Learning Tools

Images

"Ten Thousand Corpse Ditch" - Nanking Massacre
During the 1937 Japanese conquest of Nanking, thousands of Chinese prisoners of war, and civilians, were killed and buried at a location now known as the "Ten Thousand Corpse Ditch."  The ditch measured approximately three hundred meters long and five meters wide.The Japanese government estimat...
View Image >>   |   Read the Story >>

"The War in the Border States," by Thomas Nast
As the American Civil War dragged on, people who lived in border states suffered hardships, as depicted in this drawing by Thomas Nast.  (Click on the image to see a larger view.) Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri and West Virginia - all slave states - had remained with the Union.  T...
View Image >>   |   Read the Story >>

"This is the Forest Primeval" - 1929
Herb Block, who would ultimately become a famous political cartoonist at the Washington Post, created this illustration in 1929.  It was his first daily cartoon and was published in the Chicago Daily News on 24 April 1929. Upset with the incredible loss of virgin forests in America, Block capt...
View Image >>   |   Read the Story >>

"Three Old Cat" - A Baseball Game
The game of "three old cat" was played on a triangular field and had three strikers.
View Image >>   |   Read the Story >>

"Whatever Happened to 'Freedom from Fear'?"
Herb Block, one of America's most-brilliant political cartoonists, spent his life cutting politicians down-to-size and holding them accountable for their arrogance and bad decisions. In this cartoon, from 1951, he warns Americans to be vigilant about their freedoms - including the right to be free ...
View Image >>   |   Read the Story >>

"With Malice Toward None" - Original 2nd Inaugural
This facsimile image of President Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address contains the famous phrase:  "With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds..." Cli...
View Image >>   |   Read the Story >>

"Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper" - Actual Letter, Page 2
The first time anyone called the 1888 Whitechapel killer "Jack the Ripper" appears in this letter.  It was received at London's Central News Agency on the 27th of September, 1888.At first, the two-page letter was considered a hoax.  Then, three days later, the double murder of Elizabeth St...
View Image >>   |   Read the Story >>

#1 Engine Fire - B-24 Just Before Fatal Explosion
A B-24, named “Extra Joker,” was hit by flak while flying over Austria.  Although the fire behind engine number one seems small in this picture - see the left wing - the plane’s strafing damage was actually fatal.  It was just moments away from an explosion which killed t...
View Image >>   |   Read the Story >>

.32 Caliber Short Barreled Johnson Revolver
Leon Czolgosz bought this small revolver (a short-barrelled, 32 caliber, Iver-Johnson) for $4.  He practiced concealing it, since he had a plan to hide it inside a handkerchief (also depicted) before using it on his target:  William McKinley, the President of the United States.On the 6th o...
View Image >>   |   Read the Story >>

100 Decisive Battles - by Paul K. Davis
Although historians may disagree that this author has chosen the top 100 battles in the history of the world, the book conveys an unbiased look at important military conflicts which have shaped history.Each battle has about five pages of text, broken down into the followng categories:  Forces E...
View Image >>   |   Read the Story >>