First Landing of Christopher Columbus

The Columbian Exchange Should Be Called The Columbian Extraction

Europeans were eager to absorb the starches and flavors pioneered by the indigenous peoples of the Western Hemisphere.
Che Guevara

Che Guevara

In 1964, 5 years after the end of the Cuban revolution, Che Guevara wrote for an academic journal. Read the Cuban leader in his own words.
Richard Nixon at the Great Wall of China

Why Did Nixon Burn the China Hands?

Nixon targeted Foreign Service officers who served in China in the 1940s as communist sympathizers and "fellow travelers." Then he opened trade relations.
A Hudson Bay Company trading post

Why the Dakota Only Traded among People with Kinship Bonds

“Trapping was not a ‘business for profit’ among the Dakota but primarily a social exchange,” one scholar writes.
The Flower Girl by Charles Cromwell Ingham, 1846

When Botany Was for Ladies

In nineteenth century America, young women took to studying botany—a conjoining of interest, social acceptance, and readily available schooling.
A 19th-century advertisement for Hood's Tooth Powder

How the Ban on Medical Advertising Hurt Women Doctors

Intended to protect consumers from unscrupulous quackery, a nineteenth-century ban on medical advertising proved to be a double-edged sword.
Pedestrians & Vendors On Pottinger Street, Hong Kong, 1946

Hong Kong Was Formed as a City of Refugees

The story of Hong Kong, one of the most densely populated places on Earth, can't be separated from its international situation.
Storm King on the Hudson by Samuel Colman, 1866

Can American Expansion Continue Indefinitely?

Or will continued abundance require serious changes in consumer behavior?
Photograph: A Mohammadan praying towards Mecca when the Miezzin calls from a nearby mosque, with a Butane Gas reservoir in the background. circa 1950

The Jim Crow Roots of the U.S.-Saudi Arabia Relationship

Americans started pouring into Saudi Arabia in the 1940s to develop the oil fields. They brought their ideas about segregation with them.
An illustration of a person blowing a whistle

Whistleblowing: A Primer

Are whistleblowers heroes or traitors? It depends who you ask.