The States

The San Francisco earthquake of 1906 and subsequent major tremors along the San Andreas Fault prompted California scientists to explore ways to predict the next "big one. "England's first attempt to colonize the New World in 1585 at Roanoke ended in the mysterious disappearance of the entire expedition. Pro- and anti-slavery factions battled for statehood in 1850s Kansas, propelling America toward the Civil War. The first act of open rebellion in America's Revolutionary War took place at Fort William and Mary when the British stronghold was raided for weapons and munitions. When Virginia joined the Confederacy in 1861, Union loyalists in the western portion of the state rebelled, forming their own state government, but not without a struggle.

Another history lesson filled with surprising facts, figures and stories from five American states. Texas hit the jackpot in 1901 with the discovery of oil at Spindletop Well in Beaumont. Puritans came to Massachusetts to escape religious persecution, but their own zeal to convert Native Americans led to one of the bloodiest wars in US history. Arkansas, 1957--nine African American high school students attempted to enroll at Little Rock's Central High School and made Civil Rights history. During the Iowa Caucuses farmers rub elbows with would-be presidents. Finally, Delaware patriot Caesar Rodney rode into history in 1776 when he raced 80 miles on horseback to break the deadlocked vote for American independence.

Travel back to the origins of New York City at New Amsterdam, the 16th century Dutch merchant colony. Discover how French Acadians fled Canada in 1873 to settle in Louisiana, developing the "Cajun" subculture. The Oregon Trail opened in 1843, bringing half a million settlers to the west. Visit Los Alamos Laboratories in New Mexico's remote high desert, the birthplace of the atomic bomb, and where today research continues to advance science. Finally, learn how two friends from Vermont opened an ice cream shop in 1977 and would go on to become America's most famous entrepreneurs.

Crossing the icy Delaware River on Christmas night, 1776, allowed George Washington to surprise the British at Trenton, a critical American victory in the Revolutionary War. One of the world's most recognizable natural landmarks, the Grand Canyon, defies the imaginations of the five million people who visit there annually. Pioneer Daniel Boone blazed the Wilderness Trail through Kentucky in 1775 and tamed the wild frontier. The opening of "The Unassigned Lands" in Oklahoma resulted in 50,000 settlers racing across the prairie to grab a stake and claim ownership of a homestead. The discovery of oil in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, in 1975 called for an ingenious feat of engineering to transport fuel across 800 miles of icy wilderness.

Ground Hog Day in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, dates back to 1886 and an ancient European holiday called Candlemass Day. Garrison Keeler and his A Prairie Home Companion radio program export a comic, down-home image of Minnesota to a weekly worldwide audience of over four million listeners. Hawaii is the only state that was once a kingdom and had its throne toppled in 1893 by a handful of meddling foreigners with the aid of the U.S. Navy. Following the world's first submarine attack in 1864, the Confederate sub The Hunley sank mysteriously in Charleston Harbor, but was discovered and raised 131 years later. Montana has long been the world's best source for dinosaur fossils and a recent discovery is shedding new light.

Hurricanes, lightning and alligator-filled swamps made Florida an unwelcome candidate for statehood, yet it continues to draw more and more people annually. In 1900, Indianapolis, not Detroit, was the center of the auto industry, and endurance tests there resulted in the establishment of the Indy 500 in 1911. On May 18, 1980, America's most economically destructive volcanic erupts at Mt. St. Helens and rocks Washington State. Escaping religious persecution, Brigham Young leads twelve thousand Mormons on an exodus into the Utah desert in search of paradise. Roger Williams fled Massachusetts in the 16th century and founded a colony of religious tolerance in Rhode Island.