250 brilliant things about America*
The United States is 250!
For the nation’s semiquincentennial, we polled the S360 staff and compiled our top 250 beautiful, aspirational, and downright silly favorite things about the USA. Cheers to the people, places, and ideas that have shaped our nation.
| 80’s Hair bands |
| 9-11 first responders |
| A Christmas Story |
| Aerospace |
| Air conditioning |
| Airbags |
| Alan Ginsberg |
| Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act |
| Andy Warhol |
| Animal Rescue Flights |
| Anthony Bourdain |
| Apple pie |
| Audrey Hepburn |
| August Wilson |
| Bad Bunny (and Puerto Rico) |
| Bald Eagles |
| Barbie |
| Baseball |
| BBQ |
| Beastie Boys |
| Beatniks |
| bell hooks |
| Bill Nye |
| Billie Holiday |
| Bison |
| Blockbuster movies |
| Bob Dylan |
| Boston Harbor |
| Bourbon |
| Breakdancing |
| Bristol Bay (AK) |
| Broadway |
| Bruce Springsteen |
| Bubble gum |
| Buffalo wings |
| Burning Man |
| Cary Grant |
| Casey Kasem’s Top 40 |
| Cell phones |
| Charlie Chaplin |
| Chicanos |
| Chicken and waffles |
| Chocolate chip cookies |
| Civil Rights Movement |
| Coca-Cola |
| Collectively refusing to adopt the metric system |
| Connie Chung |
| Corndogs |
| Corvettes |
| Country fairs |
| Country music |
| Cowboy boots |
| Cowboys |
| Craft beer from the PNW |
| Cultural diversity |
| Denali |
| Denim |
| Disco |
| Disney |
| Doggie daycares |
| Dolly Parton & Dollywood |
| Drive-in theaters |
| Drive-thrus |
| Duct tape |
| E-bikes |
| Electric guitar |
| Electricity |
| Elvis |
| Emancipation Proclamation |
| Every biome in one place |
| Every US Olympic team |
| Fantasy football |
| FEMA |
| Ferris wheels |
| Flight |
| Folk music |
| Frank Gehry |
| Fresh snow in the Sierras |
| Fried green tomatoes |
| Frisbees |
| Fry Bread |
| Garage door opener |
| Garth Brooks |
| George Takei |
| George Washington Carver |
| Georgia O’Keeffe |
| Girl Scout cookies |
| GPS |
| Grand Canyon |
| Grandma Moses |
| Grateful Dead |
|
Great neighborhood (shout out to our next door neighbors Canada and Mexico)
|
| Green Bay Packers |
| Grunge |
| Hamburgers |
| Hands Across America |
| Harlem Renaissance |
| Harley Davidson |
| Head Start |
| Helicopters |
| Hip-hop |
| Hollywood |
| Home Run Derbies |
| Hot dogs (shout out to Jersey Shore hot dogs) |
| Hot rods |
| Hoverboards |
| Humphrey Bogart |
| Independent judiciary |
| Jackie Robinson |
| James Baldwin |
| James Dean |
| Jazz |
| Jean-Michel Basquait |
| Jimmy Hendrix |
| Joshua Tree |
| Kennedy Center |
| Kentucky Fried Chicken (original recipe) |
| Ketchup |
| Key Lime Pie |
| Landing on the moon |
| Laser tag |
| LGBTQ+ television |
| Library cards |
| Lift Every Voice and Sing (the Black National Anthem) |
| Lightbulbs |
| Little League Baseball |
| Low riders |
| Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade |
| Malls |
| Marilyn Monroe |
| Marsha P. Johnson, |
| Martin Luther King Jr. |
| Measles vaccine |
| Mini marts |
| Mohammed Ali |
| Monster truck rallies |
| Moonshine |
| Motels |
| Motown |
| Mr. Rogers |
| MRI |
| MTV |
| NASA |
| National forests and public lands |
| National historic archives |
| NBA |
| Neil deGrasse Tyson |
| Nina Simone |
| NOAA |
| NPR |
| Old fashioned cocktail |
| Organized labor |
| PBS |
| Peaceful (except once) transfer of power |
| Philadelphia Eagles |
| Phonograph |
| Pickle ball |
| Pink flamingo yard decorations |
| Polio vaccine |
| Pow wows |
| Pride |
| Proms |
| Pumpkin spice latte’s |
| R&B |
| Ranch (dip, dressing, seasoning…) |
| Refrigeratation |
| Regional accents |
| Road trips |
| Robin Williams |
| Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (and Rock & Roll!) |
| Rosie the Riveter |
| S’mores |
| Schoolhouse Rock |
| Separation of powers |
| Serena Williams |
| Sesame Street |
| Skateboarding |
| Slinkys |
| Slip and slides |
| Slurpees |
| SNL |
| Snowboarding |
| Soap operas |
| Sojourner Truth |
| Soul |
| Spam (the food) |
| Spandex |
| Spanglish |
| Spike Lee |
| Sporks |
| Star Spangled Banner |
| Star Trek |
| Star Wars |
| Steamboats |
| Stonewall |
| Studio 54 |
| Super soakers |
| Superbowl Sunday |
| Superbowl Winning Seattle Seahawks! |
| Superman |
| T-Shirt cannons |
| Tailgating |
| Take Me Home Country Roads by John Denver |
| Tater tots |
| Tejano music |
| Texas hold-em |
| TexMex |
| That being American is an idea not a nationality |
| The 1812 overture |
| The 19th Amendment |
| The 1st amendment |
| The 7th Inning Stretch |
| The ADA |
| The AIDS Quilt |
| The Backstreet Boys |
| The Blues |
| The car |
| The Declaration of Independence |
| The GI Bill |
| The Great Gatsby |
| The Internet |
| The interstate system |
| The MET |
| The Muppets |
| The National Park Service |
| The pill |
| The Redwoods |
| The Smithsonian |
| The tampon |
| The telephone |
| The television |
| The Transcendentalists |
| The U.S. Constitution & Bill of Rights |
| The Vegas Strip |
| The Voting Rights Act |
| The Women’s Olympic Hockey team |
| Thomas Paine’s Common Sense |
| To Kill a Mockingbird |
| Toni Morrison |
| Transistor radio |
| Tribal sovereignty |
| Trick or treating |
| Trucker hats |
| Twinkies (and deep-fried Twinkies) |
| Water desalination |
| Westerns |
| Woodstock |
| World Cup 2026! |
| World Series |
| Yellowstone National Park |
* We know this is not an exhaustive list, and invite you to think about even more reasons to celebrate the things you love about the USA.