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- Pocahontas was a Native American woman, belonging to the Powhatan people, notable for her association with the colonial settlement at Jamestown, Virginia. She was the daughter of Powhatan, the paramount chief of a network of tributary tribes in the Tsenacommacah, encompassing the Tidewater region of Virginia. Pocahontas's birth year is unknown, but some historians estimate it to have been around 1596. In A True Relation of Virginia (1608), Smith described meeting Pocahontas in the spring of 1608 when she was "a child of ten years old." In a 1616 letter, he again described her as she was in 1608, but this time as "a child of twelve or thirteen years of age.
- Cotton Mather FRS (February 12, 1663 - February 13, 1728) was a New England Puritan clergyman and a prolific writer. Educated at Harvard College, in 1685 he joined his father Increase as minister of the Congregationalist Old North Meeting House of Boston, where he continued to preach for the rest of his life. A major intellectual and public figure in English-speaking colonial America, Cotton Mather helped lead the successful revolt of 1689 against Sir Edmund Andros, the governor imposed on New England by King James II. Mather's subsequent involvement in the Salem witch trials of 1692-1693, which he defended in the book Wonders of the Invisible World (1693), attracted intense controversy in his own day and has negatively affected his historical reputation. As a historian of colonial New England, Mather is noted for his Magnalia Christi Americana (1702).
- Benjamin Franklin FRS FRSA FRSE (January 17, 1706 - April 17, 1790) was an American polymath who was active as a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher, and political philosopher. Among the leading intellectuals of his time, Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States, a drafter and signer of the United States Declaration of Independence, and the first United States Postmaster General.
- American planter, politician and delegate to the U.S. Constitutional Convention of 1787, one of three delegates who refused to sign the Constitution. His writings, including substantial portions of the Fairfax Resolves of 1774, the Virginia Declaration of Rights of 1776, and his Objections to this Constitution of Government (1787) opposing ratification, have exercised a significant influence on American political thought and events.
- Mercy Otis Warren was a published poet, political playwright and satirist during the age of the American Revolution-a time when women were encouraged and expected to keep silent on political matters. Warren not only engaged with the leading figures of the day-such as John, Abigail, and Samuel Adams-but she became an outspoken commentator and historian, as well as the leading female intellectual of the Revolution and early republic.
Born on September 14, 1728 in Barnstable, Massachusetts, Warren was the third of thirteen children of James Otis and Mary Allyne Otis. Her exposure to politics began early; her father was an attorney who was elected to the Massachusetts legislature in 1745. Like most girls at the time, Warren had no formal education; hers came from sitting in on her brother's lessons, where she took a particular interest in history and politics. She also made extensive use of her uncle's large book collection to educate herself.
In 1754, she wed the politically active James Warren, a classmate of her brother's at Harvard, who encouraged her to pursue writing. The couple had five sons. After James Warren's election to the Massachusetts Legislature in 1766, the Warrens began hosting leading citizens in their Plymouth home, particularly those opposed to British policies. In fact, Warren herself would maintain a lifelong, though at times tumultuous, friendship with John Adams, which included extensive letters on the nature of the new republic.
An avid patriot, Warren began writing political dramas that denounced British policies and key officials in Massachusetts, notably Governor Thomas Hutchinson. Her 1772 satire, "The Adulator" (published anonymously in the Massachusetts Spy newspaper), criticized the British colonial governor's policies a full four years before Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence. Warren also published two additional plays skewering British colonial leaders, Defeat (1773) and The Group (1775.) She supported the Boston Tea Party and boycotts of British imports and urged other women to follow suit.
From the outset of the American Revolution, Warren began writing its history, which was published in 1805 as History of the Rise, Progress and Termination of the American Revolution. This was among the first nonfiction book published by a woman in America, and she was the third woman (after Anne Bradstreet and Phillis Wheatley) to publish a book of poems. Some of her other works-Poems, Dramatic and Miscellaneous, for example-were similarly influenced by her first-hand experiences with the war. Warren, who embraced the natural rights philosophy that undergirded the Patriot cause, was hopeful that it would lead to egalitarian and democratic policies in the new republic and beyond. A Jeffersonian Republican, she took a firm stand against ratification of the Constitution, which put her at odds with conservative political friend, John Adams, a champion of the document. Likely based on her personal experiences, she opposed women's lack of access to formal education.
