Top Results for American Classics

Delivered from the Lincoln Memorial on August 28, 1963, I Have a Dream formed part of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Martin Luther King Jr. called for an end to racial segregation and discrimination, connecting the civil rights movement to promises expressed in the Declaration of Inde...

The original United States Constitution was signed in Philadelphia on September 17, 1787, after being drafted by delegates to the Constitutional Convention. Written on parchment, it establishes the structure and powers of the federal government, divides authority among three branches, and defines re...

Dorothea Lange’s “Migrant Mother” is a powerful black-and-white photograph taken in 1936. It depicts Florence Thompson, a destitute pea picker during the Great Depression, and her children. The image became an enduring symbol of poverty and hardship experienced by agricultural workers across America...

News coverage becomes the material for comedy in The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, an American television program built around political and media satire. Stewart's segments use clips and commentary to examine the gap between public claims and the evidence presented alongside them. Correspondent piec...

Preserved at the National Archives in Washington, D.C., the engrossed Declaration of Independence is the formal parchment copy signed by representatives of the thirteen colonies. Its text, adopted by the Second Continental Congress in 1776, announces separation from Great Britain. It states a theory...

Built by the American Locomotive Company between 1941 and 1944, Union Pacific's Big Boy class consisted of 25 articulated steam locomotives for heavy freight service. The 4-8-8-4 wheel arrangement placed two groups of eight driving wheels beneath an enormous boiler, with the articulated front engine...

Long, flexible lines and an expansive speaking voice distinguish Walt Whitman's poetry. The American poet made Leaves of Grass a continuing creative project, first publishing it in 1855 and revising and expanding it through later editions. His work helped establish free verse as an influential form...

Orville and Wilbur Wright were American aviation pioneers and bicycle manufacturers who developed the first successful sustained and controlled heavier-than-air powered aircraft. On December 17, 1903, they achieved the first powered flights near Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina, using their Wright F...

Released by Sire Records on October 8, 1980, Remain in Light is Talking Heads' fourth studio album. Working with Brian Eno, the American band drew strongly on Afrobeat, particularly Fela Kuti's music, and built arrangements around interlocking rhythms. Layered guitar figures and funk basslines shift...

Known professionally as JAR, Joel Arthur Rosenthal is an American jewelry designer who established his Paris practice in the late 1970s. His high-jewelry work is associated with dense pavé settings, in which closely arranged stones create a continuous jeweled surface. Unusual combinations of colored...

Edited by R. W. Franklin and published in 1999, The Poems of Emily Dickinson: Reading Edition presents 1,789 poems in a single volume. It draws on Franklin's earlier three-volume variorum edition, which documents differing versions and readings. The book retains Dickinson's distinctive lineation and...

Pancho Gonzales, born Richard Alonzo Gonzales, was an American tennis player known for his powerful serve, athleticism, and competitive longevity. He won the U.S. National Championships in 1948 and 1949 before joining the professional circuit, where he was a leading player throughout much of the 195...

Television's 1977 debut studio album, released by Elektra Records, places intricate guitar interplay at the center of its sound. Tom Verlaine and Richard Lloyd build distinct but closely connected lines over Fred Smith's bass and Billy Ficca's drums. Instead of relying mainly on blunt power chords,...

Fragmented voices and dense literary references mark the poetry of T. S. Eliot. Born in the United States and later based in Britain, he became an influential figure in twentieth-century modernism. The Waste Land uses shifts in speaker and setting to explore disillusionment, creating a poem whose br...

Alfred Sherwood Romer studied vertebrate evolution with particular attention to the early history of animals that lived on land. An American paleontologist and biologist working during the twentieth century, he combined fossil research with a broad understanding of anatomy. His fieldwork and studies...

French designer Jean Schlumberger brought an imaginative treatment of nature to Tiffany & Co. after joining the company in 1956. The collection associated with his name includes high jewelry and decorative objects shaped around subjects such as flowers, birds and marine life. Rather than reproducing...

Released in 1977, Decade is a triple-LP compilation album by Canadian singer-songwriter Neil Young. It collects material from his solo career and work with bands such as Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, spanning roughly his first ten years of recording. The album includes previo...

The American adaptation of 'The Office' is a brilliantly awkward and hilarious mockumentary sitcom set in a paper company in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Its cringe comedy, relatable characters, and surprisingly heartwarming moments have made it a cultural phenomenon. The shows success lies in its abilit...

Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848-1933) worked across glass, jewelry, and decorative objects as an American artist and designer associated with American Art Nouveau. He developed Favrile iridescent glass and designed leaded-glass windows and lamps. Color and the behavior of light are central to understand...

William Stewart Halsted helped shape modern American surgery through his work at Johns Hopkins Hospital. His approach emphasized meticulous operating technique, careful handling of tissue and control of bleeding. He also established a demanding residency model in which surgeons in training gained re...

Union Pacific No. 4014 provides an operating example of the Big Boy class, rather than a museum display alone. Built by the American Locomotive Company in 1941, it is an articulated steam locomotive with a 4-8-8-4 wheel arrangement, originally intended for heavy freight work. Union Pacific retired i...

Orville and Wilbur Wright were American inventors whose work established a practical foundation for powered aviation. Their successful flights in 1903 near Kitty Hawk, at Kill Devil Hills in North Carolina, demonstrated sustained, controlled flight in a powered heavier-than-air aircraft. The achieve...

'Daydream Nation' is the fifth studio album by the American alternative rock band Sonic Youth, released in 1988 as a double LP. The record blends noise rock with traditional song structures, featuring extensive use of alternate guitar tunings, distortion, and feedback. The release brought the band m...

Houdon's portrait bust of George Washington grew from the sculptor's visit to Mount Vernon in 1785 and the life mask he made there. That direct study gave Jean-Antoine Houdon a basis for depicting specific facial features rather than treating Washington only as an abstract national symbol. The resul...

John F. Kennedy delivered his inaugural address on January 20, 1961, following his swearing-in as the thirty-fifth president of the United States. The speech was delivered at the United States Capitol during a period of tension between the United States and the Soviet Union. It emphasized public ser...

*Howl and Other Poems* is a poetry collection by American writer Allen Ginsberg, first published by City Lights Books in 1956. The title poem, written in long, breath-based lines, critiques materialism, militarism, and social conformity in mid-twentieth-century America. The collection was central to...

Buster Keaton was a pioneering American silent film comedian renowned for his masterful physical acting. His unique style involved intricate and often dangerous stunts performed without dialogue, creating timeless comedic moments. He is particularly significant for audiences interested in classic ci...

Finance, media and the arts help shape New York City's role as a major international center, with technology also contributing to its working life. For visitors, recognizable landmarks sit alongside museums and a food culture shaped by many communities. The city's appeal extends beyond individual at...

American astronomer Andrea M. Ghez studies the center of the Milky Way, where observations of stellar motion reveal an extreme gravitational environment. Her team's work tracking stars near Sagittarius A* provided evidence for a supermassive black hole at the galactic center. The case depends on how...