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Black and white headshot of author Matthew Wills

Matthew Wills

Matthew Wills has advanced degrees in library science and film studies and is lapsed in both fields. He has published in Poetry, Huffington Post, and Nature Conservancy Magazine, among other places, and blogs regularly about urban natural history at matthewwills.com.

Photo of Generic Punk Concert, 1970s

Punks vs. Cowboys in Reagan Country 

A bastion of both the Old and New Right, Orange County in the late 1970s seems an unlikely place for punk rockers.
The only surviving image that may depict Anne Hathaway, made by Sir Nathaniel Curzon in 1708.

Anne Shakespeare: Toward a Biography

Let’s check in with Anne Shakespeare, née Hathaway, about whom so little is known.
Wall Street during the bank panic in October 1907

Mexico, 1910: An Influential Sneeze or a Home-Grown Revolution?

Historians are rethinking the claim that the Panic of 1907 in the United States helped spark the Mexican Revolution.
A nutmeg farm in the Maluku Islands

Transplanting Nutmeg

Nutmeg originated in the Maluku islands of what’s now Indonesia, but Barbados became known as the Nutmeg Island. Why did the tree wander?
Illustration from a poster of the first issue stamp celebrating the Mendez v. Westminster School District case

Mendez v. Westminster and Mexican American Desegregation

International relations and foreign influence helped end legal segregation of Mexican American students in California after World War II.
Wild timber rattlesnake (Crotalus horridus) on train tacks at sunrise, Florida

Actual American Rattlesnakes

Historians are recovering the overlooked history of North America’s Crotalus horridus, the timber rattlesnake.
A view of the New United States embassy in London, England. Circa 1950.

Whatever Happened to London’s “Little America”?

Since the time of John Adams, the first US Ambassador to the Court of St. James, Grosvenor Square has been the locus of the American government in Britain.
Forbes Field in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, ca. 1900-1915

Take Me Out to the Class Game: Social Stratification in the Stadium

The private boxes for the privileged few in today’s baseball stadiums are nothing new.
Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi of Iran sits and talks with American president John F. Kennedy, 1963

The Shah, Our Man in Tehran?

Playing up the threat of the communist incursions, the Shah of Iran gained more and more support—financial and political—from the United States.
Decorative tiles made from natural cork material

Putting a Cork in It: In Construction, That Is

The bark of the evergreen oak Quercus suber has been used for millennia as a construction material. Could it be our answer to sustainable buildings?
Mohammad Mosaddeq, 1951

US–Iran Relations: 1953

What really happened in Iran back in the day, and what did the United States have to do with it?
Wild Horses at Play by George Catlin, between 1834 and 1837

The Rise and Fall of the Equestrian Cultures of the Plains

The introduction of the horse to North America by the Spanish transformed the lives of the Indigenous peoples of the Plains in decidedly mixed ways.
Men ride their bikes, down a cobblestone road in Copenhagen, Denmark in July 3, 1946.

Copenhagen: Bike City from Back in the Day

How did Copenhagen become a “city of cyclists,” where a third of all journeys are by bicycle?
Men in striped pants removing dirt or gravel from a ditch, 1911, Panama Canal Zone

Exporting the Convict Clause: Slaves of the State in the Canal Zone

The criminalization of Blackness enabled by the Thirteenth Amendment brought chain gangs to the construction projects of the Panama Canal Zone.
An aerial view of an open pit phosphate mine

Life According to Phosphorus

Phosphorus is essential for fertilizing high-yield agriculture. The US domestic supply, restricted to Florida, is expected to run out in a couple of decades.
A satirical print depicting the height of John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich, 1788

Of Heights and Men

Given its strong gendered associations, it may be surprising that height hasn’t been well studied by historians.
Color lithograph advertisement showing the interior of a Pullman dining-car, 1894

Walking the Race Line on the Train Line

Investigators never reached a conclusion about the death of Pullman porter J. H. Wilkins, but his killing revealed much about the dangers of his profession.
Tobacco leaves on a black background

The Ever-Lengthening History of Tobacco

People have been smoking in the Pacific Northwest for more than 4,500 years.
The Pantheon, Rome

One Thousand Years of Domelessness

For more than 900 years, between the fifth century and the Renaissance, Romans didn’t cap their buildings with domes. Why?
An act to carry into further execution the provisions of an act passed in the third and fourth years of His present Majesty, for compensating owners of slaves upon the abolition of slavery

Imperfect Memories of British Slavery

British abolition in 1833 was accompanied by £20 million paid in compensation to slaveholders, many of whom subsequently "forgot" slavery ever existed.
Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson: A Vote for Cutting Off Your Nose

To reduce Virginia’s use of the death penalty, Thomas Jefferson proposed using permanent disfigurement as a punishment for rape, polygamy, and sodomy.
A set of dummies propped up in the Sahara Desert awaiting a third atomic bomb explosion during the French nuclear testing.

Nuclear France’s Empire of the Bomb

The first French nuclear bomb test took place in the Sahara in 1960 in the midst of the Algerian War, but French history doesn’t connect the two events.
Chinese President Xi Jinping, bottom left, speaks during the Opening Ceremony of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China at The Great Hall of People on October 16, 2022 in Beijing, China.

Autocratic Capitalism: An Introduction

Americans are taught that capitalism and democracy go together like motherhood and apple pie. It may be time to unlearn that lesson.
A map of the world showing the extent of the British Empire in 1886

A Primer on Settler Colonialism

What is this “settler colonialism” that’s become all the rage? Let’s take a closer look.
Elisha Gray

Gray’s Music: Over the Telegraph

Inventor of the telephone Elisha Gray also pioneered the world’s first purpose-built electric musical instrument.