Warren lived to age eighty-six. She remained vital even in her final years, continuing to write and correspond with political friends. - George Washington was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Father who served as the first president of the United States from 1789 to 1797. Appointed by the Continental Congress as commander of the Continental Army, Washington led the Patriot forces to victory in the American Revolutionary War and served as the president of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, which created the Constitution of the United States and the American federal government. Washington has been called the "Father of the Nation" for his manifold leadership in the formative days of the country.
- John Dickinson was born on 8 November 1732 in Croisadore, near Trappe, Province of Maryland, British America [now Maryland, USA]. John was married to Mary 'Polly' Norris. John died on 14 February 1808 in Wilmington, Delaware, USA.
- John Adams was born on 30 October 1735 in Braintree, Massachusetts, USA. He was a writer, known for Biography (1987). He was married to Abigail Smith. He died on 4 July 1826 in Quincy, Massachusetts, USA.
- Benedict Arnold was born on 14 January 1741 in Norwich, Connecticut, USA. He died on 14 June 1801 in London, England.
- Thomas Jefferson was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was previously the second vice president of the United States under John Adams and the first United States secretary of state under George Washington. The principal author of the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson was a proponent of democracy, republicanism, and individual rights, motivating American colonists to break from the Kingdom of Great Britain and form a new nation. He produced formative documents and decisions at state, national, and international levels.
- He enjoyed a humanistic school education. Madison completed his studies in 1771 with a Bachelor of Arts. He showed particular interest in the new ideas of the time, the Enlightenment, with which he dealt intensively. He became politically active at an early age. In 1776 he was elected to the Virginia Convention, which advocated independence and a constitution. During the American Revolution he campaigned for the colonial resistance movement against Great Britain in Virginia. Here he met the governor and later President Thomas Jefferson, with whom he became lifelong friends. In 1780, James Madison was elected to the Continental Congress, where he advocated for a strong central government that would help complete American liberation. The planter was instrumental in the preparations for the Philadelphia Constitutional Convention, where he drafted the so-called "Virginia Plan" in May 1787.
In it, Madison advocated for a strong national central government that would guarantee personal freedoms, party diversity, and federal freedoms. With this model of a balanced party system that should lead to a mutual sharing of power, Madison founded the basic principle of the republican system of government in the USA. From 1789 to 1797, Madison represented Virginia in Congress. In 1794 he married Dolley Payne Todd. After supporting the presidential campaign of his friend Thomas Jefferson, Madison was appointed Secretary of State when he took office in 1801. In the election campaign of 1808, Madison himself was elected fourth president of the United States. Although he became embroiled in war with Great Britain on June 18, 1812, Madison was re-elected to a second term that same year.
The war with Great Britain was initially very disadvantageous for the USA. In 1814, Madison watched as the Capitol and White House were set ablaze by British troops. Nevertheless, the President was able to end the war with an advantageous peace agreement within the end of the year. A hugely popular leader, Madison left the office of president in March 1817. In the coming years he assisted Jefferson in planning the University of Virginia. He acted as an advisor to the next President James Monroe. In 1829, Madison officially returned to political life to attend the Virginia Constitutional Convention. He then withdrew into private life as a quiet observer of politics.
James Madison died on June 28, 1836 in Montpelier, Virginia. - Fisher Ames was born on 9 April 1758 in Dedham, Massachusetts, USA. Fisher died on 4 July 1808 in Dedham, Suffolk County [now Norfolk County], Massachusetts, USA.
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James Monroe was born on 28 April 1758 in Westmoreland County, Virginia, USA. He was a writer. He was married to Elizabeth Kortright. He died on 4 July 1831 in New York City, New York, USA.- After school, he enrolled in college in 1774, but dropped out two years later at the start of the American Revolution to join the Virginia Army. During the fighting, Monroe was wounded and promoted to major. In 1782, Monroe began studying law and became friends with Thomas Jefferson. With this he was represented in Virginia's delegation to the Continental Congress from 1783 to 1786. During this time, Monroe married Elizabeth Kortright.
After practicing law for several years, Monroe was elected to the Senate in 1790. In this role, together with James Madison and Jefferson, he organized the opposition to President George Washington, which eventually developed into the Republican Party. From 1794 to 1796, Monroe served as an envoy to revolutionary France. In 1799 he was elevated to governor of Virginia. In this role he helped suppress a slave rebellion the following year.
In 1803, Monroe was again in diplomatic service in France, where he negotiated the American purchase of Louisiana with Robert R. Livingston. From 1804 to 1807 he served as an envoy to Great Britain. In 1811, under James Madison's presidency, Monroe was appointed Secretary of State. During the military conflict with Great Britain in 1814/15 he also served as Minister of War. As a Republican candidate, Monroe won the presidential election in 1816.
