Today's post comes from Ashley Mattingly, an archivist at the National Archives in St. Louis. The year was 1943, and Elizabeth “Betty” Maxine Chambers was a young mother and a widow. Betty’s husband, Army pilot Lt. Robert William Chambers, had died in 1942 when his P-38F Lightening aircraft crashed at Mills Field in San Mateo, … Continue reading A WASP’s Story
Today’s post is from Lee Lacy, an Assistant Professor at the U.S. Army Command & General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. When Harry S. Truman was told on April 12, 1945, by Eleanor Roosevelt that her husband, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, was dead, Truman reacted true to form. He asked if there was anything he … Continue reading Harry Truman and The Bomb
A recently discovered album donated to the National Archives by Monuments Men Foundation President Robert M. Edsel is on display until February 20, 2014. The album is open to a photograph of an important painting by master French painter Jean-Honoré Fragonard. Girl Holding a Dove was repatriated by the Monuments Men in 1946. It sold … Continue reading On display: Finding stolen art using this album
Steven Spielberg is being honored by the Foundation for the National Archives for his film legacy, which has brought history to life on the big screen. The National Archives is celebrating the award with a film festival, and Saving Private Ryan is the first film to be screened. Join us tonight, Friday, November 15. For … Continue reading Spielberg Film Festival: Saving Private Ryan
In commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the passage of the Civil Liberties Act, the original Executive Order 9066 as well as the 1988 law are on display in the National Archives Building in Washington, DC, from June 16 to August 19, 2013. Today's blog post comes from curator Bruce Bustard. “Here we admit a … Continue reading On display: Executive Order 9066 and the Civil Liberties Act of 1988
The Roosevelts had planned for a "more homey" lighting of the National Christmas tree on December 24 in 1941. FDR had directed that the tree be moved from the Ellipse to the White House grounds, just next to the South Lawn Fountain. But after the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, there … Continue reading The 1941 Christmas Tree: A Bright Light in Dark Times
Today's post comes from Nikita Buley, an intern in the National Archives Office of Strategy and Communications. The National Archives is on the West Coast, too! The National Archives at San Francisco (located in San Bruno, California) contains over 55,000 cubic feet of Federal records from the 1850s through the 1980s. The records come from … Continue reading Archives Spotlight: San Francisco
Today's post is written by archivist Dr. Greg Bradsher. When one thinks about President Kennedy’s naval career in World War II, what most often comes to mind is his command of Motor Torpedo Boat PT-109. Thanks to the 1963 movie PT 109, adapted from the 1961 book PT 109: John F. Kennedy in World War … Continue reading John F. Kennedy and PT Boat 59
It's been hot here in Washington, DC. So hot that a plane got stuck in "soft spot" in the asphalt of the runway at Reagan National Airport just across the river in Alexandria, Virginia. So hot that our brains melted and we could not choose a winner from last week's caption contest. So we turned … Continue reading Thursday Photo Caption Contest: July 12
His parents were victims of the Nazis when he was only four, and he and his uncle spent two years hiding in the forests of Poland, waiting until the end of World War II. But the ordeal of Michael Pupa was far from over. He became a “displaced person,” or DP, moving from one DP … Continue reading An Orphan of the Holocaust
