Photograph: Marley Shelton, Marla Sokoloff and the rest of the girls at a sleepover in a scene from the film 'Sugar & Spice', 2001

Source: Getty

Slumber Parties and Folklore

Slumber party rituals are indeed alive and well, and being passed down to the next generation in person and online.
Collage of buttons

Message in a Button

A dive into the the University of Connecticut Pins and Button Collection gives a wearable history of progressive causes.
An advertisement for snake oil, 1905

Why Do We Fall for Scams?

People want to believe that the person they trust with their money, or their hearts, is telling the truth. The con artist relies on that.
Lazarillo de Tormes and His Blind Master

How Social Upheaval Gave Rise to the Picaresque Novel

How did the arcadian shepherd and chivalric knight-errant, centuries-old fixtures of European literature, give way to this witty rascal, the pícaro?
Grand Saloon of the Great Britain

Separate Spheres On Narrow Boats: Victorians At Sea

On the North Atlantic, the ships were small and the trips were long, making it difficult to maintain the land-based social distinctions.
Two devadesis in Chennai, India, in the 1920s.

How South Asian Temple Dancers Fought Moral Reform

Devadāsīs appealed to a longstanding tradition to argue that they had a legitimate position in their modernizing nation.
A postcard advertising Rev. Dr. Bow Weevil, a Rooster Channel Jumper

How Black CB Radio Users Created an Audible Community

CB radio was portrayed as a mostly white enthusiasm in its heyday, but Black CB users were active as early as 1959.
Clown balloon in an early Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade

Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade: A History in Pictures

In 1927, the parade replaced live animals with helium balloons designed by puppeteer Tony Sarg.
Cedric Robinson

Cedric Robinson and the Black Radical Tradition

Cedric Robinson proposed that the Black radical tradition was necessitated into existence by “racial capitalism.”
An illustration of a dating app with Victorian women's photographs

The “Dating Apps” of Victorian England

They didn't have smartphones back then, but they still had personal ads.