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07/14/2020
Around the world, this date is known as Bastille Day, and the French ambassador to the United States has a ...
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07/13/2020
Sixty-nine years ago today, Harry Truman signed legislation granting guest workers legal status in this country. The rationale wasn't humanitarian; it was ...
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07/10/2020
It's Friday, July 10, 2020, the day of the week when I reprise a quotation intended to be instructive or ...
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07/09/2020
Yesterday, I wrote about Warren G. Harding, one of eight U.S. presidents to die in office. Harding was one of ...
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07/08/2020
I've been thinking about first ladies this week. Monday was Nancy Reagan's 99th birthday and in yesterday's note I mentioned how ...
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07/07/2020
Thirty-nine years ago today, President Reagan chose Sandra Day O'Connor to be the Supreme Court's first female justice. Although those in the ...
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07/06/2020
On this date in 1945, a 21-year-old Jewish refugee named Gerda Weissmann wrote a letter to an American officer she had met two ...
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07/03/2020
Good morning. It’s July 3, 2020 -- a federal holiday -- but also a Friday, the day of the week ...
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07/02/2020
On this date in 1976, Gerald R. Ford went to the National Archives and paid homage to the Constitution and ...
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07/01/2020
On this date in 1898, Lt. Col. Theodore Roosevelt led the "Rough Riders," a mounted amalgamation of Western cowboys and ...
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06/30/2020
On this date in 1918, a small British passenger ship that had been converted to a wartime cargo vessel was ...
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06/29/2020
Fifteen years ago today, George W. Bush uncorked one of his frequent malapropisms. Discussing his upcoming trip to Denmark, the ...
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06/26/2020
It's Friday, June 26, 2020, the day of the week when I reprise a quotation intended to be instructive or ...
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06/25/2020
Seventy years ago today, Harry Truman's hopes for a relaxing weekend at his home in Independence, Mo., were dashed by ...
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06/24/2020
One hundred and fifty-six years ago today, Union troops under the overall command of Ulysses S. Grant engaged Robert E. ...
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06/23/2020
It's Tuesday, June 23, 2020, the third day of summer -- the summer of national discontent. John Steinbeck, a native ...
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06/22/2020
I hope you had a good Father's Day weekend. If you're unfamiliar with the origins of the observance, you might ...
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06/19/2020
It's Friday, June 19, 2020, the day of the week when I reprise a quotation intended to be instructive or ...
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06/18/2020
On this date in 1983, Sally K. Ride, the astronaut with the dime novel name, made history aboard the space ...
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06/17/2020
Forty-eight years ago today, five shadowy operators, one of whom told police he once worked for the CIA, were arrested ...
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06/16/2020
On this date in 1858, a former one-term congressman from Illinois delivered one of the most momentous political orations in ...
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06/15/2020
Yesterday was Flag Day, an annual remembrance that fell this year at a time when Old Glory is sorely stressed. ...
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06/12/2020
It's Friday, June 12, 2020, the day of the week when I reprise quotes intended to be instructive or inspirational. ...
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06/11/2020
Didn't HBO pick an odd day to go all Taliban on us by removing "Gone With the Wind" from its ...
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06/10/2020
On this day in 1928, Sadie and Philip Sendak, Polish émigrés living in Brooklyn, welcomed their third child into the world. ...
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06/09/2020
If this year reminds you of 1968, you are not alone. Yesterday, a friend of mine who was just a little kid ...
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06/08/2020
Over the weekend five years ago, a vice president's son was laid to rest in the cemetery of his home ...
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06/05/2020
Good morning. It's Friday, June 5, 2020, the day of the week when I reprise a quotation intended to be ...
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06/04/2020
On this date in 1863 Abraham Lincoln wrote a letter to Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton regarding the thorny ...
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06/03/2020
Eighty-seven years ago today, Jack and Irene Cannon welcomed their first son into the world. They lived in New York ...
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06/02/2020
Yesterday evening, Donald Trump pronounced himself "your president of law and order," which apparently means he wants to be a ...
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06/01/2020
Good morning, it's June 1, 2020, a Monday morning perhaps like no other in the history of our republic. A ...
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05/29/2020
It's Friday, May 29, 2020, the day of the week when I reprise a quotation intended to be instructive or ...
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05/28/2020
Yesterday I wrote about the lovely letters written 76 years ago this week by U.S. Army Cpl. Frank Elliott to ...
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05/27/2020
Seventy-six years ago today, a 24-year-old U.S. soldier far from home wrote a letter to his wife, Pauline, who was ...
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05/26/2020
On this date in 1864, the U.S. president who described America as the "last, best hope of Earth," took a ...
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05/25/2020
On a day America mourns her war dead -- and honors the military service of those who answered their country's ...
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05/22/2020
His name was John S. Carroll and he was old school all the way. I mean that in the best ...
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05/21/2020
On this date in 1901, the state of Connecticut passed the first speed limits for motor vehicles. This was an ...
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05/20/2020
On this date 158 years ago, a wartime U.S. president signed legislation that was of interest to the men under ...
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05/19/2020
Forty-seven years ago today, the Preakness Stakes record was broken at Pimlico by a colt known affectionately by his handlers ...
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05/18/2020
This year, graduation rituals at most colleges have been cancelled, postponed, or relegated to online ceremonies. It's a loss. Commencement ...
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05/15/2020
Except maybe at Kentucky Derby time, which was postponed this year, thoroughbred horse racing is passé among most Americans these days. This ...
