A skateboarding pioneer, Cindy Whitehead turned pro at seventeen, skating both pool and half-pipe and becoming one of the top-ranked vert skaters while competing against the boys. But Whitehead had no choice but to wear boys’ shorts when competing; there were no skate products for girls in the 197

We will host a panel discussion connecting stories of teenagers in the past fighting to address systemic injustice to those of the present. The 2020 annual summit will be centered on the case study of Claudette Colvin—a 15-year-old Black student in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1955. Colvin refused to g

The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 prevented all but a few Chinese to enter the United States legally. In 1906, a major earthquake and resulting fire in San Francisco destroyed public records, allowing many Chinese to claim that they had been born in San Francisco. These men, with newly established c

A Lewis Hine silver print from about 1906–1918, this image of a young boy working at a loom in a cotton mill in Rhode Island is one in a series of photographs made by Hine for the National Child Labor Committee. The photographs document child labor throughout America in the early 20th century. As

After a young lady learned to embroider a sampler, she might attend a female academy to make a silk embroidered picture. This was a more challenging technique that became popular in the early 1800s. Subjects included classical, biblical, and historical scenes, as well as mourning pictures.

The Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History recently acquired at auction a rare 18th-century silver milk pot or creamer with engraved with symbols and an inscription that support the American colonists’ ongoing boycott of imported goods, especially tea, during the months following a

What do British cattle and Mexican cowboys have to do with the history of Hawaiian folk music? A lot, as it turns out. Slack Key guitar master Reverend Dennis Kamakahi explains in this episode of the History Explorer podcast series. The episode features songs Rev. Kamakahi played during a ceremon

Use short videos, mini-activities, and practice questions to explore American history from the 1900s in this segment of Preparing for the Oath: U.S. History and Civics for Citizenship. The nine questions included in this segment cover topics such as World War II, the Civil Rights Movement, and Se

Enlisted soldier's uniform. The brown, doughy color of the uniform led to these soldiers being referred to as "doughboys," though the exact derivation of the nickname has been debated.

The bread tin was designed to keep the doughboy's ration of hard bread dry; earlier bread rations were packaged in cardboard containers which became soggy and ruined the contents.