The system of mail delivery by horse-and-rider relays lasted only 18 months, from April 1860 to October 1861.
It connected Saint Joseph, Missouri, with Sacramento, California, a distance of 1,800 miles.
The completion of the transcontinental telegraph system brought the Pony Express to an end.
The name “America” first appeared in print in 1507 in Cosmographiae Introductio by German mapmaker Martin Waldseemuller. Waldseemiiller named it in honor of explorer Amerigo Vespucci, whom he believed was the true discoverer of America. Vespucci’s claims to have been the first to reach the American mainland (in 1497) and the first to realize that…
Harry Truman didn’t attend college. He was the only president in the 20th century without a college education.
Warren G. Harding was the first president to speak over the radio, on June 14, 1922.
Humorist Dorothy Parker made the quip “How can they tell?” after U.S. President Calvin Coolidge’s death in 1933.
Only one ancient Norse settlement has been discovered in North America. The remains of a colony at L’Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland were discovered by Norwegian archeologists in the 1960s. Settled in the 11th century, it may have been a staging area for explorations to the south.
The sheep at the White House were part of the war effort. In 1917, during World War I, President Wilson arranged for a small flock of sheep to graze on the White House lawn, thus freeing up the regular gardeners for military service. Although the sheep began eating more of the White House grounds than…