos Ambrose third.
  
  Pole position driver Martin Truex Jr. was immediately passed by Jeff Gordon before the first turn, and Dale Earnhardt Jr. led at the end of the first lap. On the ninth lap, a multiple-car accident prompted the first caution flag. Sixteen laps later the second caution was issued, with Jamie McMurray leading. During the caution period, all teams made pit stops. On lap 62 Gordon reclaimed the lead, holding it until he was involved in an accident (the race's final caution). Stewart led at the final restart, holding it until the final lap when Busch passed him to win. Five cautions were issued during the race, which saw twenty-six lead changes by thirteen different drivers and attracted 7.46 million television viewers. (Full article...)
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  Marais des Cygnes National Wildlife Refuge, which contains part of the battlefield

  
  The Battle of Marais des Cygnes (/ˌmɛər də ˈziːn, - ˈsiːn, ˈmɛər də ziːn/) took place on October 25, 1864, in Linn County, Kansas, during Price's Missouri Campaign during the American Civil War. It is also known as the Battle of Trading Post. In late 1864, Confederate Major-General Sterling Price invaded the state of Missouri with a cavalry force, attempting to draw Union troops away from the primary theaters of fighting further east. After several victories early in the campaign, Price's Confederate troops were defeated at the Battle of Westport on October 23 near Kansas City, Missouri. The Confederates then withdrew into Kansas, camping along the banks of the Marais des Cygnes River on the night of October 24. Union cavalry pursuers under Brigadier General John B. Sanborn skirmished with Price's rearguard that night, but disengaged without participating in heavy combat.
  
  Overnight, Sanborn's troops were reinforced by cavalry under Lieutenant Colonel Frederick W. Benteen, bringing the total Union strength to 3,500. The battle began early the next morning as Sanborn drove Major General John S. Marmaduke's Confederate rearguard from its position north of the river. Union troops captured cannons, prisoners, and wagons during this stage of the fighting. Marmaduke attempted to make a stand at the river crossing, but his position was outflanked by a Union cavalry regiment, forcing him to abandon it. A rearguard action by Confederate Brigadier General John B. Clark Jr.'s 1,200-man brigade bought Price more time to retreat and disengage. Some of Price's men were still caught near Mine Creek later that morning and were badly beaten in the Battle of Mine Creek. That evening, the Battle of Marmiton River became the day's third action, after which Price burned his supply train so it no longer slowed the retreat. After another defeat at the Second Battle of Newtonia on October 28, Price's column retreated to Texas through Arkansas and the Indian Territory. Only 3,500 of the 12,000 men Price had brought into Missouri remained in his force. (Full article...)
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  William McSherry SJ (July 19, 1799 – December 18, 1839) was an American Catholic priest and Jesuit who became the president of Georgetown College and a Jesuit provincial superior. The son of Irish immigrants, McSherry was educated at Georgetown College, where he entered the Society of Jesus. As one of the first Americans to complete the traditional Jesuit course of training, he was sent to Rome to be educated for the priesthood. There, he made several discoveries of significant, forgotten holdings in the Jesuit archives, which improved historians' knowledge of the early European settling of Maryland and of the language of Indian tribes there.
  
  McSherry became the first provincial superior of the Jesuits' Maryland Province from 1833 to 1837, and laid the groundwork for the sale of the province's slaves in 1838. He then briefly became the president of Georgetown College in 1837, and was simultaneously made provincial superior for a second time in 1839, despite suffering illness to which he would succumb several months later. (Full article...)
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  Maus, often published as Maus: A Survivor's Tale, is a graphic novel by American cartoonist Art Spiegelman, serialized from 1980 to 1991. It depicts Spiegelman interviewing his father about his experiences as a Polish Jew and Holocaust survivor. The work employs postmodern techniques, and represents Jews as mice and other Germans and Poles as cats and pigs respectively. Critics have classified Maus as memoir, biography, history, fiction, autobiography, or a mix of genres. In 1992, it became the first graphic novel to win a Pulitzer Prize.
  
