During the first quarter of the 20th century, 30,000 men worked to dig the New York Subway. The work was dangerous and collapses were frequent with many of those who died unnamed Italian and Irish immigrants, back then seen as less than desirable. All this work was undertaken when trams Read more
I know of presidential libraries that have a primary function of generating political dialogue and act as a depository of information from the executive branch, but given the reputation of late President John F. Kennedy, his presidential library is a tribute to the work of his life. The museum houses Read more
I’ve been to aviation museums in Ontario to the likes of Trenton and Ottawa, and those are mighty impressive. Ones in Quebec, even in major cities like Montreal and Quebec City, are much smaller. The Air Defence Museum in Bagotville, 20 minutes east of Saguenay, is a little different. Bagotville Read more
The fortress-like prison in Philadelphia have 30-foot walls that go underground. Built in 1830, it was the world’s first purpose-built prison meant to deprive people of freedom as a form of punishment. Jails before this were just holding pens for people waiting for their sentences which might be flogging, hanging, Read more
Jewish Americans landed in New Netherlands before it became New York and built their first synagogue in the country there in 1730. So, logically, New York should have been the home to this museum rather than Philadelphia. Early Jewish settlers included Portuguese Jews who were persecuted and forced to convert Read more
An incredible collection of western European modern art from the likes of Prendergast, Cézanne, and Van Gogh ended up in Philadelphia. I loved the giant pointillism painting Models by Seurat which featured a slice of the famous A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. Both are from Read more
The country’s third longest Foucault pendulum is in Philadelphia‘s Franklin Institute. It proves that the Earth is round and turns on an axis. The Pendulum appears to change direction while in reality the Earth is the one spinning and the pendulum maintaining a constant direction. The museum is named after Read more
Rocky ran up the steps to the museum entrance as he trained to defeat the Russian boxer during the height of the Cold War. Tourists line up at his statue to take a photo with young Sylvester Stallone and leap at the top step. I’m not sure how many of Read more
The Liberty Bell in Philadelphia, like many other American patriotic symbols, are not what the traditional national narrative claims it to be. For example, the Star Spangled Banner written at Fort McHenry came from the War of 1812, an expansionist American war of aggression against the British Empire, which they Read more
The first postmaster general of the United States is also the only non-president to be permanently featured on American money. He built his house in the middle of a courtyard in Philadelphia, making the museum tricky to find. Franklin was one of 17 children and apprenticed under his brother, a Read more