Amidst tensions over European political and territorial boundaries, the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand by a Serbian terrorist in 1914 derailed peace in the western world by sparking World War I—one of the highest-casualty conflicts in modern times. While European nations quickly engaged, the United States immediately declared neutrality. By 1917, however, remaining neutral was no longer an option. The Great War would bring the United States out of isolationism and onto the world stage. It would also change life on the American home front forever. A centralized government took control of American life in an unprecedented fashion by instating a mandatory military draft, controlling industries, initiating food and ration restrictions, and launching elaborate campaigns to encourage patriotism. One of the most important, if temporary, changes brought by the war at home came from the stifled flow of labor, as men were pulled away by the draft and immigration slowed. The need for American labor provided second-class citizens, such as women and African Americans, a brief opportunity for better jobs. This glimpse would help foment in them a desire for more and equal opportunities after they were pulled away once more at war’s end. This exhibition was created as part of the DPLA’s Public Library Partnerships Project by collaborators from Digital Commonwealth. Exhibition organizer: Anna Fahey-Flynn.

Pressbooks is an Open Textbook platform. This Open (Canvas LMS) course demonstrates various methods of placing an open Pressbooks textbook in Canvas, including as a Navigation menu item and as links, PDFs or pages within Modules. It also includes various methods of providing students with a print version.

On December 7, 1941, Imperial Japan attacked a US naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Pre-existing racial tensions and “yellow peril” hysteria magnified as the American public grew increasingly suspicious of Japanese Americans and uncertain of their loyalty. They were regarded as potential spies and anti-Japanese propaganda quickly spread. Then, on February 19, 1942, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066. 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry (two-thirds of whom were US citizens) were forced to evacuate from their homes and report to assembly centers. From there, they were moved to one of ten internment camps, or War Relocation Centers, located in remote areas of seven states—California, Arizona, Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho, Utah, and Arkansas.For the next three years, Japanese Americans acclimated to life behind barbed wire and under armed guard. Uprooted from their lives, they found themselves in strange and uncomfortable environments. They had to adapt to their new situation by adjusting to new living conditions, attending new schools, and finding inventive ways to pass the time. They attempted to maintain a sense of normalcy by attending religious meetings and by finding employment.This exhibition tells stories of everyday lives in Japanese Internment camps during World War II. It was created as part of the DPLA’s Digital Curation Program by the following students as part of Dr. Joan E. Beaudoin's course "Metadata in Theory and Practice" in the School of Library and Information Science at Wayne State University: Stephanie Chapman, Jessica Keener, Nicole Sobota, and Courtney Whitmore.

Throughout the nineteenth century and into the early twentieth century, Americans were inundated with myriad medicinal treatments collectively known as patent medicine. At a time when doctors and medical clinics were less common, especially in rural areas, patent medicines promised relief from pain and chronic conditions when few other options existed. The term “patent medicine” referred to ingredients that had been granted a government patent; but ironically many purveyors of patent medicine did not register their concoctions with the government. As a result, many competitors offered similar formulas and freely imitated each other’s products. The story of patent medicine is multi-layered. It is about the phenomenon of Americans self-medicating with opiates, alcohol, and herbal supplements, as well as women’s health and healthcare options. It follows the evolution of advertising in America and the rise of chromolithography printing techniques and newspaper advertisements. Finally, patent medicine reveals dubious scientific knowledge during a time when germ theory was in its infancy. This exhibition was created as part of the DPLA’s Public Library Partnerships Project by collaborators from Minnesota Digital Library. Exhibition organized by Greta Bahnemann.

After World War II, there was non-violent, political hostility between the United States and the Soviet Union (USSR), which became known as the Cold War. During this contentious time, both nations created rockets for long-range military weaponry. The Cold War catalyzed the expansion of rocket technology and each country’s desire to conquer outer space. Not only did America want to explore one of the last frontiers, it also wanted to claim technological dominance over the USSR and ensure America’s title of superiority in a time of unease and tension. In 1955, the US and the USSR each announced plans to launch a satellite into orbit. Who would be the first to succeed? On October 4, 1957, the USSR launched Sputnik I into orbit, taking the lead in the Space Race. Only four months later, the US successfully launched its own satellite, the Explorer I, into space. In the wake of these first successful orbital space flights, President Dwight D. Eisenhower recommended to the US Congress that a civilian agency should be established to direct non-military space activities. Thus, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) was born and the Space Race was underway. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, the American space program and its new classes of astronauts achieved breakthroughs in science and space exploration—even sending a man to the Moon. This exhibition was created as part of the DPLA’s Digital Curation Program by the following students in Professor Helene Williams's capstone course at the Information School at the University of Washington: Danielle Rios, Dianne Bohach, Jennifer Lam, and Bobbi deMontigny.

