Forget Custer

Hungarian immigrant and apprentice cigar maker, Sigmund Shlesinger (1848-1928) probably never expected to become a frontiersman. After he ended up in Kansas and had several business…

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The Trouble with Casual Blasphemy

On February 23, 1658, Jacob Lumbrozo was brought before a judge in the colony of Maryland and tried for blasphemy. In a world such as ours today, it is hard to imagine someone being taken…

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Curly-Headed White Chief with One Tongue

On May 30, 1854, President Franklin Pierce signed the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which officially defined the territories of Kansas and Nebraska and opened up a significant part of what became…

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