Historical Snapshots

Summary: John Adams defends British soldiers after the Boston Massacre, balancing justice and public outrage in a pivotal moment in history.

Please note: we’ve kept all quotes in this snapshot in thei…

Summary: Snapshot biography of French tennis legend Suzanne Lenglen, who captivated the world with her victories and style.

The numbers are astounding. 250 championships won. Three Olympic medals, six…

SummaryA short biography of journalist Nellie Bly, who's daring exposé in a New York insane asylum revealed shocking truths and drove reform.

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In 1887, 23-year-old Elizabeth Cochrane, who would becom…

Summary: snapshot biography of Sarah Josepha Hale, writer of the nursery rhyme "Mary Had a Little Lamb," and an advocate for Thanksgiving as a national holiday.

Sarah Josepha Hale is known as the "Mo…

Summary: Snapshot biography of Gertrude Ederle, who was a champion swimmer and the first woman to swim across the English Channel.

On a breezy morning in August 1926, nineteen-year-old Gertrude Ederl…

Summary: Snapshot history of the world's first car.

Transcript:

The world was changing rapidly in the late 19th century. Railways crisscrossed continents, and factories hummed with the sounds of indust…

A snapshot biography of Dr. James Barry, who unbeknownst to most was a woman practicing medicine for decades as a man during the 19th century.

Snapshot of the Boston Tea Party, which was an act of defiance that helped ignite the path to the American Revolution.

A snapshot biography of Isaac Burns Murphy, who is widely regarded as the greatest jockey of all time.

Sources and text: https://historicalsnaps.com/2024/11/11/the-greatest-jockey-isaac-burns-murphy/

On the morning of December 7th, 1941, Doris Miller, or Dorie as his friends called him, was working as a mess attendant, serving breakfast and collecting laundry, on the battleship West Virginia in P…

In profession, Leonie von Zesch was a dentist. In personality, she was the greatest of adventurers. Nothing seemed to scare her, and she found creative solutions to seemingly any problem.

Leonie grew …

December 22, 1849, Saint Petersburg, Russia. Fyodor Dostoevsky, just twenty-eight years old, stands with five other men facing a firing squad, awaiting execution. But then, just as the firing squad p…

Anna Stein took her first breath on a makeshift bed in a crowded Warsaw Ghetto apartment in 1940. At the time, not even a year had passed since the Nazis took over Poland and mandated all Warsaw Jewi…

She was an enormous talent who could sing with the best. One could argue that she was the best.

Sissieretta Jones, or Madame Jones as she liked to be called, captivated audiences with her beautiful a…

It is desirable to paint a pure picture of a man as special in history as Robert Gould Shaw. He deserves that for the sacrifices he made during the U.S. Civil War. Yet, part of life is growing and re…

John Mercer Langston was born to a mixed-race couple in 1829, a time when interracial relationships were highly taboo and often illegal. His father, Ralph Quarles, was a white plantation owner who he…

Isadora Duncan, often hailed as the "Mother of Modern Dance," revolutionized the art form with her free-spirited and expressive style. She became a pivotal figure in the dance world, breaking away fr…

Text for story: https://historicalsnaps.com/2024/05/23/abraham-lincoln-the-president-with-a-patent/

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Text for story available here: https://historicalsnaps.com/2024/05/21/aviation-pioneer-the-charles-alfred-chief-anderson-story/

On May 20, 1862, President Abraham Lincoln, the man with a face as etched and weathered as the divided land he governs, takes his place at his desk. Before him is a document destined to change the Am…