  In the frame-tale timeline in the narrative present that begins in 1978 in New York City, Spiegelman talks with his father Vladek about his Holocaust experiences, gathering material and information for the Maus project he is preparing. In the narrative past, Spiegelman depicts these experiences, from the years leading up to World War II to his parents' liberation from the Nazi concentration camps. Much of the story revolves around Spiegelman's troubled relationship with his father and the absence of his mother, who died by suicide when Spiegelman was 20. Her grief-stricken husband destroyed her written accounts of Auschwitz. The book uses a minimalist drawing style and displays innovation in its pacing, structure, and page layouts. (Full article...)
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  A 1980 Grant Wood one ounce gold medallion

  
  
  American Arts Commemorative Series Medallions are a series of ten gold bullion medallions that were produced by the United States Mint from 1980 to 1984. They were sold to compete with the South African Krugerrand and other bullion coins.
  
  The series was proposed by North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms after the United States Department of the Treasury began selling portions of the national stockpile of gold. Iowa Representative Jim Leach suggested that the medallions depict notable American artists. President Jimmy Carter signed the bill containing the authorizing legislation into law on November 10, 1978, despite objections from Treasury officials. (Full article...)
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  Adult in Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge in Queens, New York

  
  The tree swallow (Tachycineta bicolor) is a migratory bird of the family Hirundinidae. Found in the Americas, the tree swallow was first described in 1807 by French ornithologist Louis Vieillot as Hirundo bicolor. It has since been moved to its current genus, Tachycineta, within which its phylogenetic placement is debated. The tree swallow has glossy blue-green upperparts, with the exception of the blackish wings and tail, and white underparts. The bill is black, the eyes dark brown, and the legs and feet pale brown. The female is generally duller than the male, and the first-year female has mostly brown upperparts, with some blue feathers. Juveniles have brown upperparts, and gray-brown-washed breasts. The tree swallow breeds in the US and Canada. It winters along southern US coasts south, along the Gulf Coast, to Panama and the northwestern coast of South America, and in the West Indies.
  
  The tree swallow nests either in isolated pairs or loose groups, in both natural and artificial cavities. Breeding can start as soon as early May, although this date is occurring earlier because of climate change, and it can end as late as July. This bird is generally socially monogamous (although about 8% of males are polygynous), with high levels of extra-pair paternity. This can benefit the male, but since the female controls copulation, the lack of resolution on how this behavior benefits females makes the high level of extra-pair paternity puzzling. The female incubates the clutch of two to eight (but usually four to seven) pure white eggs for around 14 to 15 days. The chicks hatch slightly asynchronously, allowing the female to prioritize which chicks to feed in times of food shortage. They generally fledge about 18 to 22 days after hatching. The tree swallow is sometimes considered a model organism, due to the large amount of research done on it. (Full article...)
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  Japanese foreign affairs minister Mamoru Shigemitsu signs the Japanese Instrument of Surrender aboard the USS Missouri as American General Richard K. Sutherland watches, 2 September 1945.

  
  The surrender of the Empire of Japan in World War II was announced by Emperor Hirohito on 15 August and formally signed on 2 September 1945, ending the war. By the end of July 1945, the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) was incapable of conducting major operations and an Allied invasion of Japan was imminent. Together with the United Kingdom and China, the United States called for the unconditional surrender of Japan in the Potsdam Declaration on 26 July 1945—the alternative being "prompt and utter destruction". While publicly stating their intent to fight on to the bitter end, Japan's leaders (the Supreme Council for the Direction of the War, also known as the "Big Six") were privately making entreaties to the publicly neutral Soviet Union to mediate peace on terms more favorable to the Japanese. While maintaining a sufficient level of diplomatic engagement with the Japanese to give them the impression they might be willing to mediate, the Soviets were covertly preparing to attack Japanese forces in Manchuria and Korea (in addition to South Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands) in fulfillment of promises they had secretly made to the US and the UK at the Tehran and Yalta Conferences.
  
