Prologue: Pieces of History

You may have seen some of these beards and mustaches before! The mug shots of prisoners at Leavenworth Penitentiary have been featured here and here. But the images above take facial hair to a whole new level! Staff at the National Archives at Kansas City got together and created Potatriot dioramas (inspired by this post). [...]

I am excited to introduce this week’s guest judge, Dominic McDevitt-Parks, who is working on several projects as our Wikipedian-in-Residence this summer. Surprised that we support Wikipedia? Well, it turns out that the Archivist is a big fan of the web site and its work! Congratulations to Andrew P! Check your e-mail for 15% off in our eStore. [...]

“What’s Cooking, Uncle Sam?,” our current special exhibition in Washington, DC, examines the Government’s effect on what Americans eat. Government influence was especially visible during wartime, when many food products were reserved for feeding the troops and our Allies. During World War I, the U.S. Food Administration, headed by Herbert Hoover, urged the American people [...]

Al Capone—the quintessential American gangster—headed the nation’s most notorious organized crime syndicate for more than a decade during Prohibition. Through smuggling, bootlegging, and a variety of other criminal operations, his “Chicago Outfit” was able to dominate America’s illegal liquor trade throughout the 1920s. But did you know that Al Capone was never convicted of violating [...]

This week saw the 150th anniversary of the first Battle of Manassas, with hundreds of reenactors and spectators ignoring the extreme heat and coming to the Virginia battlefield. There was another, stranger Civil War anniversary today. On July 22, 1975, the House of Representatives joined the Senate in voting to restore full American citizenship to [...]