Portal:Indiana

Indiana, a state in the Midwest, played an important role in supporting the Union during the American Civil War. Despite anti-war activity within the state, and southern Indiana's ancestral ties to the South, Indiana was a strong supporter of the Union. Indiana contributed approximately 210,000 Union soldiers, sailors, and marines. Indiana's soldiers served in 308 military engagements during the war; the majority of them in the western theater, between the Mississippi River and the Appalachian Mountains. Indiana's war-related deaths reached 25,028 (7,243 from battle and 17,785 from disease). Its state government provided funds to purchase equipment, food, and supplies for troops in the field. Indiana, an agriculturally rich state containing the fifth-highest population in the Union, was critical to the North's success due to its geographical location, large population, and agricultural production. Indiana residents, also known as Hoosiers, supplied the Union with manpower for the war effort, a railroad network and access to the Ohio River and the Great Lakes, and agricultural products such as grain and livestock. The state experienced two minor raids by Confederate forces, and one major raid in 1863, which caused a brief panic in southern portions of the state and its capital city, Indianapolis.

Indiana experienced significant political strife during the war, especially after Governor Oliver P. Morton suppressed the Democratic-controlled state legislature, which had an anti-war (Copperhead) element. Major debates related to the issues of slavery and emancipation, military service for African Americans, and the draft, ensued. These led to violence. In 1863, after the state legislature failed to pass a budget and

left the state without the authority to collect taxes, Governor Morton acted outside his state's constitutional authority to secure funding through federal and private loans to operate the state government and avert a financial crisis. (Full article...)

Credit: Historic American Buildings Survey

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• ... that Gleaners Food Bank has served more than 700 million pounds (320 million kg) of food in Indiana?
• ... that the existence of Lego Indiana Jones 2: The Adventure Continues was accidentally leaked when it was displayed on an animator's résumé?
• ... that LGBT rights activist Kit Malone helped create the first transgender organized marching group in the Indianapolis Pride Parade's history?
• ... that the Indianapolis African-American community raised $100,000 in just ten days in 1911 to establish the Senate Avenue YMCA?
• ... that in 1981 Indiana State University–Evansville received a donation valued at nearly $300,000 in the form of campus radio station WSWI?
• ... that after the Wolverines released their "Moose" for his fifth season, he went on to win another Big Ten championship with the Hoosiers?

Muncie (/ˈmʌnsi/ MUN-see) is an incorporated city and the seat of Delaware County, Indiana, United States. Previously known as Buckongahelas Town, named after the prominent Delaware Chief, it is located in East Central Indiana, about 50 miles (80 km) northeast of Indianapolis. At the 2020 United States Census, the city's population was 65,195, down from 70,085 in the 2010 Census. It is the principal city of the Muncie Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses all of Delaware County. The city is also included in the Indianapolis–Carmel–Muncie, IN Combined Statistical Area.

The Lenape (Delaware) people, led by Buckongahelas arrived in the area in the 1790s, founding several villages, including one known as Munsee Town, along the White River. The trading post, renamed Muncietown, was selected as the Delaware County seat and platted in 1827. Its name was officially shortened to Muncie in 1845 and incorporated as a city in 1865. Muncie developed as a manufacturing and industrial center, especially after the Indiana gas boom of the 1880s. It is home to Ball State University. As a result of the Middletown studies, sociological research that was first conducted in the 1920s, Muncie is said to be one of the most studied United States cities of its size. (Full article...)

Richard Red Skelton (July 18, 1913 – September 17, 1997) was an American entertainer best known for his national radio and television shows between 1937 and 1971, especially as host of the television program The Red Skelton Show. He has stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his work in radio and television, and also appeared in burlesque, vaudeville, films, nightclubs, and casinos, all while he pursued an entirely separate career as an artist.

Skelton began developing his comedic and pantomime skills from the age of 10, when he became part of a traveling medicine show. He then spent time on a showboat, worked the burlesque circuit, and then entered into vaudeville in 1934. The "Doughnut Dunkers" pantomime sketch, which he wrote together with his wife, launched a career for him in vaudeville, radio, and films. His radio career began in 1937 with a guest appearance on The Fleischmann's Yeast Hour, which led to his becoming the host of Avalon Time in 1938. He became the host of The Raleigh Cigarette Program in 1941, on which many of his comedy characters were created, and he had a regularly scheduled radio program until 1957. Skelton made his film debut in 1938 alongside Ginger Rogers and Douglas Fairbanks Jr. in Alfred Santell's Having Wonderful Time, and would appear in numerous musical and comedy films throughout the 1940s and 1950s, with starring roles in 19 films, including Ship Ahoy (1941), I Dood It (1943), Ziegfeld Follies (1946), and The Clown (1953). (Full article...)

I have bad news for you, for all of our fellow citizens, and people who love peace all over the world, and that is that Martin Luther King was shot and killed tonight. — Robert F. Kennedy, Indianapolis speech on the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

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