  On 6 August 1945, at 8:15 am local time, the United States detonated an atomic bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Sixteen hours later, American President Harry S. Truman called again for Japan's surrender, warning them to "expect a rain of ruin from the air, the like of which has never been seen on this earth." Late on 8 August 1945, in accordance with the Yalta agreements, but in violation of the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact, the Soviet Union declared war on Japan, and soon after midnight on 9 August 1945, the Soviet Union invaded the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo. Hours later, the United States dropped a second atomic bomb, on the Japanese city of Nagasaki. Emperor Hirohito ordered the Supreme Council for the Direction of the War to accept the terms the Allies had set down in the Potsdam Declaration. After several more days of behind-the-scenes negotiations and a failed coup d'état, Emperor Hirohito gave a recorded radio address across the Empire on 15 August announcing the surrender of Japan to the Allies. (Full article...)
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  A streetcar departing the McGraw Square terminal

  
  The South Lake Union Streetcar, officially the South Lake Union Line, is a streetcar route in Seattle, Washington, United States, forming part of the Seattle Streetcar system. It travels 1.3 miles (2.1 km) and connects Downtown Seattle to the South Lake Union neighborhood on Westlake Avenue, Terry Avenue, and Valley Street. The South Lake Union Streetcar was the first modern line to operate in Seattle, beginning service on December 12, 2007, two years after a separate heritage streetcar ceased operations.
  
  The streetcar line was conceived as part of the redevelopment of South Lake Union into a technology hub, with lobbying and financial support from Paul Allen and his venture capital firm Vulcan Inc. The $56 million project was funded using a combination of contributions from local property owners, the city government, and grants from the state and federal government. Construction began in July 2006 and was completed over a year later by the Seattle Department of Transportation. The line is owned by the City of Seattle, with operation and maintenance contracted out to King County Metro. (Full article...)
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  The Roanoke Island, North Carolina, half dollar (also Roanoke Island half dollar) is a commemorative coin issued by the United States Bureau of the Mint in 1937. The coin commemorated the 350th anniversary of the Roanoke Colony, depicting Sir Walter Raleigh on one side, and on the other Eleanor Dare, holding her child, Virginia Dare, the first child of English descent born in an English colony in the Americas.
  
  The Roanoke Island half dollar was one of many commemorative issues authorized by Congress in 1936. Since it was intended to commemorate the 350th anniversary of the colony, founded in 1587, the coins were not struck until 1937. William Marks Simpson, a sculptor who created several commemorative coins of the era, designed the Roanoke Island issue. His work required only slight modification at the recommendation of the Commission of Fine Arts. (Full article...)
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  1894 engraving of a photograph of Slack

  
  William Yarnel Slack (August 1, 1816 – March 21, 1862) was an American lawyer, politician, and military officer who fought for the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. Born in Kentucky, Slack moved to Missouri as a child and later entered the legal profession. After serving in the Missouri General Assembly from 1842 to 1843, he fought as a captain in the United States Army for fourteen months during the Mexican–American War, beginning in 1846. He saw action at the Battle of Embudo Pass and the Siege of Pueblo de Taos. Returning to a legal career, Slack became influential in his area.
  
  After the outbreak of the American Civil War in April 1861, Slack, who held pro-slavery views, supported the Confederate cause. When the Missouri State Guard (MSG) was formed the next month to oppose the Union Army, he was appointed as a brigadier general in the MSG's 4th Division. After participating in the Battle of Carthage in July, he fought in the Battle of Wilson's Creek on August 10. After a surprise Union attack, Slack's deployment of his division gave time for further Confederate States Army and MSG troops to deploy. Suffering a bad hip wound at Wilson's Creek, he was unable to rejoin his command until October. (Full article...)
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  Missouri at sea in her 1980s configuration

  
  USS Missouri (BB-63) is an Iowa-class battleship built for the United States Navy (USN) in the 1940s and is a museum ship. Completed in 1944, she is the last battleship commissioned by the United States. The ship was assigned to the Pacific Theater during World War II, where she participated in the Battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa and shelled the Japanese home islands. Her quarterdeck was the site of the surrender of the Empire of Japan, which ended World War II.
  