During his double term in office from 1817 to 1825, he developed a policy of internal consolidation that included expanding the army, strengthening the US Bank and enforcing protectionism. During his presidency, he established the "Era of Good Feeling", which was based on restoring political harmony and overcoming partisan differences. The president's power of integration was expressed in the elections of 1820, in which Monroe received all the votes unopposed.
In the area of foreign policy, Monroe was able to claim Florida in 1819. On the question of recognizing the independent Latin American states, the US President took an independent position vis-à-vis the major European powers. In his annual address of December 2, 1823, Monroe rejected any European intervention in Latin America to restore Spanish dominance. He also reiterated the United States' intention not to interfere in the internal affairs of other nations.
This foreign policy program, then known as the "Monroe Doctrine," was to determine the isolationist and hegemonic course of US foreign policy for a long time. After Monroe left the presidency in 1825, he became involved with the University of Virginia. In 1829 he attended the Virginia Constitutional Convention with James Madison.
James Monroe died on July 4, 1831 in New York City. - Andrew Jackson was an American lawyer, general, and statesman who served as the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before being elected to the presidency, Jackson gained fame as a general in the United States Army and served in both houses of the U.S. Congress. An expansionist president, Jackson sought to advance the rights of the "common man" against a "corrupt aristocracy" and to preserve the Union.
- His father, John Adams, served as the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. In 1779, at the age of 12, the young Adams accompanied his father to Europe. There the linguistically gifted boy supported the US embassy as a translator and secretary. When Adams enrolled at Harvard in 1785, he already had knowledge of Greek, Latin, French, Dutch and German. After studying law, he began working as a lawyer in Boston in 1790. At the same time, he gained a certain level of notoriety by writing political essays for the press in support of George Washington's administration. In 1793 the young Adams was sent to the Netherlands as a diplomat. On a diplomatic mission to London he met the American consulate's daughter Louisa Catherine Johnson, whom he married in 1797. In the same year Adams was sent as an envoy to Prussia.
Returning to the United States, he was elected to the Massachusetts Senate in 1801. In 1803 he was appointed to the US Senate, where he served until 1808. In 1809, Adams went on a diplomatic mission to Russia, where he was able to win over Tsar Alexander as a mediator in the American conflict with Great Britain. In 1812 he helped negotiate the peace treaty with Great Britain. From 1815 Adams worked as an ambassador in London. Two years later, he was appointed Secretary of State by President James Monroe. In complete agreement with the president, in this role until 1825 he contributed to raising the USA to an equal size with the European powers, giving them independent diplomacy and helping them make territorial gains. In this context, Adams was instrumental in the negotiations that led to the acquisition of Florida and the securing of Louisiana's western border. In 1823 he contributed to the development of the "Monroe Doctrine".
In 1824, Adams won the American presidential election to become the sixth president of the United States for one term from the following year. However, his policy of internal reform and national consolidation was largely unsuccessful due to opposition resistance. In the election campaign of 1828, John Quincy Adams was overwhelmingly defeated by Andrew Jackson, who succeeded him as president a year later. After a temporary withdrawal from political life, Adams was elected to the House of Representatives in 1831, where he served until his death in 1848. As an independent, he took up the demand for the abolition of slavery without joining the ranks of the abolitionists. Soon after, he suffered a stroke in the House of Representatives.
John Quincy Adams died on February 23, 1848 in Washington. - William Clark (August 1, 1770 - September 1, 1838) was an American explorer, soldier, Indian agent, and territorial governor. A native of Virginia, he grew up in Pre-statehood Kentucky before later settling in what became the state of Missouri. Along with Meriwether Lewis, Clark led the Lewis and Clark Expedition of 1804-1806 across the Louisiana Purchase to the Pacific Ocean, the first major effort to explore and map much of what is now the Western United States and to assert American claims to the Pacific Northwest. Before the expedition, he served in a militia and the United States Army. Afterward, he served in a militia and as governor of the Missouri Territory. From 1822 until his death in 1838, he served as Superintendent of Indian Affairs.
- Harrison, who was born on a plantation, also came from a distinguished family of planters and politicians. His father, Benjamin Harrison, was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence in 1776. He was governor of Virginia between 1781 and 1784. William Harrison initially studied at college and at the University of Pennsylvania. In 1792 he joined the army. In 1794 he was used against the Indians in Ohio. A year later, Harrison married Anna Tuthill Symmes, an Ohio girl. In 1798, Harrison left the army as a captain. Harrison was then elected as a representative in the US Congress. In 1801, President John Adams made him governor of Indiana. During his 12 years in office, Harrison proved himself in the fight against the Indians, who had come together to form a federation under the leadership of Tecumseh.
