How Chocolate Came to Europe
Pre-Columbian cultures valued chocolate highly as a drink, and often served it at important events. It wasn't made into a solid candy until 1847.
Buzzing In at the “Bee & Bee”
City gardens and hotel rooftops can serve as refuges—and food corridors—for the troubled species.
Cold Animals, Venezuelan Crisis, and Rethinking Health
Well-researched stories from The Conversation, The Washington Post, and other great publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.
The First School Gardens
In the early 1900s, immigration and child labor laws resulted in growing numbers of schoolchildren. Gardens were seen as a way to keep them under control.
The Racism of 19th-Century Advertisements
Illustrated advertising cards invoked ethnic stereotypes, using black women as foils in order to appeal to white consumers.
When Endangered Wildlife Gets Inbred
The endangered eastern lowland gorilla populations are now so small that the species is facing a new threat: loss of genetic diversity.
Asian Families, the RAND Book, and Science Fiction
New books and scholarship from Stanford University Press, University of Minnesota, and MIT Press.
When Was the First Handshake?
A Curious Reader asks: When and how did the handshake originate?
A Decades-in-the-Making Artwork in a Dormant Volcano
James Turrell is building an observatory that uses the human eye instead of optical instruments. It may soon be open to the public for the first time.
The Mysterious Death of Meriwether Lewis
After triumphantly leading the Lewis and Clark expedition, Meriwether Lewis was either murdered or committed suicide. Did syphilis play a role?