With the NFL playoffs underway, millions of fans will crowd around their television sets, eat buffalo wings, and cheer for (or against) the remaining Super Bowl contenders. Yet football has played an important part in American culture far beyond the National Football League. Photographs at the National Archives reflect the pervasiveness of football in United … Continue reading Football Photographs at the National Archives
Photos for this blog post were collated and scanned with the assistance of Michael Bloomfield. With regard to the inauguration of a president, the United States Constitution only stipulates the date and time of the inauguration, as well as the words of the Presidential Oath of Office. Given this lack of detail, traditions surrounding the … Continue reading A Look at Inauguration Day Through the Years: Inaugural Photographs and Facts
When the Soo Canal was completed at Sault Ste. Marie in 1855, the journey through the rapids of the St. Mary’s river went from seven weeks of arduous portaging to seven minutes through the newly constructed State Locks.1 Over the next century, four locks would be constructed, repaired, and replaced, leading to more tons of … Continue reading The Mighty Soo: Construction of the Locks at Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan
Co-authored by Beth Fortson, with assistance from Audrey Amidon and Corbin Apkin. Happy Holidays from the Unwritten Record blog team! For this holiday season we've put together some of our best Christmas tree themed special media. From RG-95 we bring you a 1968 film, The Cultured Christmas Tree. From RG-16 we bring you a series of images of … Continue reading Spotlight: Tinseled Trivia
This post was written by Kaitlyn Crain Enriquez. **Edit: Seven additional photographs were added on 12/21/2018. ** In December 1944, American forces had been spread across a 75 mile stretch of the Ardennes Forest. The Ardennes was considered to be a minimal fighting area and therefore, the troops that had been placed in the area … Continue reading Christmas in Wartime: Battle of the Bulge
This post was written with Heidi Holmstrom. In the past year, staff in the motion picture preservation lab handled millions of feet of film. Films might come to us for inspection and repair, photochemical duplication, or digitization. To follow up last year’s list, we’ve identified a handful of films that were digitized in 2016 and … Continue reading Favorite Film Finds of 2016
Beef up your knowledge of polar exploration by taking a look at these trading cards from Hassan Cork Tip Cigarettes found in the Brainard Collection of Arctic Exploration, DLB-AA. The set of 49 cards depicts portraits of explorers, scenes of Inuit life, expedition ships, and scenic landscape views. The reverse side of the cards provides biographical … Continue reading Polar Pack: Your Favorite Arctic Explorers in Trading Card Form
Tomorrow marks the 75th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor. In remembrance of the event, we are presenting related maps, photographs, ship plans, and films held by NARA's Special Media Division. Photographs documenting the aftermath of the attack may be found in the General Photographic File of the Navy (RG 80-G, RG 80-GK), Color Photographs … Continue reading Visualizing Pearl Harbor 75 Years Later
General Douglas MacArthur served as the commander of the U.S. Army Forces in the Far East during World War II. During the war, MacArthur led the campaign in the Pacific theater for the Army. In 1966, the Department of the Army published two volumes of reports of MacArthur’s involvement in the war. These reports describe … Continue reading General Douglas MacArthur’s Strategic World War II Maps
The following photo essay and accompanying poem were recently discovered in an accession of Indian Health Service records. The work appears to be attributed to Mr. Allan Cayous. The content and captions are all original to the author and the intended order of presentation has been preserved in this blog post to the best of my ability. Allan Cayous was heavily … Continue reading “Who Has Given More Than The Indian?”