  After World War II, Missouri served in various diplomatic, show of force and training missions. On 17 January 1950 the ship ran aground during high tide in Chesapeake Bay and after great effort was re-floated several weeks later. She later fought in the Korean War during two tours between 1950 and 1953. Missouri was the first American battleship to arrive in Korean waters and served as the flagship for several admirals. The battleship took part in numerous shore bombardment operations and also served in a screening role for aircraft carriers. Missouri was decommissioned in 1955 and transferred to the reserve fleet (also known as the "Mothball Fleet"). (Full article...)
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  Title page of the first edition, volume 1

  
  Logan, a Family History is a Gothic novel of historical fiction by American writer John Neal. Published anonymously in Baltimore in 1822, the book is loosely inspired by the true story of Mingo leader Logan the Orator, while weaving a highly fictionalized story of interactions between Anglo-American colonists and Indigenous peoples on the western frontier of colonial Virginia. Set just before the Revolutionary War, it depicts the genocide of Native Americans as the heart of the American story and follows a long cast of characters connected to each other in a complex web of overlapping love interests, family relations, rape, and (sometimes incestuous) sexual activity.
  
  Logan was Neal's second novel, but his first notable success, attracting generally favorable reviews in both the US and UK. He wrote the story over a six-to-eight-week stretch at a time when he was producing more novels and juggling more responsibilities than any other period of his life. Likely a commercial failure for the publisher, who refused to work with Neal in the future, the book nevertheless saw three printings in the UK. Scholars criticize the story's profound excessiveness and incoherence, but praise its pioneering and successful experimentation with psychological horror, verisimilitude, sexual guilt in male characters, impacts of intergenerational violence, and documentation of interracial relationships and intersections between sex and violence on the American frontier. (Full article...)
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  Josip "Jozo" Tomasevich (1908 – October 15, 1994; Serbo-Croatian: Josip Tomašević) was an American economist and historian whose speciality was the economic and social history of Yugoslavia. Tomasevich was born in the Kingdom of Dalmatia, then part of Austria-Hungary, and after completing high school and attending a commercial academy, he earned a doctorate in economics from the University of Basel in Switzerland. In the mid-1930s, he worked at the National Bank of Yugoslavia in Belgrade and published three well-received books on Yugoslavia's national debt, fiscal policy, and money and credit respectively.
  
  In 1938, he moved to the United States as the recipient of a two-year Rockefeller fellowship and conducted research at Harvard University before joining the academic staff of Stanford University. During World War II, Tomasevich worked for the Board of Economic Warfare and the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration, and post-war he joined the Federal Reserve Bank in San Francisco. In 1948, he joined the staff at San Francisco State College (later San Francisco State University). He combined research and teaching there for twenty-five years until his retirement in 1973, which was broken by a year of teaching at Columbia University in 1954. Between 1943 and 1955, Tomasevich published two positively reviewed books on economic matters; one focused on marine resources and the other on the peasant economy of Yugoslavia. (Full article...)
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  Nirvana performing live at the 1992 MTV Video Music Awards. Kurt Cobain is in the foreground and Krist Novoselic is in the background.

  
  Nirvana was an American rock band formed in Aberdeen, Washington, in 1987. Founded by lead singer and guitarist Kurt Cobain and bassist Krist Novoselic, the band went through a succession of drummers, most notably Chad Channing, before recruiting Dave Grohl in 1990. Nirvana's success popularized alternative rock, and they were often referenced as the figurehead band of Generation X. Despite a short mainstream career spanning only three years, their music maintains a popular following and continues to influence modern rock culture.
  
  In the late 1980s, Nirvana established itself as part of the Seattle grunge scene, releasing its first album, Bleach, for the independent record label Sub Pop in 1989. They developed a sound that relied on dynamic contrasts, often between quiet verses and loud, heavy choruses. After signing to the major label DGC Records in 1991, Nirvana found unexpected mainstream success with "Smells Like Teen Spirit", the first single from its landmark second album Nevermind (1991). A cultural phenomenon of the 1990s, Nevermind was certified Diamond by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and is credited for ending the dominance of hair metal. (Full article...)
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  "Abyssinia, Henry" is the 72nd episode of the M*A*S*H television series and the final episode of the series' third season. It was written by Everett Greenbaum and Jim Fritzell, and it first aired on March 18, 1975. The episode is notable for its shocking ending, in which the unit's amiable commanding officer Lieutenant Colonel Henry Blake (played by McLean Stevenson) receives an honorable discharge and leaves for home but, in the final scene, is reported killed by enemy fire. This ending prompted more than 1,000 letters to series producers Gene Reynolds and Larry Gelbart, and drew fire from both CBS and 20th Century Fox.
  
