Flanked by members of his family, President Richard Nixon bids farewell to the White House staff after his resignation on August 9, 1974, Nixon had announced his intention to step down live on television to a stunned nation the night before. His presidency was in shambles due to the burgeoning Watergate scandal, thanks in large part to Nixon's own in-house recording system, which captured various seamy goings-on including Nixon personally ordering aides to obstruct the FBI's investigation of the break-in and attempted bugging at Democratic National Headquarters inside the Watergate Hotel.

Volumes have been written about how Nixon's paranoid personality ended up being his downfall. The Watergate affair was actually just the most publicly visible moment in a presidency rife with unsavory episodes and characters, such as the "Dirty Tricks Squad" whose task was to dig up negative personal info about Nixon's perceived enemies, and IRS audits of organizations opposed to Nixon's policies.

Rescue personnel working to extricate NASCAR great Dale Earnhardt from his car after he hit the wall on the last lap of the 2001 Daytona 500. Earnhardt, however, was already dead from a basal skull fracture.

Kamikaze pilots receiving their orders in 1944. In a desperate measure to turn the tide of the war in the Pacific, the Japanese resorted to loading planes down with bombs or torpedos, manning them with pilots who had received minimal training, and directing the pilots to crash their planes into US Navy warships.

Although these suicide attacks caused catastrophic damage when successful, it's estimated that only about 14 percent of planes actually reached their targets, with the bulk of them shot out of the sky before impact. Still, it's estimated that kamikazes sank 34 Navy ships, damaged 368 others, killed 4,900 sailors, and wounded over 4,800.

President Franklin Roosevelt giving a speech in 1938, using one of many specially constructed podiums built for his needs. His legs withered and paralyzed by polio, Roosevelt needed a strong platform upon which he could lean and support the bulk of his weight with his arms while speaking. He adamantly refused to speak while sitting, even though the mere act of standing erect for any length of time was physically exhausting for him.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1933, preparing to broadcast. From March 1933 to June 1944, Roosevelt addressed the American people in some 30 speeches via radio, speaking on a variety of topics from banking to unemployment, and with the advent of WWII, to defeating the enemy in Europe and the Far East.

Millions of people found comfort and renewed confidence in these speeches, given in an informal, conversational tone, which became known as the “fireside chats". Keep in mind there were no recording machines back then, so all these "chats" were aired live.

Roosevelt had been quick to understand the inherent power of a medium that was still in its infancy. He also took care to use the simplest possible language, with concrete examples and analogies, so as to be clearly understood by the largest number of Americans. He began many of these nighttime broadcasts with the greeting “My friends,” and referred to himself as “I” and the American people as “you” as if addressing his listeners directly and personally.

The story behind the famous photo of Johnny Cash giving the finger during his 1969 San Quentin State Prison gig has been revealed.

Photographer Jim Marshall asked the country legend to express what he thought of the prison authorities. Cash replied, "This is for the warden," and flipped off the camera.

Cats drinking fresh milk on the farm, 1954
Photo by Nat Farbman, LIFE Magazine

Laika was shot into space inside the Soviet Union's Sputnik II on November 3, 1957. She was the first living animal to be successfully put into orbit.

Unfortunately, it would be a one-way trip. The technology did not exist at the time to effect a recovery.

One of Laika’s human counterparts in the Soviet space program recalled her as a good dog. He even brought her home to play with his children before she began her space odyssey.

“Laika was quiet and charming,” Dr. Vladimir Yazdovsky wrote in a book about Soviet space medicine, as quoted by the AP. “I wanted to do something nice for her: She had so little time left to live.”

Decades later it was revealed that Laika had not perished painlessly as her oxygen ran out (first cover story), or drifted into death from a poisoned meal (second cover story).

The poor animal was actually dead after just a few orbits, from panic and overheating.

A heartless sign erected outside an unknown town during the Great Depression. It informed men seeking work or food to just keep walking.

What bothers me is this same type of attitude is now resurfacing as people fleeing Middle East violence seek refuge in the United States.

We are better than this.