CHRISTOPHER KLEIN

We all know December 7, 1941, as “a date which will live in infamy.” But did you know that was not the original line penned by President Franklin D. Roosevelt? The presidential address that was delivered to Congress on the day after the attack was not the product of a team of speechwriters and consultants but…

I always found it poetic that World War I ended on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month. But did you know that the quest for poetic symmetry came at a terrible cost? The armistice was actually signed at 5 A.M., but for six hours the staccato of machine guns and the howls…

Last Friday marked the 150th anniversary of the deadliest blaze in American history. Whipped by tornado-force winds that traversed a drought-stricken prairie, the fire that struck on October 8, 1871, reduced an entire Midwestern outpost to ashes and killed over 2,000 people.  The Great Chicago Fire? Nope. The Great Peshtigo Fire. Read all about this piece of…

The 2020 Summer Olympics have definitely been the strangest one in our lifetimes with no spectators cheering on the athletes—not to mention that it’s no longer 2020. The 2020 Summer Games, however, can not compete with the gold medalist for weirdest Olympic ever—the 1904 Summer Olympics in St. Louis. Read all about it in the…

You never know what you might find in your attic. An old scrapbook? Sun-bleached photographs? A moth-eaten high school varsity jacket? How about a copy of the Declaration of Independence? It may sound like a plot line from a “National Treasure” movie, but that startling discovery actually occurred in Exeter, New Hampshire, in 1985. Read…

The National Trust for Historic Preservation today named the Boston Harbor Islands among the 11 most endangered historic places in the U.S. As I write about in my book The Boston Harbor Islands: Discovering the City’s Hidden Shores, these 34 islands have had a front-row seat to some of the seminal moments in American history:…

Nearly 150 years before the advent of texts, tweets and e-mail, President Abraham Lincoln became the first “wired president” by embracing the original electronic messaging technology—the telegraph. The 16th president may be remembered for his soaring oratory that stirred the Union, but the nearly 1,000 bite-sized telegrams that he wrote during his presidency helped win…

Feliz Cinco de Mayo! Contrary to what many people think, Cinco de Mayo is not Mexico’s Independence Day (that’s September 16) or even a public holiday in Mexico. Instead, it marks Mexico’s May 5, 1862, victory over France at the Battle of Puebla during the Franco-Mexican War. Cinco de Mayo is a reminder that France…

Did you know that the patron saint of Ireland wasn’t Irish? Indeed, St. Patrick grew up in present-day Wales and was kidnapped int o slavery in Ireland. At least, that’s St. Patrick’s version of the story that he penned in his short autobiography, the Confessio. One historian, however, says that it’s more likely that St.…

Engaged in a furious race against time as cancer attacked his body, Ulysses S. Grant wrote his memoirs with military efficiency, churning out as many as 10,000 words in a single day. (Take it from me–that’s an insane level of output.) Grant was desperate to finish his memoirs, which Mark Twain would publish, before dying…