  The title of the episode refers to the 1920s–1930s slang use of "Abyssinia" for "goodbye". ("Abyssinia", pronounced "ab-ee-SIN-ee-ah" can be understood as "I'll be seeing you".) (Full article...)
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  Marjorie Cameron Parsons Kimmel (April 23, 1922 – July 24, 1995), who professionally used the mononym Cameron, was an American artist, poet, actress and occultist. A follower of Thelema, the new religious movement established by the English occultist Aleister Crowley, she was married to rocket pioneer and fellow Thelemite Jack Parsons.
  
  Born in Belle Plaine, Iowa, Cameron volunteered for service in the United States Navy during the Second World War, after which she settled in Pasadena, California. There she met Parsons, who believed her to be the "elemental" woman that he had invoked in the early stages of a series of sex magic rituals called the Babalon Working. They entered into a relationship and were married in 1946. Their relationship was often strained, although Parsons sparked her involvement in Thelema and occultism. After Parsons' death in an explosion at their home in 1952, Cameron came to suspect that her husband had been assassinated and began rituals to communicate with his spirit. Moving to Beaumont, she established a multi-racial occult group called The Children, which dedicated itself to sex magic rituals with the intent of producing mixed-race "moon children" who would be devoted to the god Horus. The group soon dissolved, largely because many of its members became concerned by Cameron's increasingly apocalyptic predictions. (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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  Reconstructed replica of the holotype skeleton outside the Field Museum of Natural History

  
  Brachiosaurus (/ˌbrækiəˈsɔːrəs/) is a genus of sauropod dinosaur that lived in North America during the Late Jurassic, about 154 to 150 million years ago. It was first described by American paleontologist Elmer S. Riggs in 1903 from fossils found in the Colorado River valley in western Colorado, United States. Riggs named the dinosaur Brachiosaurus altithorax; the generic name is Greek for "arm lizard", in reference to its proportionately long arms, and the specific name means "deep chest". Brachiosaurus is estimated to have been between 18 and 22 meters (59 and 72 ft) long; body mass estimates of the subadult holotype specimen range from 28.3 to 46.9 metric tons (31.2 to 51.7 short tons). It had a disproportionately long neck, small skull, and large overall size, all of which are typical for sauropods. Atypically, Brachiosaurus had longer forelimbs than hindlimbs, which resulted in a steeply inclined trunk, and a proportionally shorter tail.
  
  Brachiosaurus is the namesake genus of the family Brachiosauridae, which includes a handful of other similar sauropods. Most popular depictions of Brachiosaurus are in fact based on Giraffatitan, a genus of brachiosaurid dinosaur from the Tendaguru Formation of Tanzania. Giraffatitan was originally described by German paleontologist Werner Janensch in 1914 as a species of Brachiosaurus, B. brancai, but moved to its own genus in 2009. Three other species of Brachiosaurus have been named based on fossils found in Africa and Europe; two are no longer considered valid, and a third has become a separate genus, Lusotitan. (Full article...)
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  The Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building two days after the bombing, viewed from across the adjacent parking lot

  
  The Oklahoma City bombing was a domestic terrorist truck bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States, on April 19, 1995, the second anniversary of the end to the Waco siege. The bombing remains the deadliest act of domestic terrorism in U.S. history.
  
  Perpetrated by anti-government extremists Timothy McVeigh, the mastermind, and Terry Nichols, the bombing occurred at 9:02 a.m. and killed 168 people, injured 684, and destroyed more than one-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. Local, state, federal, and worldwide agencies engaged in extensive rescue efforts in the wake of the bombing. 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 indirectly after being struck on the head by falling debris after the bombing. (Full article...)

Did you know (auto-generated) -

• ... that college debates in the United States were originally conducted entirely in Latin?
• ... that United States Air Force brigadier general E. Daniel Cherry became close friends with the Vietnamese pilot whom he shot down during the Vietnam War?
• ... that Jerold F. Lucey introduced phototherapy to the United States as a treatment for jaundice in newborns?
• ... that the United States Conciliation Service, which was part of the U.S. Department of Labor, came to an end because the writers of the Taft–Hartley Act thought that the service was too partial to labor?
• ... that Monaco GP was the most popular arcade driving game in the United States in 1981?
• ... that the theme of the board game Parks is based on the national parks of the United States?
• ... that Frances Cleveland was the first United States first lady to have dedicated journalists write about her activities?
• ... that Bill Smyth fought as a Marine at Iwo Jima and later played four seasons for the Los Angeles Rams?