Since before the creation of the first National Parks and Wilderness areas, the Mountain West region has provided ample recreational opportunities in its wide open spaces and rocky terrains. The mountains, deserts, and plains have given visitors the chance to commune with nature and participate in a plethora of outdoor sports and activities. Utah, in particular, but the rest of the Mountain West states (Colorado, Montana, Wyoming, and Idaho) generally, has unique natural settings for many recreational activities that continue to be enjoyed by tourists from across the world. The impact of tourism on the economy and development of the region has been largely positive. However, tourism also increases the human footprint in natural areas, landmarks, and historic sites. This exhibition describes the benefits to the region and its visitors, as well as some of the impacts that tourism has on the natural environment and other economic activities. This exhibition was created as part of the DPLA’s Public Library Partnerships Project by collaborators from Mountain West Digital Library. Exhibition organizer: Della Yeager.

Designed for use as a textbook in first-year college composition programs, written as a practical guide for students struggling to bring their writing up to the level expected of them by their professors and instructors.

The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was one of the most popular of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal programs. The CCC’s mission was to conserve the natural resources of the United States while providing relief to the poor and encouraging the recovery of the economy. The program provided employment to enrolllees and financial support to their families during the Great Depression, while developing much needed conservation and infrastructure projects for a country that had been devastated by over logging and farming practices that contributed to soil erosion. Known as "Roosevelt's Tree Army," the program improved national and state parks, prevented erosion, controlled flooding, and assisted with natural disaster recovery. The unemployment rate during the Great Depression was estimated at twenty-five percent, which left a generation of young men without employment or opportunities. During its operation from 1933 to 1938, the CCC employed close to three million previously unemployed young men, although it disproportionately assisted whites. This exhibition tells the stories of the CCC’s administration and controversial policies, the men who joined, and the contributions its projects made to the history of conservation in the United States. This exhibition was created as part of the DPLA's Public Library Partnerships Project by collaborators from Mountain West Digital Library. Exhibition organizer: Anna Neatrour.

The Great Depression had an enormous impact on theatre across the United States. Productions decreased dramatically, audiences shrank, and talented writers, performers, and directors fled the industry to find work in Hollywood. But despite adversity, the show went on. The public construction projects of the Works Progress Administration built new theaters in cities across America. The Federal Theatre Project was established to fund theatre and performances across the country providing work to unemployed artists. This influx of new artists had transformed the industry, opening theatre to new voices, themes, and audiences. This exhibition explores these Depression-era changes and their impact on American theater. This exhibition was created as part of the DPLA’s Digital Curation Program by the following students as part of Professor Anthony Cocciolo's course "Projects in Digital Archives" in the School of Information and Library Science at Pratt Institute: Kathleen Dowling, Laura Marte Piccini, and Matthew Schofield.

Ever wonder why people don’t do everything for themselves? In this video, Professor Art Carden of Samford University explains how specialization and trade create wealth and make us all better off.

This exhibition explores the Gold Rush—a group of related gold rushes to Western territories in the second half of the nineteenth century—and its impact on American history and culture. Catalyzed by the discovery of gold the Sierra Nevada in 1848, gold fever would persist for decades, attracting migrants looking to stake their claims to increasingly northern and eastern destinations—from the Rocky Mountains in present-day Colorado, Idaho, Wyoming, and Montana to the Yukon Territory and present-day Alaska by the 1890s. This exhibition was created as part of the DPLA’s Digital Curation Program by the following students as part of Professor Krystyna Matusiak's course "Digital Libraries" in the Library and Information Science program at the University of Denver: Heidi Buljung, Chelsea Condren, Rachel Garfield-Levine, Sarah Martinez, Liz Slaymaker-Miller, Chet Rebman, and Brittany Robinson.

