One common myth about Washington, D.C. is in regards to the alphabetic street names. What many don’t realize is that there is no J street! The rumor was that Pierre L’Enfant (who designed the city) left J Street out of his city plan to slight either his rival, Chief Justice John Jay, or Thomas Jefferson, whom he allegedly disliked. The truth is much more mundane. L’Enfant was actually fired from the project before the streets were named, and the new city planners felt that the letters I and J were too similar, so they left off J Street to avoid confusion.

The Metro is one of the key features of travel in Washington D.C., starting with an escalator trip underground to catch a train. It is true that the Wheaton Metro station has the longest escalators in the Western Hemisphere. These escalators are 230 feet long, and each of the three takes 2.5 minutes to ride.

The rallying cry of the American Revolution was “no taxation without representation.” As it happens, this isn’t true in our capitol city. In 1973, the District of Columbia Home Rule Act gave the city more control of local affairs. DC citizens how have their own mayor and city council, but residents do not have full democratic representation in Congress. Instead, they have a non-voting delegate to the House and a shadow Senator. (a senator not officially sworn or seated). Residents are seeking statehood to gain full voting rights, but they have not been successful. So, for the time being, taxation without representation is not a myth for Washington D.C.’s residents.

Serling began supporting the war effort as early as high school when, as editor of his school paper, he worked to persuade other students to support it as well. In fact, he wanted to leave school to enlist, but a teacher told him “War is a temporary thing. It ends. An education doesn’t. Without your degree, where will you be after the war?” Serling took this advice, and enlisted in the U.S. Army the day after his high school graduation in 1943.

He served in the 511th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 11th Airborne Division. On April 25, 1944, he received the overseas orders for which he had been waiting. As he was Jewish, he had hoped to fight Hitler but, instead was sent to the Pacific theatre. On May 5, he headed to New Guinea aboard the USS Sea Pike. In November or 1944, these troops saw their first combat on the Philippine island of Leyte. He was transferred to the demolition platoon, nicknamed the “death squad” for its high casualty rate, an assignment which shaped his later writing and political views. He was also wounded twice before the successful conclusion of the mission.

On February 3, 1945, Serling was finally put to the test as a paratrooper in a battle for Manila. One night, civilians threw a party for soldiers who had freed them from Japanese control. The party was fired on, and both soldiers and civilians sustained casualties. Serling ran into the line of fire to rescue the performer on stage, distinguishing himself. As his regiment moved through Manila, they suffered a 50% casualty rate, and Serling himself was again wounded. He was sent to New Guinea to recover, but chose to return to Manila and, for his final assignment, to Japan. Serling was decorated with the Purple Heart, the Bronze Star, and the Philippine Liberation Medal.

Serling was discharged from the Army in 1946, and worked in a rehabilitation hospital while recovering from his wounds as well as he could. He then used both disability payments at the G.I. Bill to enroll in college where he became interested in theatre and broadcasting. In 1950, he received his Bachelor of Arts degree. From there, he was on his way to a Hollywood career. Next stop, The Twilight Zone.

There are a lot of stories about Truman’s middle name. It’s true that his middle name was simply the letter “S.” His grandfathers were named Andersen Shipp Truman and Solomon Young, and this is said to be a compromise between the two.

The stories you may have heard about Truman’s temper are also true! In 1950, there was a famous incident in which it flared up. After his daughter Margaret received poor reviews for a vocal performance in the Washington Post, he wrote a letter to the editor threatening to beat up the editor.

Although Truman was president, he was not elected to that position! In 1945, President Franklin D. Roosevelt chose him to be his fourth vice president. Upon his death in April of that year, Truman became the 33rd president of the United States, making him Commander in Chief of a country at war. Contrary to what some may say, Truman had a difficult time deciding to use the atomic bomb on Japan to force surrender, as victory in Europe was imminent.

The Atom Bomb may overshadow Truman’s other wartime efforts, but there were many others. In 1941, he drove 10,000 miles across the country to look into reports of profiteering in defense plants. After the war, Truman helped ensure that the Marshall Plan passed Congress, and supported the establishment of Israel.

In 1948, when Truman ran for reelection, legend has it that he came from being a long-shot to win the election through a tireless grassroots effort. We hear stories of his panache and speeches given from the back of train cabooses before traveling to the next stop. While this couldn’t hurt, he almost certainly won because the economy came booming back in the election year. In some years, that is a certain road to victory.