Selected society biography -

Edwin Taylor Pollock (1870–1943) was a career officer in the United States Navy, serving in both the Spanish–American War and World War I. As a young ensign, Pollock served on board USS New York during the Spanish–American War. After the war, he gradually rose through the ranks and served on many ships, including conducting important research into wireless communication. Less than a week before World War I, he won a race against a fellow officer to be the one to officially sign over the U.S. Virgin Islands from Denmark and serve as the territory's first acting-governor. During the war, he was promoted to captain and successfully transferred 60,000 American soldiers to France, for which he was awarded a Navy Cross. Subsequently, he was made the eighth Naval Governor of American Samoa and then the superintendent of the United States Naval Observatory, before retiring in 1927.

Selected image -

• 
  First cabinet of Barack Obama

  Photograph: Chuck Kennedy

  The first cabinet of Barack Obama, photographed in the White House East Room in September 2009. Consisting of the heads of the sixteen United States federal executive departments and seven additional members, the Cabinet of the United States acts as an advisory body to the President. Of the persons shown, five (Gary Locke, Peter R. Orszag, Christina Romer, Rahm Emanuel, and Robert Gates) left the Obama administration before the end of the president's first term.
• 
  Jane Russell

  Photograph credit: George Hurrell

  Jane Russell (June 21, 1921 – February 28, 2011) was an American actress, singer, and model who became one of Hollywood's leading sex symbols in the 1940s and 1950s. This publicity still, depicting Russell reclining on a bed of hay and holding a pistol, was taken by George Hurrell for her film debut in Howard Hughes's film The Outlaw (1943), which launched her career. She went on to star in more than twenty films, including opposite Marilyn Monroe in the hugely successful Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953).
• 
  Boston Massacre

  Engraving: Paul Revere

  A depiction of the Boston Massacre, an incident on March 5, 1770, in which British Army soldiers killed five male civilians and injured six others in Boston, Massachusetts. Eight soldiers, one officer, and four civilians were arrested and charged with murder, though all but two were acquitted; two soldiers were convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to branding. During the era of discontent that led to the American Revolution, this event was used for anti-British propaganda.
• 
  Pauline Adams

  Photograph credit: unknown; restored by Adam Cuerden

  Pauline Adams (1874–1957) was an Irish-American suffragist. On 4 September 1917, she and twelve other activists were arrested for attempting to "flaunt their banners" in front of President Woodrow Wilson's reviewing stand before a Selective Service parade in Washington, D.C., and they chose prison rather than paying a 25-dollar fine. This photograph depicts Adams seated at a table, wearing prison uniform and holding a cup in her raised right hand. The image was published in the newspaper The Suffragist in 1919.
• 
  Point Cabrillo Light

  Photograph: Frank Schulenburg

  The Point Cabrillo Light is a lighthouse in northern California, United States, between Point Arena and Cape Mendocino, just south of the community of Caspar. It is part of the California state park system as Point Cabrillo Light Station State Historic Park. Completed in 1909, the lighthouse was manned by the United States Coast Guard from 1939 until it was automated in 1973. Beginning in 1996, the station was restored to the state it would have been in the 1930s.
• 
  C. Everett Koop

  Photograph: United States Public Health Service; restoration: Adam Cuerden

  C. Everett Koop (1916–2013) was an American pediatric surgeon and public health administrator. He was a vice admiral in the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, and served as the 13th Surgeon General of the United States under President Ronald Reagan from 1982 to 1989. Koop was known for his work to reduce tobacco use, AIDS, and abortion, and for his support of the rights of disabled children.
• 
  1900 United States presidential election

  Image: Northwestern Litho. Co.; Restoration: NativeForeigner

  A campaign poster from the 1900 United States presidential election for the incumbent William McKinley, who would eventually win. The poster shows McKinley standing on a gold coin, representing the gold standard, with support from soldiers, businessmen, farmers and professionals, claiming to restore prosperity at home and victory abroad. The election was a repeat of the 1896 election, pitting McKinley against William Jennings Bryan.
• 
  Denver

  Photograph: William Henry Jackson; Restoration: Bammesk

  Denver is the capital and most populous municipality of the U.S. state of Colorado. It is located in the South Platte River Valley on the western edge of the High Plains, just east of the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains. Founded in 1858, the city is named after James W. Denver, a governor of the Kansas Territory, and it is nicknamed the Mile High City because its official elevation is exactly one mile (5280 feet or 1609.3 meters) above sea level. Formerly part of Arapahoe County, Denver became a consolidated city-county in 1902.
  
