A man named Samuel Clemens received funds from the radical abolitionist Boston Vigilance Committee in 1854. It may have been Mark Twain, pulling a prank.

Why are battles over just who gets the honor of toasting new graduates—and what they say—always so heated?

Decades after Charles Knowlton died, his book would be credited with the reversal of population growth in England and the popularization of contraception in the United States. 

Horses were omnipresent in the West until only a few generations ago, but then they were replaced by machines and disappeared from our streets as well as our consciousness.

Shaker communities seem to have appealed to a lot of women because they offered a respite where their work was honored and respected.

Julia Ward Howe wrote her most famous poem, the legendary Civil War song, “Battle Hymn of the Republic,” in a single burst of inspiration 156 years ago.

According to the Association of Retail Professionals, about 16 to 18 percent of Americans shop at thrift stores in any given year.

Noah Webster, author of An American Dictionary of the English Language published in 1828, invented the word "immigration."

She’s best known as the intrepid author of Little Women, but Louisa May Alcott was once a domestic servant.

The "sparrow war" in the United States in the 1870s ended with a resounding victory… for the sparrows.