Old Glory #24 -- West Bottoms, Kansas City, MO. “This is the part of Kansas City that was all under water during the flood.” Kansas City’s West Bottoms was once a maze of rail yards, stockyards, and warehouses. In 1903, floodwaters rose as high as 12 feet, swallowing entire streets, displacing thousands, and claiming 19 lives. By 1905, when this postcard was mailed, the trains were running again. Hard to imagine nearly everything pictured had been underwater just two years earlier.

Old Glory #228 - Smithfield Street, Pittsburgh, PA. Pittsburgh, 1910: steel, coal, and railroads built fortunes while workers faced smoke, danger, and long hours. The postcard reads “Pittsburg,” the federal spelling until 1911, when the city got its “h” back. Locals had kept using it all along.

Old Glory #31 - Battle Scars, Fort Pulaski, Savannah, GA. Fort Pulaski’s massive brick walls met their match on April 10–11, 1862. Union rifled cannons breached the fort after 30 hours, threatening its powder magazine and forcing a Confederate surrender. The battle exposed masonry forts’ vulnerability to modern artillery.