Jefferson’s Fossils
What can Thomas Jefferson’s mistaken ideas about fossils tell us about science and belief in the early United States?
Consuming the Empire
Sugar, tea, and tobacco tied British daily life to empire, turning global exploitation into ordinary habits of consumption.
Wayne Thiebaud’s Sweet Take on American Art
The beloved American painter rejected attempts to categorize his work as a Pop Art as he experimented with texture, light, and nostalgia.
Love Is Blind … but Are Your Hormones?
Do women’s attraction to certain faces really change across the menstrual cycle? A long-running theory meets modern data.
Dorothy Parker: Sharp-Witted Writer, Bitter Professor
Dorothy Parker’s year as a visiting professor shows how a celebrated literary voice struggled to adapt to the realities of academic teaching.
How Cold War “Orphans” Sang Their Way into American Hearts
Touring choirs helped cast Korean children as ideal adoptees—and Americans as benevolent saviors.
The Nineteenth-Century Science of Fashion
Victorian-era color theory moved from labs and studios into women’s magazines—and into everyday decisions about dress.
When Mao’s Mango Mania Took Over China
A fleeting cult built around a mango exposes the logic, and illogic, of Mao’s personality cult.
Celebrating Black History Month
JSTOR Daily editors pick their favorite stories for Black History Month.
H. H. Richardson and the Making of an American Romanesque
Historical photographs help trace the emergence of Richardsonian Romanesque and its lasting influence on American architecture.