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Winston Churchill
Historian: Winston Churchill was born at his family’s home, Blenheim Palace, in 1874. He rarely saw his father, Lord Randolph Churchill, and was a poor student at school. In 1895, Churchill joined the army and went to fight in various places in the British Empire.
Historian: He combined his military career with journalism, which sometimes made him unpopular with other officers. He loved the life of adventure - as a journalist, he was taken prisoner in South Africa but escaped through a bathroom window and wrote a book about it.
Historian: After leaving the army, he became an MP for the Conservative Party in 1900. However, his interest in delivering social justice made him take the unusual step of leaving the Conservative party and joining the Liberals, who introduced a minimum wage and an eight-hour workday.
Historian: This was to be paid for by taxing the rich. In 1911, Churchill was made head of the navy and developed new technology such as military planes and tanks to modernize the country’s fighting ability. He was in this job at the start of th
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American Stories for English Learners
Text & MP3 Files
The Stories Sorted by Author
Bierce, Ambrose (1842-1914)
Burroughs, Edgar Rice (1875-1950)
Butler, Ellis Parker (1869-1937)
Cather, Willa (1873-1947)
Chopin, Kate (1850-1904)
Crane, Stephen (1871-1900)
Folk Stories
Garland, Hamlin (1860-1940)
Harte, Bret (1836-1902)
Hawthorne, Nathaniel (1804-1864)
Henry, O. (1862-1910)
Irving, Washington (1783-1859)
Jewett, Sarah Orne (1849-1909)
London, Jack (1876-1916)
Melville, Herman (1819-1891)
O'Brien, Fitz-James (1828-1862)
Poe, Edgar Allan (1809-1849)
Porter, Eleanor H. (1868-1920)
Stockton, Frank R. (1834-1902)
Twain, Mark (1835-1910)
Weaver, Caty
Wharton, Edith (1862-1937)
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- These will all print very cleanly (without printing the MP3 player and menu.)
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- The Voice of America (VOA) American Stories are good for people studying English
because they can not only listen to the stories but also rea- •
Da Vinci
Historian: Leonardo da Vinci was born in Tuscany, Italy, in 1452. He received a basic education and, because he was talented, went to train with the artist Andrea del Verrocchio in Florence.
Historian: Around 1483, da Vinci went to work for the Duke of Milan. He stayed with him for almost twenty years. During this time, he created his famous painting, The Last Supper. Da Vinci believed that the most important thing an artist needed to know was how to see.
Historian: He developed this skill throughout his life, in both religious pictures and in portraits of real people like the Mona Lisa. His style combined accurate observation and sensitive imagination. Today, there are only around fifteen paintings that we know da Vinci painted.
Historian: During his life, da Vinci worked in Florence, Milan, and Rome. He was always drawing and produced thousands of pages of sketches of people, animals, birds, and nature. Da Vinci was left-handed, and he often used mirror writing to explain what he drew. In addition to sketches of everyday objects, he also sketched many new
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