Introduction
The United States of America is a federal republic of 50 states, a capital district, and a few other territories. It resides mostly in central North America. The U.S. has three land borders, two with Canada and one with Mexico, and is otherwise bounded by the Pacific Ocean, the Bering Sea, the Arctic Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean. Of the 50 states, only Alaska and Hawaii are not contiguous with any other state. The U.S. also has a collection of districts, territories, and possessions around the world. Each state has a high level of local autonomy according to the system of federalism. The United States traces its national origin to the declaration by 13 British colonies in 1776 that they were free and independent states. They were recognized as such by the Treaty of Paris in 1783. Since then, the nation has grown to become a global superpower and exerts a high level of economic, political, military, and cultural influence.
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The Red Badge of Courage is a war novel by American author Stephen Crane. Taking place during the American Civil War, the story is about a young private of the Union Army, Henry Fleming, who flees from the field of battle. Overcome with shame, he longs for a wound—a "red badge of courage"—to counteract his cowardice. When his regiment once again faces the enemy, Henry acts as standard-bearer. Although Crane was born after the war, and had not at the time experienced battle firsthand, the novel is known for its realism. He began writing what would become his second novel in 1893, using various contemporary and written accounts (such as those published previously by Century Magazine) as inspiration. It is believed that he based the fictional battle on that of Chancellorsville; he may also have interviewed veterans of the 124th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment, commonly known as the Orange Blossoms. Initially shortened and serialized in newspapers in December 1894, the novel was published in full in October 1895. Several of the themes that the story explores are maturation, heroism, cowardice, and the indifference of nature. Adapted several times for the screen, the novel became a bestseller. It has never been out of print, and is now thought to be Crane's most important work and a major American text.
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Selected society biography
John Calvin Coolidge, Jr. (July 4, 1872 – January 5, 1933), more commonly known as Calvin Coolidge, was the thirtieth President of the United States (1923–1929). A Republican lawyer from Vermont, Coolidge worked his way up the ladder of Massachusetts state politics, eventually becoming governor of that state. His actions during the Boston Police Strike of 1919 thrust him into the national spotlight. Soon after, he was elected as the twenty-ninth Vice President in 1920 and succeeded to the Presidency upon the death of Warren G. Harding. Elected in his own right in 1924, he gained a reputation as a small-government conservative.
In many ways Coolidge's style of governance was a throwback to the passive presidency of the nineteenth century. He restored public confidence in the White House after the scandals of his predecessor's administration, and left office with considerable popularity. As his biographer later put it, "he embodied the spirit and hopes of the middle class, could interpret their longings and express their opinions. That he did represent the genius of the average is the most convincing proof of his strength."
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I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
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Anniversaries for December 11
Selected cuisine
New England cuisine is an American cuisine which originated in the New England region of the United States, and traces its roots to English cuisine. It is characterized by extensive use of seafood and dairy products, which results from its historical reliance on its seaports and fishing industry, as well as extensive dairy farming in inland regions. Many of New England's earliest Puritan settlers were from eastern England, where baking foods was more common than frying, such as pies, beans, and turkey, as was the tradition elsewhere. Two prominent characteristic foodstuffs native to New England are maple syrup and cranberries. The traditional standard starch is potato, though rice has a somewhat increased popularity in modern cooking. New England cuisine is known for limited use of spices aside from ground black pepper, although parsley, garlic, and sage are common, with a few Caribbean additions such as nutmeg. Use of cream is common, due to the reliance on dairy. The favored cooking techniques are stewing, steaming, and baking. Many local ingredients, such as squash, corn and local beans, sunflowers, wild turkey, maple syrup, cranberries and dishes such as cornbread, Johnnycakes and Indian pudding were adopted from Southern New England Algonquian cuisine. Read more...
