A Pint for the Alewives
Until the Plague decimated Europe and reconfigured society, brewing beer and selling it was chiefly the domain of the fairer sex.
What Skulls Told Us
The pseudoscience phrenology swept the popular imagination, and its practitioners made a mint preying on prejudices, gullibility, and misinformation.
Water Logs
Log drivers once steered loose timber on rivers across America before railroad expansion put such shepherds out of work.
Who and What Was a Knocker-Upper?
Pour one out for the people paid to rouse the workers of industrial Britain.
On the Rocks
Ice harvesters once made a living from frozen lakes and ponds, and the international ice industry was a booming business. Then refrigeration came along.
Hold the Line
As telephony developed, so did a workforce of switchboard operators—all women—who were ultimately rendered obsolete by technological progress.