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

Kate Kelly
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Tombs Angel: A One-Woman Social Service Agency

Rebecca Foster Salome was a middle-class woman who earned the apt name the “Tombs Angel” for her daily visits to the Manhattan courts and detention center in the 1880s-1890s.  Known as the Tombs, The New York City Halls of Justice and House of Detention, was a surprising place for an upper middle-class wife to find herself. But there were no social service agencies to help the poor and newly incarcerated, and Rebecca Foster learned how…
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Bid Whist and Sleeping Car Porters

Sleeping car porters are a well-known part of history. The card game of Bid Whist is not. Yet the story of the men and the story of the card game are very much intertwined. As the Pullman porters traveled the country, they spread information, music and card games like Bid Whist. (Bid Whist is a trick-taking strategic card game compared to spades and bridge.) Why haven’t more people heard of it? Here’s the story: How…
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formal portrait of Charles Drew

Dr. Charles Drew, Medical Pioneer in Blood Work

Dr. Charles Drew was a pioneer in medicine who achieved recognition in a racially divided America for his work with blood collection and storage during World War II. But those who knew him said that his greatest pride was in having mentored many Black surgeons who might never have moved forward in the field of medicine if it hadn’t been for Dr. Drew. Dr. Drew was one of several scientists working on ways to get…
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Red Ball Express truck stuck in mud WWII

Red Ball Express: Transport System Helped Win WWII

The Red Ball Express was a desperately needed World War II truck transport system that came about six weeks after D-Day. By late July of 1944, the Allies were progressing farther and faster than expected after the June 6 surprise landing on the beaches of Normandy. The military was struggling to keep the front lines supplied.  The creation of a truck convoy system would provide a way to get ammunition, gas, and supplies to the…
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On
This
Day

At 5:13 a.m. on April 18, 1906, an earthquake (est. close to 8.0 on the Richter scale) struck San Francisco, California, killing hundreds of people. The brick buildings and wooden structures of the day were far from earthquake-proof. Buildings toppled or burned down, and the resulting fires could not be extinguished because of ruptured water mains. Many people had to be evacuated, and it took years for the city to re-build.

Women Leaders

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Shirley Chisholm (1924-2005), Seven Terms in Congress (NY)

  • First African-American woman elected to Congress
  • First woman to run for Democratic presidential nomination (1972); Margaret Chase Smith had run for Republican nomination in 1964381px-Shirley_Chisholm
  • First black candidate to put name forward to run for president with a major party
“Shirley Chisholm had guts” was her answer when she was asked how she wanted people to remember her.
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Libby Riddles (1956- )

blank American dogsledder and first woman to win the Iditarod, 1985 The Iditarod is a grueling 1152-mile trans-Alaska dogsled race in which male mushers dominated until 1985 when Libby Riddles became the first woman to win the annual race.

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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

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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)
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