The black naturalist, astronomer, surveyor, and almanac-writer Benjamin Banneker took issue with Thomas Jefferson’s attitude toward “those of my complexion.”
“I will leave this house only if I am dead,” the prominent New York doctor told his ex-wife, who was seeking half the value of their Manhattan townhouse in a divorce.
As a young man, Theodore Roosevelt struggled through a brutal winter on a cattle ranch in the Dakota Territory. The adventure launched a love affair with the western U.S.
When the Pentagon wanted a photographer to record the largest airborne assault in the Vietnam War, the most qualified candidate was a young French woman.