The first major wagon train to the northwest departs from Elm
Grove, Missouri, on the Oregon Trail.

Although U.S. sovereignty over the Oregon Territory was not
clearly established until 1846, American fur trappers and
missionary groups had been living in the region for decades,
to say nothing of the Native Americans who had settled the
land centuries earlier.

They followed a route blazed by fur traders, which took them west
along the Platte River through the Rocky Mountains via the easy
South Pass in Wyoming and then northwest to the Columbia River.

  
CAMILLE
BOHANNON

Hiram King "Hank" Williams
(September 17, 1923 – January 1, 1953)

Williams was a singer-songwriter, regarded as one of the
most significant and influential American singers and
songwriters of the 20th century. Williams recorded 55
singles that reached  the top 10 of the Billboard Country
& Western Best Sellers chart, five of which were released
posthumously, and 12 of which reached No.1.               

Calvin Coolidge (1872 – 1933)

On May 26, 1924, President Calvin Coolidge (above) signed
into law the Immigration Act of 1924, the most stringent U.S.   
immigration policy up to that time in the nation’s history.

The new law—also known as the Johnson-Reed Immigration
Act, reflected the desire of Americans to isolate themselves 
from the world after fighting World War I in Europe, which
exacerbated growing fears of the spread of communist ideas. 

It also reflected the pervasiveness of racial discrimination in
American society at the time. Many Americans saw the huge 
influx of largely unskilled, uneducated immigrants during the 
early 1900s as causing unfair competition for jobs and land. 

The first organized immigration of freed enslaved people to Africa
from the United States departed New York harbor on a journey to Freetown, Sierra Leone, in West Africa. The immigration was largely
the work of the American Colonization Society, a U.S. organization founded in 1816 by Robert Finley to return formerly enslaved
African people to Africa. However, the expedition was also partially funded by the U.S. Congress, which in 1819 had appropriated
$100,000 to be used in returning displaced Africans, illegally
brought to the United States after the abolishment of the slave
trade in 1808, to Africa.

The program was modeled after British’s efforts to resettle formerly enslaved people in Africa following England’s abolishment of the
slave trade in 1772.

Most Americans of African descent were not enthusiastic to
abandon their homes in the United States for the West African
coast.

On November 12, 1954, Ellis Island, the gateway to America, shut
it doors after processing more than 12 million immigrants since
opening in 1892. Today, tens of millions of Americans can trace
their roots through Ellis Island, located in New York Harbor off
the New Jersey coast and named for merchant Samuel Ellis,
who owned the land in the 1770’s.

Health inspection for new immigrants, Ellis Island, New
York, 1920.