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Selected location
Cleveland is the second largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the 33rd largest city in the nation. It was founded in 1796 near the mouth of the Cuyahoga River, and became a manufacturing center owing to its location at the head of numerous canals and railroad lines. With the decline of heavy manufacturing, Cleveland's businesses have diversified into the service economy, including the financial services, insurance, and healthcare sectors. Cleveland is also noted for its association with rock music; the city is home to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
As of the 2000 Census, the city proper had a total population of 478,403 and is the center of Greater Cleveland, the largest metropolitan area in Ohio.
In studies conducted by The Economist in 2005, Cleveland and Pittsburgh were ranked as the most livable cities in the United States, and the city was ranked as the best city for business meetings in the continental U.S. The city faces continuing challenges, in particular from concentrated poverty in some neighborhoods and difficulties in the funding and delivery of high-quality public education.
Selected culture biography
William Gibson (born March 17, 1948) is an American-Canadian writer who has been called the "noir prophet" of the cyberpunk subgenre of science fiction. Gibson coined the term " cyberspace" in his short story " Burning Chrome" and later popularized the concept in his debut novel, Neuromancer (1984). In envisaging cyberspace, Gibson created an iconography for the information age before the ubiquity of the Internet in the 1990s. He is also credited with predicting the rise of reality television and with establishing the conceptual foundations for the rapid growth of virtual environments such as video games and the Web.
After expanding on Neuromancer with two more novels to complete the dystopic Sprawl trilogy, Gibson became a central figure to an entirely different science fiction subgenre – steampunk – with the 1990 alternate history novel The Difference Engine, written in collaboration with Bruce Sterling. In the 1990s he composed the Bridge trilogy of novels, which focused on sociological observations of near future urban environments and late-stage capitalism. His most recent novels – Pattern Recognition (2003) and Spook Country (2007) – are set in a contemporary world and have put Gibson's work onto mainstream bestseller lists for the first time.
To date, Gibson has written more than twenty short stories, nine novels (one in collaboration), a nonfiction artist's book, and has contributed articles to several major publications and collaborated extensively with performance artists, filmmakers and musicians.
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Featured content
As of 11 December 2019, there are 1,222 featured and 3,205 good articles within WikiProject United States scope. This makes up 5.47% of the articles on Wikipedia, 13.33% of all featured articles and lists, and 10.56% of all good articles. Including non-article pages, such as talk pages, redirects, categories, etcetera, there are 1,041,790 pages in the project.
Featured culture biographies:
Actors and filmmakers –
James Thomas Aubrey, Jr.
• Kroger Babb
• Eric Bana
• Joseph Barbera
• Bette Davis
• Kirsten Dunst
• Judy Garland
• Jake Gyllenhaal
• Maggie Gyllenhaal
• Anthony Michael Hall
• William Hanna
• Phil Hartman
• Ethan Hawke
• Katie Holmes
• Janet Jackson
• Michael Jackson
• Angelina Jolie
• Diane Keaton
• Madonna (entertainer)
• Austin Nichols
• Brad Pitt
• Nancy Reagan
• Ronald Reagan
• Aaron Sorkin
• KaDee Strickland
• Sharon Tate
• Reese Witherspoon
• Anna May Wong;
Arts and entertainment –
James Robert Baker
• William D. Boyce
• Stephen Crane
• H.D.
• Emily Dickinson
• George Washington Dixon
• Zelda Fitzgerald
• Margaret Fuller
• William Gibson
• Rufus Wilmot Griswold
• Ernest Hemingway
• Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
• Jenna Jameson
• James Russell Lowell
• Master Juba
• I. M. Pei
• Edgar Allan Poe
• Roman Vishniac
• Nathaniel Parker Willis;
Musicians –
Aaliyah
• Alice in Chains
• Audioslave
• Bix Beiderbecke
• Big Star
• Mariah Carey
• Damageplan
• Bob Dylan
• Flea (musician)
• Black Francis
• John Frusciante
• Godsmack
• The Greencards
• Insane Clown Posse
• Janet Jackson
• Michael Jackson
• Bradley Joseph
• Maynard James Keenan
• Frank Klepacki
• David Lovering
• Madonna (entertainer)
• John Mayer
• Metallica
• Nine Inch Nails
• Nirvana (band)
• The Notorious B.I.G.
