Foreword

Finding History

History is an abstraction for many Americans, and that's a shame. Our legacy as a nation is so rich and alive, and our diversity as a people is so rewarding, that every aspect of American history is endlessly fascinating, invigorating, and relevant to us all.

Even when our history has been less than proud — as it was, for example, when, during the Second World War, the U.S. government forcibly interned 120,000 Americans of Japanese ancestry (my family and me among them) for reasons born of wartime hysteria, racism, and weak political leadership — there are lessons to be learned that have a direct, positive impact on the future of the United States and the American people.

More than forty-five years had passed before Congress apologized, on behalf of the American people, to survivors of the internment. To understand why that redress of such a clear injustice took so long — or why that apology was extended at all — requires an understanding of the events, personalities, ethics, and public opinions that ebbed and flowed in more than just those four decades.

History is more than individual events or the events of individuals. American history is the framework of our society. Americans, I believe, understand that intuitively. We understand that history is more than famous last words, old radio broadcasts, or yesterday's videotape. If we didn't, the Fourth of July would have little meaning 217 years after the Declaration of Independence was signed. But it still has great meaning, because the spirit of American history is alive in us all.

The United States is the greatest living experiment in multicultural self-government the world has ever known. There has never been a second American Revolution for that very reason: we are still living in the first. When you realize that, you then realize that to understand America is to comprehend a kind of intricate road map with all the milestones in American history drawn on it. Any road map needs a key, and that's what The Great American History Fact-Finder is all about.

This book is a guide to the people and events that have shaped the American tapestry of peoples and cultures. It is a dictionary of our heritage, and like any dictionary this one will grow and expand as our history grows and expands. How that will happen will depend on us. It will depend on what we do in our lives that will make America a better place and Americans a still better people.

I believe in the beauty, in the daring, in the vision of American history. I hope The Great American History Fact-Finder will act as a guide to help bring that history alive for you, as it has for me.

Norman Y. Mineta
U.S. House of Representatives