On September 2, 1945, he witnessed the Japanese surrender in Tokyo Bay from his ship’s signal bridge about mile away. He looked back on that event, saying “That was one of the greatest moments in my life. To be 18, almost 19, standing on the signal bridge and watching the signing of that document. I felt so proud to be part of the service at that time.”

Following his discharge, Curtis studied acting at the Dramatic Workshop of The New School in New York under the GI Bill. He was on his way to the acting career for which he would become famous. In fact, one and a half years to the day after leaving the Navy, he got his first starring role. During his career, he was even able to work with Cary Grant and Tyrone Powers, the men who had inspired him to join the Navy.

As with so many celebrities who served, Tony Curtis gave back to the Navy after being discharged. He was involved with the U.S. Navy Memorial Foundation, was a co-host at the first Lone Sailor Dinner (and, later, won the Lone Sailor Award), and was a guest speaker at the Navy Memorial. In addition, he served as narrator during the U.S. Navy Band’s 226th birthday concert. It was at another birthday celebration, the 1998 Submarine Birthday celebration, at which Curtis was presented with a pair of submariners “silver dolphins” and was given the title of “submariner” for his support of the Navy and the Submarine Service. Finally, after all of those years, Curtis was given the rank and recognition he had long sought.

Washington was sworn in as the first president of the United States on April 30, 1789. A week later, an elaborate ball was held to celebrate the event in New York, the temporary headquarters of the federal government, in a building on Broadway near Wall Street. Unfortunately for the president, his wife Martha was unable to attend. She was still at their estate Mt. Vernon, in Virginia, where she was wrapping up business affairs before making the trip to New York.

Washington arrived at the ball in the company of other American statesmen and their wives. That evening he danced with many of New York’s society ladies. Vice President John Adams, members of Congress and visiting French and Spanish dignitaries, as well their wives and daughters, joined in the festivities. Eliza Hamilton, wife of Alexander Hamilton, recorded her impressions of the ball in her memoirs, noting that the president liked to dance the minuet, a dance she thought was suited to his dignity and gravity.

Following Washington, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson held much more informal inaugural celebrations. But in 1809, Madison’s gregarious wife Dolly threw a gala for 400 people at Long’s Hotel in Washington, D.C. Since then, formal inaugural balls have been held almost every four years to celebrate new presidential terms. As the tradition evolved, venues changed to accommodate the increase in attendees. In 1957, multiple balls were held at several venues for Eisenhower’s inauguration. Presidents since Eisenhower have spent inaugural night making whirlwind stops at a series of parties. Both Woodrow Wilson and Warren Harding cancelled their inaugural balls in order to save money; Franklin Pierce cancelled his due to the recent death of his son. Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt held charity balls for their inaugurations. William Henry Harrison attended three balls after standing all morning in freezing cold conditions at his inaugural ceremony. Soon after, he caught a cold that later developed into pneumonia. He died of complications from the pneumonia 30 days into his term.

The record number of inaugural balls attended in one night by a president is 15, set by President Bill Clinton in 1997. George H.W. Bush ran a close second, making 11 stops in 1989.

This post originally appeared at History.com

The raid began around 1 a.m. local time, when 23 U.S. Navy SEALs in two Black Hawk helicopters descended on the compound in Abbottabad, a tourist and military center north of Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad. One of the helicopters crash-landed into the compound but no one aboard was hurt. During the raid, which lasted approximately 40 minutes, five people, including bin Laden and one of his adult sons, were killed by U.S. gunfire. No Americans were injured in the assault. Afterward, bin Laden’s body was flown by helicopter to Afghanistan for official identification, then buried at an undisclosed location in the Arabian Sea less than 24 hours after his death, in accordance with Islamic practice.

Just after 11:30 p.m. EST on May 1 (Pakistan’s time zone is 9 hours ahead of Washington, D.C.), President Barack Obama, who monitored the raid in real time via footage shot by a drone flying high above Abbottabad, made a televised address from the White House, announcing bin Laden’s death. “Justice has been done,” the president said. After hearing the news, cheering crowds gathered outside the White House and in New York City’s Times Square and the Ground Zero site.

