Indiana

The first train robbery in American history happened in Indiana. On October 6, 1866, the Reno brothers boarded a moving train near Seymour, broke into the express car, and made off with about $13,000.

Nobody had ever robbed a moving train before. The Reno Gang basically invented the crime, and outlaws like Jesse James and Butch Cassidy copied it for decades.

The Miami, Potawatomi, Shawnee, and other Native peoples had lived across Indiana for thousands of years before Europeans arrived. France moved in during the 1670s, Britain took over after the French and Indian War, and Indiana became the 19th state in 1816.

A young Abraham Lincoln grew up here. He arrived at age 7 and spent 14 years on the Indiana frontier before heading to Illinois.

When the Civil War broke out, Hoosiers showed up in force. Nearly 210,000 volunteered for the Union, and so many signed up in the first call that thousands had to be turned away.

In Indianapolis, a woman named Madam C.J. Walker built a hair care empire and became America's first self-made female millionaire. Her company headquarters on Indiana Avenue still stands.

You can watch cars scream around the Indianapolis Motor Speedway at the Indy 500, held every Memorial Day since 1911. The track is so big that Vatican City, Yankee Stadium, and the Taj Mahal could all fit inside.

Drive south to Indiana's limestone country, where the stone for the Empire State Building and the Pentagon was quarried. In Parke County, cross some of the 32 covered bridges that make it the Covered Bridge Capital of the World. And if you visit Santa Claus, Indiana, around Christmas, the town receives half a million "Dear Santa" letters every year.