During the war with Great Britain from 1812 to 1814, he secured American rule over Indiana and the Northwest. Returning to Ohio, William Harrison was elected to the House of Representatives in 1816, where he was represented until 1819. In 1825 he was elected to the US Senate, where William Harrison was active until 1828. In 1828, President John Quincy Adams sent Harrison as an envoy to Colombia, but he was recalled the following year. After a temporary withdrawal from politics, Harrison was considered a candidate in the presidential election in 1836, which was won by Martin van Buren. In the following election campaign in 1840, Harrison was able to garner the majority of votes. In March 1841 he took office as the ninth President of the USA.
William Henry Harrison died of pneumonia in Washington just one month later, on April 4, 1841. He was succeeded by John Tyler. - Elbridge Gerry (July 17, 1744 - November 23, 1814) was an American Founding Father, politician, and diplomat who served as the fifth vice president of the United States under President James Madison from 1813 until his death in 1814. The political practice of gerrymandering is named after him. He was the second vice president to die in office.
- Meriwether Lewis was an American explorer, soldier, politician, and public administrator, best known for his role as the leader of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, also known as the Corps of Discovery, with William Clark. Their mission was to explore the territory of the Louisiana Purchase, establish trade with, and sovereignty over the natives near the Missouri River, and claim the Pacific Northwest and Oregon Country for the United States before European nations. They also collected scientific data, and information on indigenous nations. President Thomas Jefferson appointed him Governor of Upper Louisiana in 1806. He died of gunshot wounds in what was either a murder or suicide, in 1809. While the Louisiana Purchase was not made official until July 1803, president Jefferson secretly requested Congress to fund the expedition in January 1803.
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Clement Moore was born on 15 July 1779 in New York City, New York, USA. He was a writer, known for Lance's Crappy Christmas (2021), The Night Before Christmas (1912) and Mission Rejected (2019). He was married to Catherine Taylor. He died on 10 July 1863 in Newport, Rhode Island, USA.- Music Department
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Francis Scott Key was born to Ann Phoebe Penn Dogworthy and Captain James Ross Key at the family plantation Terra Rubra on August 1, 1779 in Frederick, Maryland. His father was a lawyer, judge, and officer in the Continental Army and his great grandparents Philip Key and Susanna Barton Gardiner where both born in England and immigrated to America in 1726. Francis graduated from St. John's College in Annapolis in 1796. During the War of 1812 Key was on board the British ship HMS Tomnant; he witnessed the bombarding of Fort McHenry during the Battle of Baltimore on the night of September 13-14, 1814. When the smoke cleared Francis saw an American flag still waving and was inspired to write the poem "The Defense of Fort McHenry." This poem was first published in the Patriot on September 20, 1814. It was subsequently set to the melody of composer John Stafford Smith's composition "To Anacreon in Heaven" and has gone on to be internationally known as "The Star-Spangled Banner." "The Star-Spangled Banner" was adopted as the American anthem by President Woodrow Wilson in 1916 and further confirmed as such by a Congressional resolution signed by President Herbert Hoover in 1931. Moreover, the stanza "In God is Our Trust" was adopted as the national motto by law in 1956. From 1817 to 1843 Key served as the Vice President of the American Bible Society. In 1832 he served as the attorney for Congressman Sam Houston during his trial in the U.S. House of Representatives for assaulting another Congressman. Francis published a prose work entitled "The Power of Literature and Its Connection to Religion" in 1834. In 1835 Francis prosecuted Richard Lawrence for his unsuccessful attempt at assassinating President Andrew Jackson. He was married to Mary "Polly" Tayloe Lloyd and was the father of nine children. Key died of pleurisy at age 63 on January 11, 1843 in Baltimore, Maryland.- Served as eighth President of the United States (1837-1841). He was one of the founders of the Democratic Party. He was the eighth Vice President of the United States (1833-1837) He was also the tenth Secretary of State. Martin Van Buren was the first President of the United States of the United States to actually be born in the United States. He was a major factor in the abolitionist movement.
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Washington Irving (April 3, 1783 - November 28, 1859) was an American short-story writer, essayist, biographer, historian, and diplomat of the early 19th century. He is best known for his short stories "Rip Van Winkle" (1819) and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" (1820), both of which appear in his collection The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. His historical works include biographies of Oliver Goldsmith, Muhammad and George Washington, as well as several histories of 15th-century Spain that deal with subjects such as Alhambra, Christopher Columbus and the Moors. Irving served as American ambassador to Spain in the 1840s.- Thomas Hastings was born on 15 October 1784 in Washington, Connecticut, USA. He died in 1872.
