AOL Finally Pulls the Plug on Dial-Up
America Online is ending an era. The company announced that it will be winding down its dial-up internet service. Yes, dial-up. The kind that screeches and clicks before finally connecting. F...
The Tariff That Broke Global Trade in 1930
The Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, passed in 1930, sharply raised US import duties on thousands of goods. The goal was to protect American industries during the early days of the Great Depression. Instead, ...
The Secret Plan to Crown an American King
In 1786, the United States was drifting. The Articles of Confederation had created a weak national government. Economic turmoil, internal dissent, and lack of federal authority were threatening the...
The Congressman Who Won an Election from Beyond the Grave
Nick Begich vanished. Mid-term. Alaska's lone U.S. Representative. October 16, 1972. Cessna 310 from Anchorage to Juneau. He flew with House Majority Leader Hale Boggs, an aide and a pilot. Weather...
The Firing of Labor Stats Chief Ethelbert Stewart by Herbert Hoover
Ethelbert Stewart led the Bureau of Labor Statistics from 1921 to 1932. He survived four presidents. He built the Bureau into a respected source on labor conditions. By 1930, the Great Depression h...
The Man Who Almost Crashed Wall Street With Salad Oil
In 1963, a man named Anthony "Tino" De Angelis nearly broke the American financial system. He wasn't a banker. He wasn't a trader. He sold salad oil. De Angelis ran Allied Crude Vegetable Oil Re...
Want to Pay Down the U.S. Debt? Just Venmo It
You can now send money to the U.S. Treasury using Venmo or PayPal. That's not a joke. The Treasury Department has updated its "Gifts to Reduce the Public Debt" portal on Pay.gov to accept digita...
FINRA Moves To Lower Pattern Day Trader Barrier
FINRA is preparing to rewrite the Pattern Day Trader rule. The current threshold requires $25,000 in equity. That's set to drop to $2,000. Retail investors will finally get more access. The current...
When the Capitol Exploded: The 1983 Senate Bombing
November 7, 1983. Just before 11 p.m. A bomb hidden under a bench inside the Capitol's Senate wing detonated. The building shook. Glass shattered. Offices were torn apart. The target? A space just ...
Donald Trump vs. the NFL: The $1 Victory That Ended a League
In the early 1980s, Donald Trump saw an opening. He believed that America could support a second professional football league. One that would compete with the NFL. One that would play in the spring...
April 23, 2013: When Twitter Triggered a Sell-Off
It took just one tweet. "Breaking: Two Explosions in the White House and Barack Obama is injured." That message came from the official Twitter account of the Associated Press on April 23, 2013. ...
The Time Google Paid $600,000 For Its Own Domain Name
It happened in 2015. Sanmay Ved, a former Google employee, made a late-night discovery. While casually browsing Google Domains, he noticed something strange: Google.com was available for purchase. ...
The Day a Congressman Beat a Senator Unconscious in the Senate
On May 22nd, 1856, a sitting Congressman walked into the U.S. Senate chamber and unleashed a brutal assault on a fellow lawmaker. Rep. Preston Brooks of South Carolina entered the chamber with a ca...
The Plot to Steal Abraham Lincoln's Corpse
It sounds like fiction. But it isn't. In 1876, a group of counterfeiters tried to steal Abraham Lincoln's body from his tomb in Springfield, Illinois. The goal? Ransom. At the time, the Secre...
The Day Vice President Dick Cheney Shot a 78-Year-Old in the Face
It was February 11th, 2006. Vice President Dick Cheney was hunting quail on a ranch in Texas. The group had split up. Visibility was limited. Cheney fired at a bird. Instead, he hit Harry Whitti...