1. John Adams, from Abigail Adams (pictured). Abigail Adams wrote this to her husband in a December 23, 1782 letter. The original letter can be read here, at the website of the Massachusetts Historical Society.

2. Woodrow Wilson, to Edith Bolling Galt (pictured). This is from a letter that widower President Wilson wrote from the White House on September 19, 1915, to Edith Bolling Galt, whom he would marry. The full text of the letter is in volume 34 of The Papers of Woodrow Wilson, ed. Arthur Stanley Link (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994), page 491.

3. Ronald Reagan, to Nancy Reagan (pictured). This is from a letter written on White House stationery by Ronald Reagan, to his wife Nancy on March 4, 1981. From Nancy Reagan, I Love You, Ronnie: The Letters of Ronald Reagan to Nancy Reagan (New York: Random House, 2002).

4. Theodore Roosevelt, about Alice Lee (pictured). This is from Roosevelt's diary entry of February 13, 1880. On that evening, he became engaged to Alice Lee, whom he married. On Valentine's Day, 1884, she died while giving birth to their daughter Alice. Roosevelt's mother died the same day. His diary entry for that day is simply a large black X with the words, "The light has gone out of my life." The Library of Congress has made scans of the original diary pages, available online here.

1. Winter counts, kept by the Lakota people, mark each year in a Lakota band's history with a picture depicting an important event. For the year 1833, many Lakota winter counts show the same event: stars falling from the night sky.

True. In the winter of 1833, the Leonid meteor shower, visible each November, blazed with extraordinary strength. The falling stars caught the attention of people throughout North America, and many Lakota bands chose the shower as the event to stand for the year. Later in the 1800s, ethnologist Garrick Mallery (1831-1894) identified the pictures as standing for the meteor shower, allowing scholars to match the years of the winter counts with the European calendar.

2. Prior to introduction to European calendar systems, the Native peoples of Alaska used peg calendars, wooden calendars in which a peg was moved forward in a series of holes day by day to mark the passage of time.

False. Russian colonists and missionaries introduced peg calendars to the Native peoples of Alaska so that they could track the holy days of the Russian Orthodox Church. Russian contact with Alaskan cultures began in the 1700s, and settlement of the region, accompanied by cultural exchange, continued until 1867, when the U.S. purchased Alaska from the Russians. Peg calendars remained in use into the 20th century.

3. The Winnebago Native Americans recorded time using calendar sticks, in which notches were cut to signify important events, lunar cycles, years, and other units of distinction and division.

True. The Winnebago Native Americans did use sticks to record the passing of time in this manner. However, the use of calendar sticks was not limited to the Winnebago. Other Native American groups throughout North America used sticks, including the Pima, the Osage, and the Zuni. The markings on sticks and their daily and ceremonial use varied from region to region and people to people.

4. The Hopi calendar divides the year into four sections. Spirits known as katsinas (or kachinas) visit the Hopi people in two of these sections, alternating with the two sections free of the spirits.

False. The Hopi calendar divides the year into two halves, one beginning around the summer solstice (June 20th or 21st) and the other with the winter solstice (December 21st or 22nd). After the winter solstice, katsinam, benevolent spirits, visit the Hopi people, personated by Hopi men in masks and costumes. Following the summer solstice, the katsinam leave the Hopi again.

1. 1790
families with 11 or more members
families holding 2-4 slaves
avg. slaves per slaveholding family
free colored slaveholding families
persons of Scotch nationality
persons of Hebrew nationality

2. 1840
white persons 20 years of age and over who cannot read and write
scholars in primary and common schools
female slaves 55-99 years of age
free colored females under 10 years of age
men employed in newspaper production
persons employed in navigation of canals

3. 1870
male citizens 21 years of age and over
persons born in Africa
persons 10 and over who cannot read
total state taxation
public debt of the county
youths employed in manufacturing

4. 1880
persons born in China
Indians
colored persons
farms 500-999 acres rented for fixed money rental
average hours labor per week in iron and steel manufacturing
average youths and children employed in manufacturing

5. 1900
other colored females 5-20 years of age
illiterate foreign-born alien males 21 years of age and over
native white illiterates 10 years of age and over of native parentage
farms of colored owners and tenants
capital invested in buildings used in manufacturing
salaries of salaried officials, clerks, etc. in manufacturing

6. 1910
rural population
white persons born in asian turkey
native white males of voting age of mixed parentage
Indian, Chinese, Japanese and male of all other races of voting age
persons 15-17 years of age attending school
farms of foreign-born whites

1. Who was the first Irish American to run for president?

b. Alfred Emmanuel Smith, Jr.

In 1928, Alfred Emmanuel Smith, Jr., four times governor of New York, ran as the Democratic candidate for president of the U.S.. Though "Al" Smith's heritage also included German, Italian, and English ancestry, he identified as Irish American, and faced prejudice for both his ethnicity and his religion (he was Catholic) during his campaign. The press and the public suspected him of drunkenness (stereotypically associated with Irish Americans), manipulation by the Pope, and involvement with Tammany Hall (a New York City Democratic political machine known for supporting Irish Americans in politics).

Smith lost the election to Herbert Hoover, but he went on to become president of Empire State, Inc.—the company that built the Empire State Building.

