The Most Dangerous Woman in the World
“Chicago May” was a classic swindler who conned her way around the world in the early twentieth century. She was also a sign of hard times.
A Night at the Oscars
All (or at least a lot) of what you need to know before going to this year’s Academy Awards watch party.
A Cold War Baby: Happy Birthday, Alvin!
The submersible Alvin is sixty years old this year. Numerous overhauls and upgrades have kept the craft going down (and coming back up!).
The Annotated Oppenheimer
Celebrated and damned as the “father of the atomic bomb,” theoretical physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer lived a complicated scientific and political life.
Not All Forms of Carbon Removal Are Created Equal
The carbon market and offsetting system have created “carbon cowboys” and perpetuated forms of neo-colonialism and other inequities.
What Do Gardens and Murder Have in Common?
Writers have long plotted murder mysteries in gardens of all sorts. What makes these fertile grounds for detective fiction?
A Body in the Bog
The bog is where forensics and archaeology meet to solve “cold cases.”
Chinese Science Fiction Before The Three Body Problem
Viewing the genre as a means to spread modern knowledge, Chinese novelists have been writing science-fiction stories since at least 1902.
Shogun, Evolving Eyes, and a Feast of Drunkenness
Well-researched stories from Smithsonian Magazine, Atlas Obscura, and other great publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.
Using False Claims to Justify War
Hardly the recent innovation it’s frequently mistakened to be, deception as a path to war has been used by American presidents since the 1800s.