Labor Pains: A Don’t Know Much About Minute

Don’t Know Much About® Lyndon B. Johnson

All I have I would have given gladly not to be standing here today. Lyndon B. Johnson, in his first address as President to a joint session of Congress (November 27, 1963) The 36th President, Lyndon B. Johnson, was born on this date in 1908, in a small farmhouse near Stonewall, Texas on the Pedernales [...]

Don’t Know Much About® the 19th Amendment

It took 144 years after Independence. But on August 26, 1920–90 years ago– the “other half” of the country got their rights. The 19th Amendment to the Constitution, giving women the vote, was declared in effect on this date by the Secretary of State. The Amendment had actually been ratified earlier in the month when [...]

TODAY IN HISTORY: The “Negro Riots” in Watts

It started with a “DWB”– “driving while black.” On August 11, 1965, an all-too-frequent stop of a young black man exploded into one of the worst urban riots in American history. Where: Watts was a rundown district of shabby houses built near the highway approaching Los Angeles International Airport. Ninety-eight percent black, Watts was stewing [...]

Don’t Know Much About® Hiroshima

Of “Mosques,” Memorials and Burning Convents

In polite society, one supposedly never discusses religion or politics. In America, it seems we can rarely separate the two. The latest fracas over faith in the public square involves the plans for Cordoba House, an Islamic Center, including a “mosque,” to be built two blocks from Ground Zero. Proposed to bridge the differences between [...]

TODAY IN HISTORY: Don’t Know Much About® Tocqueville in America

Happy Birthday, Monsieur Tocqueville (born July 29, 1805; died April 16, 1859) Observing a Choctaw tribe—the old, the sick, the wounded, and newborns among them—forced to cross an ice-choked Mississippi River during the harsh winter, Alexis de Tocqueville once wrote, “In the whole scene, there was an air of destruction, something which betrayed a final [...]

TODAY IN HISTORY: A Very Significant Amendment

I know. The mere mention of Constitutional Amendments automatically sends most of us for the snooze button. But this one is different. On July 28, 1868, the 14th Amendment to the Constitution was declared in effect. On July 9, 1868, the state of South Carolina ratified the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, providing the [...]

Today in History: Don’t Know Much About® New York’s Bloody Draft Riots

On July 13, 1863, New York City exploded in a four-day long murderous riot, still considered one of the deadliest urban riots in American history. The cause of the riots–violent opposition to the Civil War draft law.

Raising the Star and Stripes in California

On July 7, 1846, the United States Navy sailed into Monterey Bay and announced that the Republic of California was now a part of the United States. Just like that, the future state of California fell from Mexico’s hands into its American future. The story of California’s shift from Spain to Mexico and then to American control is an extraordinary one. The last part of that story, the annexation of California by the United States, is due largely to the exploits of a somewhat forgotten man, John Charles Frémont and his extraordinary wife Jessie Benton Frémont.