 Caesar
Crosses the Rubicon, 49 BC
"The die is
cast." Julius Caesar decides to cross a small stream
and changes history.
 Invasion
of England, 1066
The Normans
win the Battle of Hastings and change England forever.
Battle
at Lexington Green, 1775
The local militia
assembles in a New England village to repel the British
and fires "the shot heard around the world."
Columbus
Discovers America, 1492
The New World
is born.
Wright
Brothers' First Flight, 1903
A journey over
a wind-swept North Carolina beach that lasts less than
a minute ushers in the age of powered flight.
Assassination
in Sarajevo, 1914
An assassin's
bullet kills a duke, ignites World War I and shapes the
world we live in today.
The
Battle of Midway, 1942
Five minutes
that changed the course of the war in the Pacific.
The
First Atomic Blast, 1945
"We were reaching
into the unknown and we did not know what might come
of it."
Jackie
Robinson Breaks Baseball's Color Barrier, 1945
"Can you do
it? Can you do it?" A watershed meeting in Brooklyn Dodgers
general manager Branch Ricky's office makes history.
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The
Burning of Rome, 64 AD
Did Nero fiddle
while Rome burned?
The
Destruction of Pompeii, 79 AD
"Ashes were
already falling, not as yet very thickly. I looked round:
a dense black cloud was coming up behind us..."
 The
Black Death, 1348
"...brother
abandoned brother, and the uncle his nephew, and the
sister her brother, and very often the wife her husband."
The
Great Fire of London, 1666
The fire started
in the King's bakery and consumed almost the entire city.
The
San Francisco Earthquake, 1906
The quake lasted
a minute, the fires three days.
Sinking
of the Titanic, 1912
"Mr Case and
Mr Roebling, brave American men, saw us to the lifeboat,
made no effort to save themselves..."
Galveston
Hurricane of 1900
"...all at
once the house went from its foundation and the water
came in waist-deep." The greatest natural disaster in
American history.
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Aboard
a Whaling Ship, 1850
Thar
She Blows!... "The boat spun after him with almost
the swiftness of a top, now diving through the seas and
tossing the spray, and then lying still while the whale
sounded."
Building
the Brooklyn Bridge, 1871
"...a dreadful
pain shot through both my ears." Nothing like it had
ever been attempted before: join a "sandhog" working
below the East River
A
Cowboy in Dodge, 1882
"We sauntered
around town, drinking moderately, and visiting the various
saloons and gambling houses." Texas cowboys on the trail.
Children at Work, 1908-1912
"...photo of messengers absorbed in their usual game of poker in the 'Den of the terrible nine.' " Photographer Lewis Hine documents children at work.
 Making Movies, 1920
Film legend
Lillian Gish describes how movies were made in Hollywood's
early days.
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The
Suicide of Socrates, 399 BC
The Greek
philosopher is forced to be his own executioner.
The
Assassination of Julius Caesar, 44 BC
"All quickly
unsheathed their daggers and rushed at him."
Death
of a Martyr, 203 AD
The last words
of a young Christian woman condemned to die in the Roman
arena reach out to us from over 1800 years ago.
The
Execution of Charles I, 1649
"I go to where
no disturbance can be."
The
Execution of Mary, Queen of Scots, 1587
"Please help
me mount this. This is the last request I shall make
of you." The "star-crossed" Queen meets her end.
 The
Execution of Louis XVI, 1793
"We are arrived, if I mistake not." The king of
France becomes a victim of the French Revolution.
The
Death of George Washington, 1799
America's first
President catches a cold.
A
Duel at Dawn, 1804
Founding Fathers
Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton face off on a New Jersey
field.
The
Death of Abraham Lincoln, 1865
"The giant
sufferer lay extended diagonally across the bed, which
was not long enough for him." America's 16th President "joins
the ages."
The
Death of Billy the Kid, 1881
"I drew my
revolver and fired, threw my body aside, and fired again." Sheriff
Pat Garrett describes his showdown with the young outlaw.
The
Execution of Tsar Nicholas II, 1918
"We must shoot them
all tonight." The Romanov dynasty ends in a Siberian
cellar.
The
Assassination of Gandhi, 1948
"Just an old
man in a loincloth in distant India: Yet when he died,
humanity wept."
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Slave Auction, 1859