There are few ideas more sacred than the physical, emotional, and spiritual connections individuals have had with nature. The love of these beautiful landscapes has inspired countless generations to protect and preserve these lands and to make sure that the wild, untamed beauty will continue to awe future generations who have yet to come across their magnificence. On March 1, 1872, Yellowstone National Park was federally recognized as the country’s first protected area, 44 years before the National Park Service was founded in 1916. And with this first step, the conservation, culture, history, and preservation of parks and protected areas began. Not only do these parks and protected areas ensure the vitality of natural resources, but of historical and cultural resources as well. Constructing and defining the National Park Service as the revered organization that it is today was no easy task. While some individuals have used their talents to create and preserve the physical landscape—physically building the parks and developing policies and laws—others have used their literary and artistic skills to showcase their beauty and history. No one person is the guardian or champion of these protected areas—with collaboration, vision, and connection to the land, we are part of the parks equally as the parks are part of ourselves. Created by Clemson University Libraries.

The Civil War, from 1861 to 1865, is the centerpiece of our nation's story. It looms large, not merely because of its brutality and scope but because of its place in the course of American history. The seeds of war were planted long before 1861 and the conflict remains part of our national memory. Geography has helped shape this narrative. The physical landscape influenced economic differences between the regions, the desire to expand into new territories, the execution of the conflict both in the field and on the home front, and the ways in which our recollections have been shaped. Maps enable us to present the complex strands that, when woven together, provide a detailed account of the causes and conduct of the war. These visual images remain a salient aspect of our memory. Photographs, prints, diaries, songs and letters enhance our ability to tell this story, when our nation, as a Currier & Ives cartoon depicts, was about to be "Torn in Two." This exhibition tells the story of the American Civil War both nationally and locally in Boston, Massachusetts, through maps, documents, letters, and other primary sources. This exhibition was developed by the Norman B. Leventhal Map Center, a nonprofit organization established as a partnership between the Boston Public Library and philanthropist Norman Leventhal.

On April 26, 1913, Confederate Memorial Day, thirteen-year-old Mary Phagan was murdered at the National Pencil Company in Atlanta, Georgia. Leo Frank, the Jewish, New York-raised superintendent of the National Pencil Company, was charged with the crime. At the same time, Atlanta’s economy was transforming from rural and agrarian to urban and industrial. Resources for investing in new industry came from Northern states, as did most industrial leaders, like Leo Frank. Many of the workers in these new industrial facilities were children, like Mary Phagan. Over the next two years, Leo Frank’s legal case became a national story with a highly publicized, controversial trial and lengthy appeal process that profoundly affected Jewish communities in Georgia and the South, and impacted the careers of lawyers, politicians, and publishers. By the early twentieth century, Jewish communities had become well-established in most major Southern cities, continuing a path of migration that began during colonial times. The Leo Frank case and its aftermath revealed lingering regional hostilities from the Civil War and Reconstruction, intensified existing racial and cultural inequalities (particularly anti-Semitism), embodied socioeconomic problems (such as child labor), and exposed the brutality of lynching in the South. The exhibition was created by the Digital Library of Georgia (http://dlg.galileo.usg.edu/). Exhibition Organizers: Charles Pou, Mandy Mastrovita, and Greer Martin.

In 1853, the City of New York set aside hundreds of acres of swampland in the middle of Manhattan, with the idea that this uninhabitable space could serve a practical, public purpose. Today, we know that area as Central Park, one of the most widely visited and celebrated public spaces in the country. The then-unknown park designer who won the bid to design Central Park, Frederick Law Olmsted, would go on to inspire and revolutionize urban park design in the United States. The work of Olmsted and other early parks pioneers, building on older concepts like town squares, would spur the growth of urban parks large and small nationwide. Benefiting from new innovations in design, these parks serve as community centers and defining features of cities and towns across the country. Urban parks have continually adapted to meet the needs of the publics they serve, evolving, for example, from places to simply enjoy nature into recreation sites that offer activities and equipment. More than just sites for leisure, they also play a broader role in supporting community engagement by providing places for civic participation, enhancing quality of life and property values, and offering safe, healthy, and convenient recreation options. This exhibition was created as part of the DPLA’s Public Library Partnerships Project by collaborators from the Minnesota Digital Library. Exhibition Coordinator: Carla Urban.