Stories of America’s Past
Welcome to America Comes Alive!, a site I created to share little-known stories of regular people who made a difference and changed the course of history. Look around and see what inspires you! — Kate Kelly
Polaris was a puppy when Ernest Harold Baynes, an American naturalist and writer, visited Admiral Robert Peary at Eagle Island in Casco Bay near Portland, Maine in 1914. When Peary offered to take Baynes by motor launch over to Flag Island to show Baynes some of the dogs that pulled …
By April 1975—after almost twenty years fighting in Vietnam–the United States began its pull-out. That winter the North Vietnamese pushed the South Vietnamese back forcefully and definitively.
The Americans knew that it was over. They needed to pull out about 1000 Americans—many of them civilians—and 6000 at-risk Vietnamese, who would suffer …
In the 1930’s and 1940’s, sunscreen was being developed independently but simultaneously by at least four different chemists in various parts of the world:
The first-to-market was likely H.A. Milton in Australia. In the early 1930s, he discovered that a wound-healing substance seemed to protect against the sun. Once he developed …
Curb cuts—the slight slope from a sidewalk to a roadway—are preferred by most people: walkers, bikers, and parents pushing children in strollers—yet they came about only because of a hard-fought battle by disability rights activists.
Enjoy them, use them, just don’t ever take them for granted.
The Issue With Curbs
For most people, …
Ethel Waters was an enormously popular jazz and blues singer from the 1920s until her death in 1977. She broke barriers in many cultural areas and created a path for Blacks to star on Broadway. Her quieter more interpretive style of presenting a song brought blues out of the jazz …
The invention of the telephone in 1876 jump-started several new developments:
The telephones themselves needed to be further refined.
Telephone offices with operating equipment needed to be created so that telephone calls could be made within a community. (Very early telephones were sold in pairs and functioned as a home-to-office communication system, …
On
This
Day
On July 25, 1832, the first recorded railroad accident in U.S. history occurred on the Granite Railway near Quincy, Massachusetts. Guests were invited to view how a railway transports big loads of stone. On their way back from the quarry, a cable snapped, causing a crash that tossed four people from the train. One person was killed; three others were seriously injured.
Heroes & Trailblazers
Polaris was a puppy when Ernest Harold Baynes, an American naturalist and writer, visited Admiral Robert Peary at Eagle Island in Casco Bay near Portland, …
President Joe Biden and First Lady Dr. Jill Biden moved into the White House in 2021 with two German shepherds. Thirteen-year-old Champ and two-year-old Major. …
In the 1930’s and 1940’s, sunscreen was being developed independently but simultaneously by at least four different chemists in various parts of the world:
The first-to-market …
Curb cuts—the slight slope from a sidewalk to a roadway—are preferred by most people: walkers, bikers, and parents pushing children in strollers—yet they came about …
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Recent Stories
Polaris was a puppy when Ernest Harold Baynes, an American naturalist and writer, visited Admiral Robert Peary at Eagle Island in Casco Bay near Portland, …
President Joe Biden and First Lady Dr. Jill Biden moved into the White House in 2021 with two German shepherds. Thirteen-year-old Champ and two-year-old Major. …
By April 1975—after almost twenty years fighting in Vietnam–the United States began its pull-out. That winter the North Vietnamese pushed the South Vietnamese back forcefully …
In the 1930’s and 1940’s, sunscreen was being developed independently but simultaneously by at least four different chemists in various parts of the world:
The first-to-market …
During the 1960s, two American cities burst with new music from Black artists. Detroit rocked with Motown, and Philadelphia rolled with the sounds of soul …
Curb cuts—the slight slope from a sidewalk to a roadway—are preferred by most people: walkers, bikers, and parents pushing children in strollers—yet they came about …
Part of the inspiration for this site comes from this remark: “People do not want to hear about simple things. They want to hear about great things – simply told.”
Nobel Peace Prize winner Jane Addams (1860-1935)