When America Incarcerated “Promiscuous” Women
From WWI to the 1950s, the "American Plan" rounded up sexually-active women and quarantined them, supposedly to protect soldiers from venereal disease.
The Gunpowder Plot, Redux
The cultural meaning of Guy Fawkes’ conspiracy to blow up the House of Lords has shifted, from countercultural symbol to HBO drama.
Finding a Murderer in a Victim’s Eye
In late nineteenth-century forensics, optography was all the rage. This pseudoscience held that what someone saw just before death would be imprinted on their eye.
When Chestnuts Were an Everyday Food
Even if you haven't actually roasted chestnuts on an open fire, you probably associate them with winter. But once they were a common year-round food.
When Mining Destroys Historical Cemeteries
Mountain top removal mining brings with it total ecosystem destruction. It also erases history by destroying historic mountain cemeteries.
Better Living Through Nudity
In England in the 1920s and ’30s, nudism was ideological and utopian. Then the Nazis coopted the concept for their eugenicist Nacktkultur movement.
Do We Have to Tell Them the House Is Haunted?
On the law and mythologies of haunting, from antiquity to today.
William Gannaway Brownlow, the Fighting Parson of Tennessee
The controversial politician William Gannaway Brownlow shepherded Tennessee's re-admission to the Union. It was the first state of the Confederacy to do so.
Why Climate Change Is a National Security Issue
Viewing climate change through a national security lens makes a certain amount of sense -- but it won't entirely solve the problem.
When Clairvoyants Searched for a Lost Expedition
When Captain Sir John Franklin's Arctic expedition went awry, clairvoyants claimed to be able to contact the crew members. Why did people believe them?