Finding the unexpected in the everyday.
March 6, 1995 Operations began for a newly built rail station in the city of San Clemente on the coast of Orange County, California. This station is served by both the Orange County Line and Inland Empire-Orange County Line of southern California’s commuter trains network Metrolink. San Clemente station is specifically located in the North... Continue Reading →
While she ultimately became a world-renowned etiquette maven, Emily Post (1872-1960) was also a female automotive pioneer who firmly established herself as a formidable travel journalist. The zenith of this part of the Baltimore-born Post’s writing career was arguably her participation in an automobile journey from New York City to San Francisco in 1915. This... Continue Reading →
February 13, 1958 The Ford Motor Company introduced the first four-passenger model of the Ford Thunderbird (popularly known as the T-Bird) nearly four years after the original version of this automobile -- which was built for two -- had made its official debut. The four-passenger version marked the transformation of the T-Bird from a sports car... Continue Reading →
January 29, 1914 Fred L. Baker (1872-1927) was a long way from his hometown of Los Angeles, but he had had an important reason for being in New York City on a Thursday in January. As president of the Automobile Club of Southern California -- an affiliate of the federation of motor clubs of the... Continue Reading →
January 21, 1945 In the final year of World War II, a U.S. Navy transport ship was launched in a Sunday ceremony at a Kaiser Shipbuilding yard in Richmond, California. This ship was named after Andre Walker Brewster (1862-1942), a U.S. Army major general and Medal of Honor recipient. Walker’s noteworthy assignments during his long... Continue Reading →
December 23, 1944 A little over three years after the United States entered World War II on the side of the Allies, the U.S. Navy rescue and salvage ship USS Bolster (ARS-38) was launched at a shipyard of the Basalt Rock Company. This company, which was located just south of the San Francisco Bay Area’s... Continue Reading →
December 11, 1976 On a Saturday morning, a ferry terminal in the city of Larkspur (located north of San Francisco) was opened with considerable fanfare. Larkspur Landing, which is also called Larkspur Ferry Terminal, provides commuter ferry services to downtown San Francisco via the North Bay. This terminal is operated by the Golden Gate Bridge,... Continue Reading →
December 5, 1931 The luxury ocean liner SS Manhattan, which had been built by the New York Shipbuilding Corporation, was launched in Camden, New Jersey. Former First Lady Edith Roosevelt (1861-1948), widow of President Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919), christened the ship with a bottle containing water taken from various streams throughout the country. This United States Lines... Continue Reading →
November 19, 1914 The week before Thanksgiving, several race car drivers were gathered in the city of Corona, California, to get ready for the big day. They were not focused on generous helpings of food and gratitude, but rather on something far different: practice runs in their automobiles for that following Thursday’s 109-lap, 300-mile (482.8-kilometer) competition... Continue Reading →
Shirley Reilly, who is of Iñupiat descent, has compiled a noteworthy record as a world-class wheelchair racer. (The Iñupiat are a group of Alaska Natives; their wide-ranging traditional territory extends from Norton Sound, an inlet of the Bering Sea, to the United States’ border with Canada.) Shirley Reilly was born in Anchorage on May 29,... Continue Reading →
Transportation History 