American Presidents Story Briefs

U.S. Presidents have varying backgrounds and political persuasions. Only one was unanimously elected. They can have little or lasting influence. These stories are about individuals with the power to make a difference at home and abroad.

Soldiers attempting to find John Wilkes Booth believed (correctly) he might be hiding near Port Royal on the Rappahannock River.

Against Colonel Bakers explicit orders to take Booth alive, Sgt. Boston Corbett shot Booth in the neck.

One week after her husband's death, Jackie Kennedy told reporter Theodore White that the Kennedy era was like "Camelot." It was her way of making sure...

Even before the Civil War was over, President Lincoln wanted an Amendment to the U.S. Constitution which freed slaves throughout the country. The Amen...

Clint Hill, a Secret Service officer for JFK, shared his memory of the day President Kennedy was fatally shot.

The Bay of Pigs fueled Castro's worry of an American invasion and his desire for missiles from the Soviet Union.

Elizabeth Shoumatoff (1888-1980) was painting President Roosevelt's portrait at his Little White House, in Warm Springs, on the 12th of April, 1945. T...

While he was on the run, following his escape from Washington, John Wilkes Booth recorded his thoughts in a diary. Some of its pages are missing, lead...

Slaves helped to build the White House which upset First Lady Abigail Adams. She and John Adams were the first family to move into the Executive Mansi...

The U.S. government used the domino theory to justify taking action in Vietnam. A political cartoon, however, turns that theory upside down.

Although he was a pacifist, who despised war, Albert Einstein also realized that if Hitler and his scientists were the first to discover how to build ...

This image depicts the second page of a letter - from Albert Einstein to President Roosevelt - which changed the world.

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