Based on computer files and other evidence the SEALs collected during the raid, it was later determined that bin Laden was making plans to assassinate President Obama and carry out a series of additional attacks against America, including one on the anniversary of September 11, the largest terrorist attack ever on U.S. soil, which left nearly 3,000 people dead. Shortly after the 2001 attack, President George W. Bush declared bin Laden, who was born into a wealthy family in Saudi Arabia in 1957 and used his multi-million-dollar inheritance to help establish al Qaeda and fund its activities, would be captured dead or alive. In December of that year, American-backed forces came close to capturing bin Laden in a cave complex in Afghanistan’s Tora Bora region; however, he escaped and would continue to elude U.S. authorities for years.

A break in the hunt for bin Laden came in August 2010, when C.I.A. analysts tracked the terrorist leader’s courier to the Abbottabad compound, located behind tall security walls in a residential neighborhood. (U.S. intelligence officials spent the ensuing months keeping the compound under surveillance; however, they were never certain bin Laden was hiding there until the raid took place.) The U.S. media had long reported bin Laden was believed to be hiding in the remote tribal areas along the Afghan-Pakistani border, so many Americans were surprised to learn the world’s most famous fugitive had likely spent the last five years of his life in a well-populated area less than a mile from an elite Pakistani military academy. After the raid, which the U.S. reportedly carried out without informing the Pakistani government in advance, some American officials suspected Pakistani authorities of helping to shelter bin Laden in Abbottabad, although there was no concrete evidence to confirm this.

This post originally appeared at History.com

President Jefferson’s greatest achievement was the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, a deal that doubled the size of the United States.

At the time, France was in the middle of a war with England. France also was having trouble holding onto its possessions in the New World. Slave uprisings in its Caribbean colonies cost the lives of a lot of soldiers, and France finally withdrew in 1803. Napoleon decided that he was better off abandoning a hopeless cause in the Americas and selling his holdings in the western United States to fund his war in Europe.

Jefferson sent James Monroe and Robert Livingston to Paris in 1802 to buy the city of New Orleans and its coastal areas. Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours, a French nobleman with ties with Jefferson and Napoleon, helped negotiate the purchase price of $15 million. On Dec. 20, 1803, the French flag was lowered in New Orleans and the U.S. flag was raised. It ended any conflict the United States would have with France over territory on our continent.

The new American continent needed to be explored and charted. Jefferson had a great interest in science and discovery, and in 1803 he asked Congress for funds for the exploration. Jefferson was a member of the American Philosophical Society, (founded in Philadelphia in 1743 by Benjamin Franklin), and he used its resources to send Meriwether Lewis to the society for instruction in botany, mathematics, surveying, astronomy, chemistry and map making. In 1804, Lewis and William Clark led a two-year expedition of 45 men to explore the Louisiana Territory and beyond. The expedition gathered a tremendous amount of scientific and geographical information which greatly helped with the settlement of the West.

Among the expedition’s accomplishments was the blazing of the desired Northwest Passage, a path of rivers to make commerce easier and practical. It helped Jefferson’s claim on the Pacific Northwest, ahead of any European powers. The expedition also gathered topographical information of the land and its natural resources, and details about the Native American tribes.

As has been the case with most presidents, Jefferson’s second term was filled with problems.

Trouble with England continued and got worse. President Jefferson thought embargoes would bring England around, especially since the British were still at war with France. However, the embargoes did more to hurt American commence that it did to hurt England. It also hurt Jefferson’s popularity at home.

Even though Jefferson had strongly opposed the Alien and Sedition Acts in his bitter battles with John Adams, Jefferson evoked the acts against his political enemies. He ordered his former vice president, Aaron Burr, tried for treason in 1807. Burr was accused of planning an insurrection in order to establish a separate union of Western states and territories. Burr was acquitted.

Jefferson inherited a situation where the United States was paying $80,000 in extortion money to the Barbary states for protection against North African pirates, who had been capturing American ships for ransom. Tripoli made new demands in 1801 for a payment of $225,000 and an annual payment of $25,000. Jefferson chose to fight the pirates instead of paying them. Tripoli declared war on the United States, beginning the First Barbary War. President Jefferson sent a fleet of naval vessels to the Mediterranean. He forced Tunis and Algiers to break their alliance with Tripoli which ultimately forced it out of the fight. America’s naval bombardments of Tripoli restored peace in the Mediterranean.

It was President Jefferson who authorized the establishment of West Point, even though the idea of such an institution had been discussed since the American Revolution. In 1802, Jefferson convinced Congress to fund and build the United States Military Academy at West Point, on the Hudson River in New York.

