Currently browsing: Americana
Americana means different things to different folks. Here at Great American Things, it means cool stuff that doesn’t fit into any other category. I guess we could have called it Miscellaneous, but “Great Miscellaneous Things” doesn’t tell you much, does it?
Americana: Supermarkets
At first glance, a strange choice, I concede. We take our supermarkets so much for granted. But go to virtually any other country in the...
Read MoreKid Stuff: Chatty Cathy
Toy makers had been trying to develop a talking doll for decades, but what they came up with was either cumbersome or unnatural. Then the...
Read MoreAmericana: National Hurricane Center
It wasn’t that long ago that hurricanes were a scientific mystery. No forecasting or tracking was possible, no warnings were given,...
Read MoreAmericana: The Star Spangled Banner
(This is a repost of an entry that originally published on March 24, 2010. It seemed appropriate to post it again in honor of Flag Day.) We...
Read MoreKid Stuff: Happy Meal
In 1977, McDonald’s was king of all it surveyed (sorry, Burger King, for the unfortunate analogy). The company knew that kids loved...
Read MoreAmericana: The Lost Colony
The people of Roanoke Island, part of the Outer Banks on North Carolina’s coast, were looking for the proper way to celebrate the...
Read MoreAmericana: Air Force One
Technically, any Air Force airplane transporting the President of the United States is designated as Air Force One. For our purposes,...
Read MoreAmericana: Drive-In Restaurants
Drive-in restaurants didn’t originate in the fifties, but that decade provided their glory days. In post-war America, people were...
Read MoreAmericana: Arlington National Cemetery
In these 624 Virginia acres are all the reasons you’ll ever need to be thankful to be an American. Here you’ll find the...
Read MoreAmericana: The Apollo Theater
In 1914, a new building was constructed on 125th Street in the Harlem section of New York City. Named “Hurtig and Seaman’s New...
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