  This picture shows a panorama of Denver in around 1898, viewed from the top of the Colorado State Capitol, facing northwest and looking down 16th St. The domed building on the left is the former Arapahoe County Courthouse, demolished in 1933, and the Brown Palace Hotel is visible on the righthand side.
• 
  Bryce Canyon National Park

  Photograph credit: Tony Jin

  Bryce Canyon National Park is an American national park located in southwestern Utah. The major feature of the park is Bryce Canyon, which despite its name, is not a canyon, but a collection of giant natural amphitheaters along the eastern side of the Paunsaugunt Plateau. This panoramic view, as seen from Inspiration Point, shows the colorful Claron Formation, from which the park's delicate hoodoos are carved; the sediments were laid down in a system of streams and lakes that existed from 63 to about 40 million years ago (from the Paleocene to the Eocene epochs). The brown, pink and red colors are from hematite, the yellows from limonite, and the purples from pyrolusite.
• 
  Construction of Mount Rushmore

  Photo credit: Rise Studio

  The construction of Mount Rushmore, a United States National Monument depicting the heads of four U.S. Presidents carved into the Black Hills of South Dakota, began on August 10, 1927, with the bust of George Washington. This first phase was completed in seven years (partial completion in 1932 shown here), culminating in its unveiling in 1934. The remaining three heads—Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt—took only an additional seven years to complete.
• 
  Lillian Ascough

  Photograph credit: Edmonston; restored by Adam Cuerden

  Lillian Ascough (1880–1974) was an American suffragist. She served as the Connecticut chair of the National Woman's Party (NWP) and the vice president of the Michigan branch of the NWP. She was a speaker in the Suffrage Special, an event created by the Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage in 1916, which toured the "free states" which had already allowed women's suffrage in the United States. This formal photographic portrait of Ascough was taken around 1915 and published in the magazine The Suffragist.
• 
  Seattle, Washington

  Photo credit: Cacophony

  The skyline of Seattle, Washington at dusk, viewed from the south. The Columbia Center (middle) is the second tallest building on the West Coast of the United States, and the twelfth tallest in the United States. Smith Tower (left), completed 1914, was at one time the fourth tallest building in the world. The highway in the foreground is Interstate 5.
• 
  Art and engraving on United States banknotes

  Engraving credit: W. W. Rice, after Robert Walter Weir; restored by Andrew Shiva

  Artists producing art and engraving on United States banknotes began experimenting with copper plates as an alternative to wood engraving in the early 18th century. Applied to the production of paper currency, copper-plate engraving, and later steel engraving, enabled banknote design and printing to rapidly advance during the 19th century. This vignette, engraved by W. W. Rice, appeared on certain United States fifty-dollar bills issued in 1875. Produced for the Department of the Treasury's Bureau of Engraving and Printing, the engraving is of Robert Walter Weir's painting Embarkation of the Pilgrims, which hangs in the United States Capitol rotunda. It depicts the Pilgrims on the deck of the ship Speedwell as they depart Delfshaven in South Holland on July 22, 1620. They met additional colonists at Southampton, England, and transferred to the Mayflower before sailing to the New World.
• 
  Martha Ann Honeywell

  Cutout credit: Martha Ann Honeywell

  Martha Ann Honeywell (1786–1856) was an American disabled artist who produced silhouettes and paper-cutout images using only her mouth, arm stumps and toes, often in public performances. She sold cutouts such as this one as souvenirs. The text at the center of this cutout, with framed dimensions of
  '"`UNIQ--templatestyles-0000001F-QINU`"'
  8+1⁄4 in × 7+5⁄8 in (21 cm × 19 cm), is the standard text of the Lord's Prayer, signed underneath with the inscription "Written without hands by Martha Honeywell". The work is now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
• 
  New Kensington, Pennsylvania