- Zachary Taylor was an American military leader who served as the 12th president of the United States from 1849 until his death in 1850. Taylor previously was a career officer in the United States Army, rising to the rank of major general and becoming a national hero as a result of his victories in the Mexican-American War. As a result, he won election to the White House despite his vague political beliefs. His top priority as president was preserving the Union. He died sixteen months into his term, having made no progress on the most divisive issue in Congress, slavery.
- Davy Crockett was born on 17 August 1786 in Limestone, Tennessee, USA.
- Favorite writer of generations of Americans, Cooper was born on Tuesday, September 15th, 1789, and grew up on his family's huge wooded settlement, in Cooperstown, New York, which his father, William Cooper, a prominent Federalist, had founded before this son's birth. His days as a Yale student were cut short when he was expelled for misbehavior. He gamely joined the navy, earning the rank of midshipman. On New Year's Day, Tuesday, January 1st, 1811 he married Susan Augusta De Lancey, settling down and writing prolifically, politically, and prodigiously. Eventually he and his wife moved south to an estate in Scarsdale, New York, where he continued to write and publish his critical, thoughtful, and creative works. Cooper died at Cooperstown on Sunday, September 14th, 1851, one day shy of reaching sixty-two.
- His father was governor of Virginia and a judge. After graduating from college in 1807, Tyler studied law. At 19 he was admitted to the bar. From 1811 to 1815, Tyler sat in the Virginia House of Delegates. He then served as a Democratic member of the US House of Representatives from 1817 to 1821. Tyler was appointed governor of Virginia in 1825. In 1827 he resigned from this position because he was now elected to the US Senate, where he was represented until 1836. In these positions, Tyler distinguished himself as a staunch advocate of the "states' rights" theory and a faithful interpretation of the Constitution. The doctrine advocated the primary sovereignty and independence of the US states over the federal government. After turning away from the Democratic Party, Tyler was elected vice president in 1840 as the Whig candidate.
However, the new President William Harrison died in 1841 after only a month in office. Therefore, Tyler succeeded him as the tenth President of the USA on April 4, 1841. Differences with his new Whig party blocked the new president's key domestic policy initiatives. As a southern aristocrat, the former Virginia governor and senator was only put forward to win southern voters for Harrison. However, his political views were opposed to those of the Whig Party, which represented the interests of the northeastern states with their emerging industry and business community - so he vetoed the establishment of a national bank, which was a fundamental concern of the Whigs and their most prominent senator, Henry Clay. In the fall of 1841, he was expelled from the Whig Party. In 1842, when he vetoed the tariff bill, Congress tried, but failed, to impeach him.
In the area of foreign policy, Tyler prepared the incorporation of Texas into the Union after his presidency. In 1842, his Secretary of State Daniel Webster was able to reach a border treaty with Great Britain that established the border between Maine and Canada. In the run-up to the Civil War, he campaigned for secession and was elected to the Congress of the Confederacy, but died of a stroke before he could take office. In the presidential election of 1844, Tyler was no longer a candidate. Tyler was replaced in 1845 by James Knox Polk. After his presidency, however, Tyler remained involved in political life. Shortly before his death, he was elected to the Congress of the Confederate States of America in 1861. The politician died before its meetings opened.
John Tyler died on January 18, 1862 in Richmond, Virginia. - After graduating from college in 1809, Buchanan became a lawyer. In 1814 he entered the Pennsylvania Assembly as a Federalist representative. In 1820 Buchanan was elected to the US House of Representatives, where he served until 1831. At the same time he served as envoy to Russia from 1823 to 1833. He became a leading figure in the newly emerging Democratic Party in Pennsylvania. From 1834 to 1845 he served in the US Senate, where he supported the southern states' position on the slave issue. Under the presidency of James Knox Polk (1845-1849), Buchanan played a key role in his expansionist policies as Secretary of State.
Meanwhile, he was chairman of the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations from 1836 to 1841. He reached an agreement with Great Britain on the Oregon issue. In the war against Mexico (1846-1848) he advocated the annexation of large parts of the neighboring country. President Franklin Pierce sent Buchanan as an envoy to Great Britain from 1853 to 1856. In 1856 he won the US presidential election as the Democratic candidate. The following year he began his term in the White House. Buchanan was the only unmarried President of the United States. His niece, Harriet Lane, served as "First Lady" during his term.
