When did the passenger pigeon become extinct in the U.S.?
Once common in U.S. skies and hunted widely as cheap food, the last known passenger pigeon died in the Cincinnati Zoo on September 1, 1914.
Henry Ford adopted the eight-hour day and five-day week to alleviate a depression in the auto industry in 1926. The move to reduce working hours curbed overproduction and unemployment in the industry.
Legendary frontiersman Daniel Boone was an old man when Davy Crockett was just starting his own career as a backwoodsman. Born in Pennsylvania, Boone (1734-1820) is best known for his exploration and settlement of Kentucky. Crockett (1786-1836) served as a U.S. representative from Tennessee and died defending the Alamo. Both men are remembered in folklore…
What Peter Minuit gave the Manhattoe tribe was a package of trinkets and cloth valued at 60 guilders, roughly equivalent to $24.
Of the 22.4 million Hispanic-Americans counted in the 1990 census, more than 60 percent (13.5 million) are of Mexican heritage. Another 2.7 million are Puerto Rican, 1 million are Cuban, and the rest are “other.” All together, Hispanics, who can be of any race, account for 9 percent of the U.S. population.
In her popular manual for housewives, The American Woman’s Home, published with her sister Harriet Beecher Stowe in 1869, Beecher encouraged a systematic and orderly approach to the noble duties of housework. She suggested this schedule: Monday—prepare for the week Tuesday—wash Wednesday—iron Thursday—iron, mend, fold and put away clothes Friday—sweep and clean the house Saturday—arrange…
Jeannette Rankin (1880-1973) was elected as Montana’s sole delegate to the House of Representatives in 1916. After serving her term, she was not reelected until 1940. A pacifist, she holds the distinction of being the only member of Congress to have voted against American participation in both World Wars.