  Lithograph: Thaddeus Mortimer Fowler; restoration: Adam Cuerden

  A lithograph by Thaddeus Mortimer Fowler showing the town of New Kensington, Pennsylvania, in 1896. Originally part of Burrell (and later Lower Burrell) Township, the city of New Kensington was founded in 1891. During the public sale held on June 10, 1891, thousands of people came to the area, including a number of investors, including the Pittsburgh Reduction Company, which later became Alcoa. The city continued to grow and, as of 2010, New Kensington has a population of 13,116.

Selected culture biography -

Michael Jordan (born February 17, 1963) is a retired American professional basketball player. Widely considered one of the greatest basketball players of all time, he became one of the most effectively marketed athletes of his generation and was instrumental in popularizing the NBA (National Basketball Association) around the world in the 1980s and 1990s. Jordan joined the NBA's Chicago Bulls in 1984 and quickly emerged as one of the stars of the league. His leaping ability, illustrated by performing slam dunks from the foul line at Slam Dunk Contests, earned him the nicknames "Air Jordan" and "His Airness". Jordan's individual accolades and accomplishments include five NBA MVP (Most Valuable Player) awards, ten All-NBA First Team designations, nine All-Defensive First Team honors, fourteen NBA All-Star Game appearances and three All-Star MVPs, ten scoring titles, three steals titles, six NBA Finals MVP awards, and the 1988 NBA Defensive Player of the Year Award. He holds the NBA record for highest career regular season scoring average with 30.1 points per game, as well as averaging a record 33.4 points per game in the playoffs. In 1999, he was named the greatest North American athlete of the 20th century by ESPN, and was second to Babe Ruth on the Associated Press's list of athletes of the century.

Selected location -

Interstate 15 in Arizona is part of Interstate 15 (I-15), a transcontinental Interstate Highway from San Diego, California, to the Canadian border. The highway segment passes through Mohave County in the far northwest corner of the U.S. state of Arizona. Despite its length of 29.43 miles (47.36 km) and isolation from the rest of the state in the remote Arizona Strip, it is notable for the scenic section through the Virgin River Gorge. The highway heads in a northeasterly direction from the Nevada border northeast of Mesquite, Nevada, to the Utah border southwest of St. George, Utah. The southern portion of the routing of I-15 was built close to the alignment of the old U.S. Route 91, but the northern section through the Virgin River Gorge was built along an alignment that previously had no road. The southern section of the highway was complete and opened in the early 1960s, while the section through the gorge did not open to traffic until 1973. When it opened, the portion of I-15 through the Virgin River Gorge was the most expensive section of rural Interstate per mile.

Selected quote -

Anniversaries for November 12

• 1936 – In California, the San Francisco – Oakland Bay Bridge opens to traffic.
• 1970 – The Oregon Highway Division attempts to destroy a rotting beached Sperm whale with explosives, leading to the now infamous "exploding whale" incident.
• 1979 – Iran hostage crisis: In response to the hostage situation in Tehran, US President Jimmy Carter orders a halt to all petroleum imports into the United States from Iran.
• 1980 – The NASA space probe Voyager I makes its closest approach to Saturn and takes the first images of its rings.
• 1981 – Space Shuttle program: Mission STS-2, utilizing the Space Shuttle Columbia, marks the first time a manned spacecraft is launched into space twice.
• 2001 – In New York City, American Airlines Flight 587, an Airbus A300 en route to the Dominican Republic, crashes minutes after takeoff from John F. Kennedy International Airport, killing all 260 on board and five on the ground.

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 -

Albany, New York and the Hudson River

Albany, New York and the Hudson River

More did you know? -

• ... that the Catskills' Esopus Creek (pictured, near Shandaken) is one of the most productive trout streams in the Northeast?
• ... that although the Anacostia Waterfront Corporation was created in 2004 to implement a 20-year, $8 billion redevelopment plan in Washington, D.C., it was abolished after just three years?
• ... that Max Desfor's image Flight of Refugees Across Wrecked Bridge in Korea was taken during the longest retreat in the military history of the United States?

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