[ad_1] The word “Seminole” is derived from the Muscogean word simanó-li, or “runaway,” reflecting a common heritage, as Upper Creeks from Alabama, Lower Creeks from Georgia, other affiliated tribes and escaped African slaves all sought sanctuary in Spanish Florida. There they mixed with one another, adapted to their surroundings, traded with Britain, Spain and the United […]

[ad_1] Books Buffalo Bill: Scout, Showman, Visionary (2010, by Steve Friesen) This is my biography of William Frederick “Buffalo Bill” Cody, written when I was the director of the Buffalo Bill Museum & Grave. What sets it apart is a wealth of original photographs and images of artifacts and documents associated with the showman’s life, […]

[ad_1] Fresh from robbing the Deadwood Stagecoach, the Sioux performers of Buffalo Bill’s Wild West changed into loose-fitting Chinese garb and attached long single braids to the backs of their heads, mimicking the clothing and hairstyle of the Boxers then rebelling halfway around the world. Thus was the stage set for the “Western Easterners” to […]

[ad_1] The California Gold Rush. The very words evoked the strong reaction of an American populace driven by adventure and a lust for easy riches. Drawn inexorably west in the wake of the Jan. 24, 1848, strike at Sutter’s Mill were argonauts from every walk of life—shopkeepers, former soldiers, fallen women and those willing to […]

[ad_1] O n the evening of June 5, 1944, Louis Leroux, his wife, and their six children scrambled atop an embankment near their farm to investigate the sounds of distant explosions. Three miles south, Allied fighter-bombers were attacking bridges over the Douve River on France’s Cotentin Peninsula. In the fading twilight the family watched silhouetted […]

[ad_1] Of all the city slickers ever to venture into the 19th century American West, Oscar Wilde towered above the rest, preening like a peacock with his ostentatious wardrobe, his philosophy of art and his knack for spilling printer’s ink across the pages of Western newspapers. In the parlance of the cowboy, Wilde exemplified the […]

[ad_1] Frenchman Henri Farman was already a celebrated cycling champion, race car driver and entrepreneur when he ordered a biplane from the world’s first airplane factory, Les Frères Voisin. Five months later, in January 1908, he won Ernest Archdeacon’s prize for the first officially observed heavier-than-air flight over a one-kilometer circular course. A week after […]

[ad_1] To the disbelief of gaping onlookers in the packed stands at El Toreo, Mexico City’s largest bullring, American rodeo performer Bill Pickett clung to the horns of a massive Mexican bull ironically named Frijoles Chiquitos (“Little Beans”). Watching from a safe distance in the saddle atop jittery horses were cowhand Vester Pegg and siblings […]

[ad_1] The Curtiss-Wright Corporation came into being in 1929 through the merger of companies started by pioneering aviators Glenn Curtiss and the Wright brothers. Within the new company, the Curtiss-Wright airplane division made airplanes while the Wright Aeronautical Corporation focused on engines. By the time of World War II, Curtiss-Wright held more defense contracts than […]

[ad_1] By the end of the Civil War, it is estimated that surgeons on both sides had conducted roughly 60,000 amputations. With the increased number of disabled veterans, the prosthetic industry saw great advances. Many of these veterans, however, decided not to wear artificial limbs for various reasons, including not wishing to take “charity” from […]