In honor of Juneteenth, we highlight our Headlines and Heroes blogs focusing on African American history and culture, ranging from a look at fugitive slave ads to our acquisition of a rare comic book series, Negro Romance.
Events in Rosa Parks' life are chronicled in newspapers and comic books and reinforce her well-justified iconic status. At times, though, their simplified coverage perpetuates the myth of Parks as the quiet seamstress who was too tired to stand to give up her seat.
"I was worried that the moon might be too soft and that he would sink in too deeply," Viola Armstrong, Neil Armstrong's mother. This mother's heartfelt concern appears in a newspaper from Neil Armstrong';s hometown of Wapakoneta, Ohio.
“We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal…” On July 20, 1848 in Seneca Falls, New York, the first Woman’s Rights Convention approved a Declaration of Sentiments, which had been drafted by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and modeled after the Declaration of Independence in its commitment to secure women’s …
In 1860, the 3rd edition of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass received a wildly varying reception in newspapers. At opposite ends of the spectrum, it was advertised as “America’s First Distinctive Poem” and reviewed as “armless, witless, pointless.” The advertisement was from the volume’s …
Catherine Wolfe Donohue is not a well-known name, but in the late 1930s newspapers featured her as she lay dying. She was among the women who painted luminous numbers on watch, clock, and instrument dials using radium-laced paint in factories in New Jersey, Illinois, and Connecticut. Dubbed “Radium Girls” and “Living Dead,” they suffered radium …
This is a guest post by Valerie Haeder, a reference librarian in the Serial and Government Publications Division. A handful of presidents are remembered for their greatness, but most are relegated to the footnotes of history. Even fewer vice presidents have achieved fame and favor, with one—Vice President John Nance Garner who served under Franklin …
One hundred years ago, on February 17, 1919, the African-American 369th Infantry Regiment, popularly known as the Harlem Hell Fighters, marched up Fifth Avenue into Harlem in a massive victory parade in their honor. “Hell Fighters” was the nickname the German enemy gave the 369th and the name stuck for good reason. They were among the …
One hundred years ago, on January 25, 1919, the delegates to the Paris Peace Conference approved a proposal to create the League of Nations. Nearly a year later, on January 16, 1920, the League held its first meeting with its stated principal mission of maintaining world peace. American newspapers presented conflicting views of the League …