As with his predecessor Franklin Pierce, Buchanan's efforts at reconciliation and compromise were doomed to failure in view of the increasingly irreconcilable conflict over the slave issue. During his presidency, the Democratic Party was increasingly divided into northern and southern factions. An economic depression and conflict with the Mormons in Utah continued to complicate the domestic political environment of Buchanan's administration. Having already lost the 1860 presidential election to Abraham Lincoln, Buchanan faced his final crisis in office with the secession of South Carolina.
The US President lacked the ability to take decisive action to counteract the southern state's secession from the Union. Amid allegations of having been responsible for the dissolution of the Union and the outbreak of the American Civil War, Buchanan bitterly withdrew from the presidency and politics in 1861.
James Buchanan died on June 1, 1868 in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. - Writer
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John Howard Payne was born on 9 June 1791 in East Hampton, New York, USA. He was a writer, known for The Family Stone (2005), The Chechahcos (1923) and First Love (1939). He died on 10 April 1852 in Tunis, Tunisia.- Music Department
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Lowell Mason was born on 8 January 1792 in Medfield, Massachusetts, USA. He is known for Reindeer Games (2000), Get Carter (2000) and Mute (2018). He died on 11 August 1872 in Orange, New Jersey, USA.- Sound Department
Sam Houston is an American soldier and politician. An important leader of the Texas Revolution, Houston served as the first and third president of the Republic of Texas, and was one of the first two individuals to represent Texas in the United States Senate. He also served as the sixth governor of Tennessee and the seventh governor of Texas, the only American to be elected governor of two different states in the United States.
Born in Rockbridge County, Virginia, Houston and his family migrated to Maryville, Tennessee when Houston was a teenager. Houston later ran away from home and spent time with the Cherokee, becoming known as Raven. He served under General Andrew Jackson in the War of 1812. With the support of Jackson and others, Houston won election to the United States House of Representatives in 1823. He strongly supported Jackson's presidential candidacies, and in 1827, Houston was elected as the governor of Tennessee. In 1829, Houston resigned from office, and joined his Cherokee friends in Arkansas Territory.
Sam Houston settled in Texas in 1832. After the Battle of Gonzales, Houston helped organize Texas's provisional government and was selected as the top-ranking official in the Texian Army. He led the Texian Army to victory at the Battle of San Jacinto, the decisive battle in Texas's war for independence against Mexico. After the war, Houston won election in the 1836 Texas presidential election. He left office due to term limits in 1838, but won election to another term in the 1841 Texas presidential election.
He was an unsuccessful candidate for the presidential nomination of the American Party in the 1856 presidential election and the Constitutional Union Party in the 1860 presidential election. In 1859, Houston won election as the governor of Texas. He was forced out of office in 1861 and died in 1863. Houston's name has been honored in numerous ways, and he is the eponym of the city of Houston, the fourth most populous city in the United States.- Cornelius Vanderbilt was born on 27 May 1794 in Staten Island, New York City, New York, USA. He was married to Francis Crawford and Sophia Johnson. He died on 4 January 1877 in New York City, New York, USA.
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George Catlin was born on 26 July 1796 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, USA. George is known for A Man Called Horse (1970). George died on 23 December 1872 in Jersey City, New Jersey, USA.- Jedediah Smith was born on 6 January 1799 in Bainbridge, New York, USA. He died on 27 May 1831 in Ulysses, Kansas, USA.
- John Brown was born on 9 May 1800 in Torrington, Connecticut, USA. He died on 2 December 1859 in Charles Town, West Virginia, USA.
- William Henry Seward was an American politician who served as United States Secretary of State from 1861 to 1869, and earlier served as governor of New York and as a United States Senator. A determined opponent of the spread of slavery in the years leading up to the American Civil War, he was a prominent figure in the Republican Party in its formative years, and was praised for his work on behalf of the Union as Secretary of State during the Civil War. He also negotiated the treaty for the United States to purchase the Alaskan Territory.
- Pio Pico was born on 5 May 1801 in San Gabriel, California, USA. He was married to María Ignacia Alvarado. He died on 11 September 1894 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Brigham Young (June 1, 1801 - August 29, 1877) was an American religious leader and politician. He was the second president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) from 1847 until his death in 1877. During his time as church president, Young led his followers, the Mormon pioneers, west from Nauvoo, Illinois to the Salt Lake Valley. He founded Salt Lake City and served as the first governor of the Utah Territory. Young also worked to establish the learning institutions which would later become the University of Utah and Brigham Young University. A polygamist, Young had at least 55 wives and 56 children. He instituted a ban prohibiting conferring the priesthood on men of black African descent, and defended the Utah saints in the Utah War waged by the United States.