• Leo Ornstein
• Ellis Paul
• Pearl Jam
• Pixies
• Elvis Presley
• Selena
• Slayer
• The Smashing Pumpkins
• Elliott Smith
• Gwen Stefani
• The Supremes
• Tool (band)
• Uncle Tupelo
• Wilco
• Frank Zappa;
Sports and games –
Nick Adenhart
• Shelton Benjamin
• Moe Berg
• Tim Duncan
• Bobby Eaton
• Orval Grove
• Art Houtteman
• Magic Johnson
• Michael Jordan
• Bart King
• Sandy Koufax
• Jimmy McAleer
• Bob Meusel
• Stan Musial
• Ben Paschal
• CM Punk
• J. R. Richard
• Jackie Robinson
• Bill Russell
• Sigi Schmid
• Lee Smith (baseball)
• Ozzie Smith
• Paul Stastny
• Jim Thorpe
• Tyrone Wheatley
Featured society biographies:
Military –
Daniel Boone
• James Bowie
• Simon Bolivar Buckner
• Henry Cornelius Burnett
• Frederick Russell Burnham
• Wesley Clark
• Brian Eaton
• Gerald Ford
• Winfield Scott Hancock
• Benjamin Harrison
• William Henry Harrison
• Rutherford B. Hayes
• Thomas C. Hindman
• Thomas C. Kinkaid
• Eli Lilly
• John McCain
• George B. McClellan
• Fred Moosally
• Sylvanus Morley
• Edwin Taylor Pollock
• Ronald Reagan
• Uriel Sebree
• Lawrence Sullivan Ross
• Isaac Shelby
• William Tecumseh Sherman
• Myles Standish
• Edward Teller
• Benjamin Franklin Tilley
• Stephen Trigg
• Harriet Tubman;
Politics and government –
Samuel Adams
• J. C. W. Beckham
• Daniel Boone
• William O'Connell Bradley
• Simon Bolivar Buckner
• Henry Cornelius Burnett
• Charles Carroll the Settler
• Murray Chotiner
• Wesley Clark
• Grover Cleveland
• Calvin Coolidge
• Richard Cordray
• John J. Crittenden
• Gerald Ford
• Wendell Ford
• William Goebel
• Emma Goldman
• John W. Johnston
• Franklin Knight Lane
• John McCain
• George B. McClellan
• Bob McEwen
• Thomas R. Marshall
• Harvey Milk
• Edwin P. Morrow
• Pat Nixon
• Barack Obama
• Rosa Parks
• Paul E. Patton
• Edwin Taylor Pollock
• Nancy Reagan
• Ronald Reagan
• Theodore Roosevelt
• Lawrence Sullivan Ross
• Terry Sanford
• Antonin Scalia
• Solomon P. Sharp
• Isaac Shelby
• Augustus Owsley Stanley
• Stephen Trigg
• Jerry Voorhis
• Daniel Webster
• Franklin D. Roosevelt
• Harry S. Truman;
Science and academia –
Edward Drinker Cope
• Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
• David A. Johnston
• Eli Lilly
• Glynn Lunney
• Barbara McClintock
• Sylvanus Morley
• Gerard K. O'Neill
• Hilary Putnam
• Edward Teller
• Roman Vishniac
• Otto Julius Zobel
Featured lists: There are over 230 Featured lists in the scope of United States including:
109th United States Congress
• Commandant of the Marine Corps
• Korean War Medal of Honor recipients
• Most populous counties in the United States
• National Parks of the United States
• Tallest buildings in Washington, D.C.
• U.S. state name etymologies
• U.S. states by population
• United States Secretary of Energy
• Volcanoes in the Hawaiian – Emperor seamount chain
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Things to do
Featured article candidatesTotal pages in content type is 10
Good article nomineesTotal pages in content type is 87
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- Portal:United States - Needs to be updated and expanded
- 2010 Census - Update articles using 2000 census data to use the 2010 data
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United States is one of the United States WikiProjects.
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