To sixteenth century Europeans America was a land of marvels, a place where nothing was impossible. Some even believed that there they might discover a way to regain their lost youth. Ponce de Leon was a Spanish conquistador who came to the New World with Columbus on the explorer’s second voyage. He became the governor […]

On the night of April 18, 1775,700 British soldiers marched silently out of Boston. Their orders were to. seize weapons and ammunition that rebellious colonists had stored in Concord, a nearby town. But the colonists wrere warned that the soldiers were coming. Signal lights were hung from the spire of Boston’s tallest church and two […]

The most famous “conductor” on the Under­ground Railroad was a young black woman named Harriet Tubman. She was bom in 1821 and grew up as a slave on a plantation in Maryland. In 1849 she escaped to Philadelphia and joined the Underground Railroad. Although she could neither read nor write, Harriet Tubman had great abilities […]

I Icnry Ford is famous for making automobiles. But what makes him important is how he made them. Ford began to make automobiles in the 1890S: One day in 1903 he was talking to a friend about the best way to do this. “The real way is to make one like another, as much alike […]

In the 1920s American movies filled the cinema screens of the world. Most were made in lolly – wood, a suburb of the city of Los Angeles in California. Hollywood’s big attraction for film­makers was its clean air and plentiful sunshine. The movies made there were bright and clear. By the 1920s it had become […]