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John Hill Hewitt was born on 11 July 1801 in New York City, New York, USA. He was married to Mary Smith and Estelle Mangin. He died on 7 October 1890 in Boston, Massachusetts, USA.- Soundtrack
Author and social reformer Lydia Marie Child was born on February 11, 1803, into a staunchly abolitionist family (a stance that was quite unpopular at the time). She attended a seminar for a year, and her social awareness was largely due to the influence of her brother, a Unitarian clergyman who later became a professor at Harvard Divinity School. She took up the cause not only of the abolition of slavery but also the care of the poor. She wrote many books on various subjects, ranging from anti-slavery tracts to tips for housewives.
In 1826 she founded the first magazine directed at children, "The Juvenile Miscellany". She discontinued that publication in 1833 when she married David Child and the two published "An Appeal in Favor of That Class of Americans Called Africans". The book came under severe criticism from many quarters of American society--especially in the South--largely due to the fact that it advocated the formal education of blacks, but overall it focused attention on a subject that many Americans of the time knew little or nothing about--slavery--and actually converted some slaveowners to the abolitionist cause.
From 1840-44 she and her husband were the editors of "The National Anti-Slavery Standard", a newspaper published weekly in New York City. They moved to Wayland, Massachusetts, in 1852, buying a farm and settling down there. They continued their involvement in the abolitionist cause, writing books and contributing money to anti-slavery organizations, and got involved in the anti-death penalty movement.
She died on her farm in Wayland on October 20, 1880.
She was involve to posthumous soundtracks like Planes, Trains & Automobiles (1987). In 1973 it recorded the soundtrack to this song in A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving (1973), Boardwalk Empire (2010) and The Middle (2009).- Ralph Waldo Emerson (May 25, 1803 - April 27, 1882), who went by his middle name Waldo, was an American essayist, lecturer, philosopher, abolitionist, and poet who led the transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century. He was seen as a champion of individualism and a prescient critic of the countervailing pressures of society, and his ideology was disseminated through dozens of published essays and more than 1,500 public lectures across the United States.
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Nathaniel Hawthorne was an American novelist, dark romantic, and short story writer. His works often focus on history, morality, and religion. He was born in 1804 in Salem, Massachusetts, from a family long associated with that town. Hawthorne entered Bowdoin College in 1821, was elected to Phi Beta Kappa in 1824, and graduated in 1825. He published his first work in 1828, the novel Fanshawe; he later tried to suppress it, feeling that it was not equal to the standard of his later work. He published several short stories in periodicals, which he collected in 1837 as Twice-Told Tales. The following year, he became engaged to Sophia Peabody. He worked at the Boston Custom House and joined Brook Farm, a transcendentalist community, before marrying Peabody in 1842. The couple moved to The Old Manse in Concord, Massachusetts, later moving to Salem, the Berkshires, then to The Wayside in Concord. The Scarlet Letter was published in 1850, followed by a succession of other novels. A political appointment as consul took Hawthorne and family to Europe before their return to Concord in 1860. Hawthorne died on May 19, 1864, and was survived by his wife and their three children. Much of Hawthorne's writing centers on New England, many works featuring moral metaphors with an anti-Puritan inspiration. His fiction works are considered part of the Romantic movement and, more specifically, dark romanticism. His themes often center on the inherent evil and sin of humanity, and his works often have moral messages and deep psychological complexity. His published works include novels, short stories, and a biography of his college friend Franklin Pierce, the 14th President of the United States.- Frederick H. Hedge was born on 12 December 1805 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. He was married to Lucy L. Pierce. He died on 20 August 1890 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.
- Joseph Smith Jr. (December 23, 1805 - June 27, 1844) was an American religious leader and founder of Mormonism and the Latter Day Saint movement. When he was 24, Smith published the Book of Mormon. By the time of his death, 14 years later, he had attracted tens of thousands of followers and founded a religion that continues to the present with millions of global adherents.
- Sanford Faulkner was born on 3 March 1806 in Scott County, Kentucky, USA. Sanford was married to Evelene M. Peak. Sanford died on 4 August 1874 in Little Rock, Arkansas, USA.
- Robert Edward Lee was a Confederate general who served the Confederate States of America in the American Civil War, during which he was appointed the overall commander of the Confederate States Army. He led the Army of Northern Virginia, the Confederacy's most powerful army, from 1862 until its surrender in 1865. During the war, Lee earned a solid reputation as a skilled tactician, for which he was revered by his officers and men as well as respected and feared by his adversaries in the Union Army.