2. Which of the following men with Irish ancestry was known as "father" of a branch of the U.S. military?

a. John Barry, naval officer in the American Revolution

Irish-born John Barry first crisscrossed the Atlantic as a respected commander of merchant ships—but when war broke out with England, he joined the Continental Army and was commissioned a naval captain in 1776. (He also served in several battles on land, while a ship he was to command, the Effington, was under construction.) Though he gained fame for valor and loyalty during the war, he returned to captaining merchant ships when it concluded.

However, in 1794, some time after the establishment of the U.S. Navy, President George Washington chose Barry as senior Captain of the Federal Navy. Barry saw active service until 1801, and trained many of the naval officers who would serve in the War of 1812. He was referred to as "Father of the U.S. Navy" in his own time.

3. Which famous survivor of the Titanic's sinking was Irish American?

d. Margaret Brown, activist and socialite

The daughter of Irish immigrants, Margaret Brown rose into high-society circles when her husband, James Joseph Brown, became a board member of the Ibex Mining Company. She used her new social status to advocate for the rights of women and children—activities which she continued throughout her life. Her status also allowed her to board the Titanic as a first-class passenger; she earned fame and the nickname "The Unsinkable Molly Brown" for her efforts to get passengers into lifeboats and to bring her own lifeboat around to look for survivors.

4. Which of these women of Irish ancestry helped found the Industrial Workers of the World, a major (and still existing) labor union?

a. Mary Harris Jones

Mary Harris Jones, also known as "Mother Jones," participated in the founding of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) in 1905. Jones, who was born in Ireland and grew up in the U.S., took a leading role in the early-20th-century labor movement following the death of her husband and four children in a yellow fever epidemic and the later loss of her dressmaking shop in the Great Chicago Fire. Arrested multiple times, she gained notoriety across the country as a labor organizer, motivating women and children to participate in strikes in support of their husbands and fathers. She also organized children to strike for their own rights—in 1903, child mill and mine workers marched in Jones's "Children's Crusade," helping to bring child labor to public attention.

Jones remained active in labor organization until her death in 1930, when she was over 90 years old.

1. On December 5th 1872, the Mary Celeste was found sailing empty of all crew, but with all valuables—including her cargo of raw alcohol—still aboard. The yawl (a small boat) was missing, and two cuts were made to the bow of the ship. Which of the following theories was proposed by one of the captain's relatives?

a. Warm weather made the alcoholic cargo release gas, causing cargo barrels to explode and the crew to abandon ship.

The captain's cousin, Oliver Cobb, and the vessel owner, J.H. Winchester, felt that the cargo caused minor explosions in the hold. Following the explosions, the ship would have been abandoned in extreme haste, as such explosions were known to splinter and sink vessels.

The official opinion on the Mary Celeste was that the crew sampled the alcohol, killed the captain and his family, damaged the bow of the brig to make the vessel appear unseaworthy, and waited for another captain to "save" them from their vessel. Others held that the ship was becalmed. As it slowly drifted toward shore, Briggs and his men set out in the yawl, to avoid being onboard if the ship wrecked. However, they did not tie the yawl to the Mary Celeste; and when the wind started again, the ship abandoned them. Many other theories exist, and this remains one of history's mysteries. (Incidentally, there were no African Americans among the crew—though Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote a fictionalized account in which African American crewman mutinied.)

2. In November 1819, a vessel was struck and wrecked by a sperm whale the crew had seen before, at previous whaling sites. What is the name of the ship?

b. The Essex

Having survived the wreck, 20 crewmembers set out from the Essex in small rowboats with minimal supplies. Over the course of three months, they floated about the South Seas, suffering from the heat, dehydration, and starvation. The evacuees eventually resorted to cannibalism when their food stores were depleted. Eight men survived, including the captain, James Pollard, Jr., and Owen Chase, author of the best-known firsthand account of the disaster. The story of the Essex inspired Herman Melville to write his famous novel Moby-Dick.

3. The 1904 loss of the New York excursion steamer the General Slocum resulted in over 400 dead. Which factor did not contribute to the loss of life?

b. Inaccurate nautical charts

On June 15, 1904, the General Slocum departed on the annual Sunday School excursion of St. Mark's German Lutheran Church. However, unbeknownst to passengers and crew, a fire had broken out in a storage room. Many passengers died of burns, and others drowned, unable to swim. The steamer's defective life preservers added to the death toll. The preservers' insides, made of finely-ground cork, quickly became waterlogged when the preservers' rotten covers fell away. One survivor told of a woman with three children. The mother and two girls could swim, but one daughter could not. The daughter was put in a life preserver and tossed overboard, where she immediately sank.

The General Slocum disaster was recognized internationally because of the loss of so many women and children.

4. In December 1717, Blackbeard captured the sloop Margaret. What did the pirates take from the ship?

c. Cutlasses, hogs, books, and navigational tools

Captain Henry Bostock reported his losses as cutlasses, hogs, books, and navigational instruments—not the traditional image of pirate booty. However, the hogs would provide fresh meat; the books provided entertainment on board a ship where the crew often had little to do (pirate crews could be roughly 80 men strong, as compared to the 12-man crew of a merchant vessel); and accurate navigation was crucial at sea. When we think of pirates and maps, we imagine mythical treasure maps, but maps were vital to any ship—the more the better, as they were often inaccurate by as much as 600 nautical miles. Also, pirates were essentially democratic, so crews determined destinations by common vote. As a result, pirate ships often took odd, zigzagging routes, rather than tried-and-true sea paths, making maps still more valuable.