America Legend

Have you heard of the Star Maiden, Old Sally Cato, or Sweet Betsey from Pike? Everyone knows about Paul Bunyan, Johnny Appleseed, and Davy Crockett, But have you heard of these larger-than-life women? From Bess Call, who wrestles any and all challengers, to Molly Cottontail, who can outwit any critter in the woods, to Hekeke, who slays a giant singlehandedly, here are 15 funny, stormy, and always entertaining tall tales of legendary American women. They're as difference as can be, but still cut from the same cloth.

Winchester, Virginia, is an emblematic American town. As the US economy and American culture have transformed in recent decades, the ground under centuries-old social codes has shifted, throwing old folkways into chaos. Homeplace teases apart the tangle of class, race, and family origin that still defines the town and illuminates questions that now dominate our national conversation - about how we move into the future without pretending our past doesn't exist, about what we salvage, and what we leave behind.

The American cowboy came into the west to begin after a bloody civil war had ended. He worked long hours in lonely cow camps and his pay was meager, but he had grit and determination. He faced constant danger; he fought Indians and rustlers and braved swollen rivers and stampedes. And, finally, when the days of the open range were over, he rode off into the sunset. But his legacy lives on.

The American South has given birth to many of the nation's great stories and legends. From the earliest Colonial times, it's been a place of mystery, replete with disappearing colonies and strange apparitions in the woods, but the South's long and proud history has always had a darker, and stranger, side to it. One of America's most famous mysteries was its first. Despite the fact he had left over 100 colonists at the island of Roanoke in 1587, John White returned to literally nothing, with all traces of the settlement gone.

A rogue, slave trader, and murderer, Jim Bowie would die a hero at the famous battle of the Alamo. In this purely American story of reinvention, Bowie leaves his comfortable life in New Orleans to help fight for Texas independence. His resilience and fortitude at the Alamo earned him the admiration of his fellow Texans, and, after his death, Bowie's legend would grow and serve as inspiration for generations to come.

Painted lavishly in oils in historic, genre-melding, technical virtuosity, and using custom-made costumes and local craftsman, the six-foot wide panoramic scene features an actual descendant of John Harris posing as John Harris himself, and a former Broadway Dancer as the heroic rescuing chief. Secret ancient historical information, celestial symbolism, and fantastic artistic technique are delivered within the compositional arrangements and careful selection of colors and elements.

At a time in antiquity when most of Europe was covered with forests and wandering tribes, Mexico had already developed complex civilizations, beginning with the Olmecs and followed by the Maya, a civilization with advanced knowledge of medicine, engineering and astronomy. The Maya calculated the precession of the equinoxes and cycles of the Pleiades, on which they based their year, since they believed they had come from that constellation.

El hombre rojo, en general, creía que el mundo habitable se formó a partir del limo que afloraba sobre las aguas primordiales, y los nahuas compartían sin duda este concepto. A diferencia de la tierra, que creen que tiene rasgos femeninos y está claramente personificada en este caso por Tonacaciuatl, el firmamento es reconocido casi universalmente por los pueblos aborígenes americanos como la esencia masculina del cosmos.

In Cherokee myth - as in other indigenous American traditions - the whole of creation is alive and able to communicate like humans and with the human beings who share their environment. Cherokee myths explain how the world came to be the way it is and imparts important lessons about Cherokee cultural values.