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Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was born on 27 February 1807 in Portland, Maine, USA. He was a writer, known for Temple of Our Fathers, The Wreck of the Hesperus (1948) and The Village Blacksmith (1922). He was married to Frances Elizabeth Appleton and Mary Storer Potter. He died on 24 March 1882 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.- Writer
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American poet and writer John Greenleaf Whittier was born on December 17, 1807, near Haverhill, Massachusetts. He grew up on a farm with an extended family, consisting of three siblings--two sisters and a brother--and his mother's sister and his father's brother. The farm was fairly large but not particularly profitable, and the family made just enough money to get by. Whittier was a rather sickly child, and couldn't help out with farm chores very often (among other problems, his color-blindness made it difficult for him to distinguish between ripe and unripe fruits) and his frailty and bad health were problems for him throughout his life.
His formal education was not particularly extensive--due to his family's ongoing financial problems and his own poor health--but he developed into an avid reader who studied his father's books on the Quaker religion so thoroughly that the theology became the guiding principles in his life. He was strongly influenced by the religion's emphasis on one's responsibility to one's fellow human beings, which contributed to his becoming a fervent abolitionist later in his adult life.
Introduced to poetry by a teacher, Whittier wrote his first poem, "The Exile's Departure", in 1826. His sister thought so highly of it that she sent it to a newspaper, the Newburyport Free Press, and its editor, the abolitionist publisher William Lloyd Garrison, published it in the June 8 edition. Garrison was also impressed by the young boy's writing ability and urged him to attend the Haverhill Academy, a recently opened private school. Paying his tuition with money obtained from a variety of jobs--including shoemaker and teacher--he graduated from the Academy in 1828. Garrison hired him as editor of his weekly publication The American Manufacturer in Boston. Whittier soon developed into a fierce opponent of President Andrew Jackson, and in 1830 he was hired as the editor of the prestigious New England Weekly Review in Hartford, Connecticut, which was one of the most prominent Whig publications in the region.
Whittier ran for Congress in 1832 but lost. The experience caused him to have a nervous breakdown, and he returned home to the family farm at Haverhill to recuperate. The next year he resumed his relationship with Garrison, and soon joined his mentor in the abolitionist cause. He published an anti-slavery pamphlet, "Justice and Expediency". The pamphlet earned him the wrath of Northern businessmen and Southern slaveowners, effectively ending any hopes he may have harbored for a political career, and he devoted the next 20 years of his life to helping rid the country of the cancer of slavery. He helped to found the American Anti-Slavery Society, and was a very effective lobbyist in Congress for the cause, helping to recruit quite a few congressmen to the abolitionist movement. His activities were not without consequences, though. He received more than a few death threats, was stoned by mobs in his travels around the country and was run out of town several times. This didn't stop his activities on behalf of the movement, however, and in 1838 he became editor of The Pennsylvania Freeman, an anti-slavery newspaper in Philadelphia, a position he held for the next two years (in that same year the newspaper moved to a new office, which was promptly burned down by a rioting pro-slavery mob). Unfortunately, he and Garrison developed differences over the direction of the abolitionist movement, and the two bitterly split in 1839.
Whittier went on to help form the Liberty Party, an abolitionist political group. However, the combination of his editorial duties, his poetry and prose writings, his activities in the abolitionist movement, the violence directed against it--and him--and his continuing health problems contributed to his having yet another nervous breakdown. He returned to his home in Amesbury, and stayed there for the rest of his life. Although that ended his active participation in the abolitionist movement, he was still a strong supporter of it, and helped the Liberty Party to evolve into the Free Soil Party. In 1847 Whittier became editor of The National Era, probably the most powerful and influential abolitionist paper in the North, a post he held for the next ten years, and contributed what many believe to be his best writing to the paper. With the passage of the 13th Amendment in 1865, which outlawed slavery, Whittier ended his abolitionist activities and devoted himself to writing poetry. He was one of the founding members of The Atlantic Monthly--a publication that survives to this day--and in 1867 he met Charles Dickens while the renowned British author was on a visit to the U.S., an event that left a deep impression on him.
Although Whittier spent virtually his entire life in Massachusetts, he died at the home of a friend in Hampton Falls, New Hampshire, on September 7, 1892. Among his most famous works are the poems "Barbara Frietchie", "Snow-Bound" and "The Brewing of Soma". The city of Whittier, California--home of former US President Richard Nixon--is named after him.