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05/14/2020
When the United States entered the First World War, a young New Yorker named Henry Johnson was one of those ...
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05/13/2020
Eighty years ago today, in her darkest hour, Great Britain turned to Winston Churchill as her leader. Hitler's invasion of Poland eight ...
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05/12/2020
On this date in 1883, Boston publishing house James R. Osgood and Co. issued a new work, "Life on the ...
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05/11/2020
Good morning, it's Monday, May 11, 2020. Yesterday was a glorious day on the East Coast, and Americans who've been ...
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05/08/2020
It's Friday, May 8, 2020, the day of the week when I reprise a quotation intended to be educational or ...
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05/07/2020
Sixteen years ago this week, NBC aired the final episode of "Friends" to a national audience estimated at 52.5 million. ...
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05/06/2020
This is Willie Mays' birthday. Yes, the "Say Hey" Kid turns 89 today. During the current lockdown, everybody has things ...
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05/05/2020
Today is Cinco de Mayo, one of the holidays I cherish most, albeit an unlikely cause for celebration in the United ...
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05/04/2020
Fifty years ago today, the number of Americans killed in Vietnam had surpassed 50,000. Most of those who gave their last full ...
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05/01/2020
It's Friday, May 1, 2020, the day of the week when I reprise a quotation intended to be educational or ...
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04/30/2020
It was April 30 in 1789 when George Washington took the inaugural oath as the first president of this -- ...
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04/29/2020
No American is alive today who attended the St. Louis World's Fair, which opened this month in 1904, but those ...
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04/28/2020
The United States is closing in on 1 million confirmed coronavirus cases. As I write these words, the death toll ...
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04/27/2020
Today is the birthday of Ulysses S. Grant, born 198 years ago on this date in Point Pleasant, Ohio. His ...
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04/24/2020
At his daily White House coronavirus briefing/2020 campaign rally earlier this week, President Trump induced much merriment among the assembled ...
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04/23/2020
April is National Poetry Month. Perhaps you already knew that, but it might surprise you to learn how many U.S. ...
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04/22/2020
Good morning, it's Wednesday, April 22, 2020, the 50th anniversary of Earth Day. Even ardent environmentalists couldn't have foreseen how we're ...
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04/21/2020
On this date in 1861, 27-year-old Asa Melvin, a Concord farmer, was just getting to know his new comrades in ...
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04/20/2020
On this date in 1875, centennial festivities in New England had concluded, President Grant had returned to Washington, and residents ...
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04/17/2020
After the Bay of Pigs fiasco in April 1961, John F. Kennedy's third month in office, the president reluctantly accepted ...
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04/16/2020
Yesterday, while writing about the doomed ship Titanic, I mentioned the White Star Line's early-20th-century competition with Cunard Line. Competition ...
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04/15/2020
Americans didn't always have to pay income taxes, you know. It took a constitutional amendment to even make it legal. ...
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04/14/2020
Today, Ford's Theatre is quiet -- as are the famous stages on Broadway and elsewhere in the country. The place ...
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04/13/2020
President Franklin D. Roosevelt had planned to deliver a radio address on April 13, 1945, from his curative getaway in ...
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04/10/2020
At Episcopal High School in Bellaire, Texas, Mark Hamilton lettered in soccer as well as in baseball. Baseball America magazine ...
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04/09/2020
More than 3,800 Americans have died in the last two days from the coronavirus that has shut down America. That's ...
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04/08/2020
Today the RealClear family of sites welcomes a new member, one focused on a topic receiving scant attention in our ...
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04/07/2020
Long before "Hamilton," there was "South Pacific," which opened on Broadway 71 years ago today. I've written about this musical ...
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04/06/2020
In an alternative universe, which is to say, the normal reality that we've enjoyed for the past 80 years, the ...
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04/03/2020
Mason Temple in Memphis was packed with listeners on this date in 1968. They had come to hear Martin Luther ...
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04/02/2020
On this date in history, Albert Einstein came to the United States for the first time. The famed scientist has ...
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04/01/2020
Today's history lesson is about coping with loss, although it was loss on a human scale, which is to say ...
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03/31/2020
On this date in 1938, Ernest Hemingway returned to Barcelona for the third time during the bloody civil war between ...
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03/30/2020
On Friday, I wrote about heroism. I’ll continue in that vein this morning by highlighting the actions of an American ...
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03/27/2020
In wartime, and that's what this feels like, sentient citizens find themselves contemplating the true meaning of courage and its ...
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03/26/2020
On March 26, 1953, Dr. Jonas E. Salk announced on CBS radio that he had developed a vaccine for the ...
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03/25/2020
One would be foolish to minimize the threat of this pandemic. And still, an event that took place 63 years ...
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03/24/2020
Yesterday, I wrote at length about the life and times of reporter and author Randy Shilts during the earliest days ...
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03/23/2020
Thirty-seven years ago today, the San Francisco Chronicle ran a bracing story based on a study done by two local ...
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03/20/2020
Yesterday, a friend and I were commiserating (digitally, of course) about the uncertainty -- and, in some places, misery -- ...
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03/19/2020
On this date in 1993, two months after Bill and Hillary Clinton moved into the White House, Hillary’s father suffered ...
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03/18/2020
It seems so long ago, but a large and unruly roster of candidates assembled themselves at the outset of this ...
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03/17/2020
The big St. Patrick’s Day parades were canceled in Europe as well as the United States. Ireland’s prime minister cut ...
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