President Jefferson pursued a policy of removing Native Americans from the path the United States was taking. As governor of Virginia during the Revolutionary War, Jefferson favored the forcible removal of Cherokee and Shawnee tribes who had fought with the British. Jefferson believed the Indians should give up their cultures and religions and adopt western culture and Christianity. His first choice was for the Indians to assimilate, or else be removed to the West.

After leaving the White House, Thomas Jefferson pursued a goal he had envisioned for several decades. He wanted to start a university where students could study areas not offered at other universities, and he believed the school should be financed by the general public, so everyone could attend. His dream became the University of Virginia, which opened in 1825, and it was the first university to offer a full curriculum of elective courses. It also was unique in that it was centered around a library rather than a church.

Historians have made much of Thomas Jefferson’s treatment of African-Americans, both pro and con. Jefferson was a Virginia tobacco planter who owned hundreds of slaves during his lifetime. He held the common view that Africans were inferior. However, he became a leader against the international slave trade, and he signed the Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves in 1807. This was the earliest that the trade could be regulated, because the Constitution of 1787 protected the slave trade for 20 years. During that 20-year period, Southern planters imported tens of thousands of slaves, more than during any other period. However, while the new law ended the international trade, it did not regulate domestic slave trading.

There were allegations, even in Jefferson’s time, that he was the father of the children of his house slave, Sally Hemings. DNA tests in 1998 confirmed a match between Sally’s last child and the Jefferson line.

Thomas Jefferson died on July 4, 1826, on the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, and a few hours before John Adams died. He died deeply in debt, and to satisfy his creditors his estate had to sell his possessions, including 130 slaves and Monticello.

Thomas Jefferson is buried in the family cemetery at Monticello.

The idea for the Empire State Building is said to have been born of a competition between Walter Chrysler of the Chrysler Corporation and John Jakob Raskob of General Motors, to see who could erect the taller building. Chrysler had already begun work on the famous Chrysler Building, the gleaming 1,046-foot skyscraper in midtown Manhattan. Not to be bested, Raskob assembled a group of well-known investors, including former New York Governor Alfred E. Smith. The group chose the architecture firm Shreve, Lamb and Harmon Associates to design the building. The Art-Deco plans, said to have been based in large part on the look of a pencil, were also builder-friendly: The entire building went up in just over a year, under budget (at $40 million) and well ahead of schedule. During certain periods of building, the frame grew an astonishing four-and-a-half stories a week.

At the time of its completion, the Empire State Building, at 102 stories and 1,250 feet high (1,454 feet to the top of the lightning rod), was the world’s tallest skyscraper. The Depression-era construction employed as many as 3,400 workers on any single day, most of whom received an excellent pay rate, especially given the economic conditions of the time. The new building imbued New York City with a deep sense of pride, desperately needed in the depths of the Great Depression, when many city residents were unemployed and prospects looked bleak. The grip of the Depression on New York’s economy was still evident a year later, however, when only 25 percent of the Empire State’s offices had been rented.

In 1972, the Empire State Building lost its title as world’s tallest building to New York’s World Trade Center, which itself was the tallest skyscraper for but a year. Today the honor belongs to Dubai’s Burj Khalifa tower, which soars 2,717 feet into the sky.

This post originally appeared at History.com

Source: Today in Science

In front of 10,000 spectators, Washington appeared in a plain brown broadcloth suit holding a ceremonial army sword. At 6′ 3, Washington presented an impressive and solemn figure as he took the oath of office standing on the second balcony of Federal Hall. With Vice President John Adams standing beside him, Washington repeated the words prompted by Chancellor Robert R. Livingston, kissed the bible and then went to the Senate chamber to deliver his inaugural address.

Observers noted that Washington appeared as if he would have preferred facing cannon and musket fire to taking the political helm of the country. He fidgeted, with his hand in one pocket, and spoke in a low, sometimes inaudible voice while he reiterated the mixed emotions of anxiety and honor he felt in assuming the role of president. For the most part, his address consisted of generalities, but he directly addressed the need for a strong Constitution and Bill of Rights and frequently emphasized the public good. He told the House of Representatives that he declined to be paid beyond such actual expenditures as the public good may be thought to require. In deference to the power of Congress, Washington promised to give way to my entire confidence in your discernment and pursuit of the public good.

After delivering his address, Washington walked up Broadway with a group of legislators and local political leaders to pray at St. Paul’s Chapel. Later, he made the humble and astute observation that his presidency, and the nation itself, was an experiment.

This post originally appeared at History.com