The American Record

A captured Nazi weapon falls back to the New Mexico desert in 1946 and shatters on impact — but the camera bolted to its side just brought back something no one had ever seen: the curve of the Earth from space.

Before dawn on October 23, 1944, two American submarines ambushed the most powerful column of Japan's navy in the Palawan Passage, opening the largest naval battle in history and sending its commander swimming for his life.

In 1777, a small force of Rhode Island soldiers behind an earthen wall outside Philadelphia stops a Hessian assault meant to break the siege of the Delaware River — and a French engineer's last-minute fix turns the tide.

On October 21, 1861, a sitting U.S. Senator led Union troops into a disaster above the Potomac. His death would reshape how Congress watched the war.

On a single Saturday night in 1973, two of Nixon's top law enforcement officials chose resignation over an unlawful order. The Saturday Night Massacre, and the men who walked away.