Skip to content
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.

Birds flying past the windows of a building

Migrating Birds Face an Unexpected Danger: Glass Buildings

Research shows that building collisions take a staggering annual toll on North America's bird population.
From From canal boy to president by Horatio Alger, 1881

The Creepy Backstory to Horatio Alger’s Bootstrap Capitalism

In a famous essay, a scholar uncovered difficult truths about Alger, whose name has been associated with the "rags to riches" myth.
We-Wa

One Barrier to Two-Spirit History: Settler Archives

Historians need to know more about the roles of two-spirit Native Americans, but relying on written records isn't always productive.
A poster with the famous words 'Big Brother is Watching You' from a BBC TV production of George Orwell's classic novel '1984'.

Is the Authoritarian Personality a Legitimate Concept?

A group of thinkers who fled Europe wanted to explain the rise of Nazism, but their ideas haven't withstood scrutiny.
Christine Jorgenson

A History of Transphobia in the Medical Establishment

At a time when trans people who wanted surgery needed to trust doctors, transphobia made it difficult.
Convicts working at Reed Camp, South Carolina, 1934

How Mass Incarceration Has Shaped History

A historian argues that it's time to look at the consequences of locking up millions of people over several decades.
Mothers' Crusade for Victory over Communism

The Red Scare and Women in Government

In 1952, a government administrator named Mary Dublin Keyserling was accused of being a communist. The attack on her was also an attack on feminism.
A group of Puerto Ricans at Newark airport, who just arrived by plane from Puerto Rico waiting to be transported to New York, 1947

How Migrant Labor Policies Shaped a Latino Identity

When Puerto Rican and Mexican workers came to the U.S. in large numbers, they faced similar discrimination and bigotry.
Ellen and William Craft

Passing for White to Escape Slavery

Passing for white was an intentional strategy that enslaved people used to free themselves from bondage.
A person taking a photograph of a mushroom on their phone.

iNaturalist and Crowdsourcing Natural History

The citizen-science app iNaturalist lets you record observations of plants and animals. The data can be used to study biodiversity.
Photographs of criminals, with mask in the centre, from Cesare Lombroso's l'Uomo Delinquente, 1889

Criminal Minds? Try Criminal Bodies

Cesare Lombroso wanted to use science to understand who criminals were. But his ideas about biological "atavism" easily transferred to eugenics and nativism.
A hand holding a corn cob with a spray nozzle on its top

Corn Is Everywhere!

Two educators use the history of corn, from the domestication of maize 10,000 years ago to today's ubiquitous "commodity corn," to teach about biodiversity.
Bhagat Singh Thind in his U.S. Army Uniform, 1918

How “Prerequisite Cases” Tried to Define Whiteness

A law of 1790 said that only "free white persons" were eligible to be naturalized. But courts struggled for years afterward to tell who was white at all.
A poster supporting the Anti-Rent Movement, 1839

Rural Rent Wars of the 1840s

Anti-rent rebellions in New York State helped to shatter the two-party political system in the nineteenth century.
The cover of Exodus by Leon Uris

How Americans Were Taught to Understand Israel

Leon Uris's bestselling book Exodus portrayed the founding of the state of Israel in terms many Americans could relate to.
Chicano Moratorium Committee antiwar demonstrators, East Los Angeles, 1970

Police Versus the Chicano Moratorium March of 1970

Despite police violence against Chicano demonstrators in Los Angeles, the movement was not deterred.
Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, 1941

Suppressing Native American Voters

South Dakota has been called "the Mississippi of the North" for its long history of making voting hard for Native Americans.
City Federation of Colored Women's Clubs of Jacksonville, State Meeting, Palatka, Florida

Women’s Clubs and the “Lost Cause”

Women's clubs were popular after the Civil War among white and Black women. But white clubwomen used their influence to ingrain racist curriculum in schools.
A 19th century advertisement for fish glue

Isinglass; or, The Many Miracles of Fish Glue

Isinglass comes from the swim bladders of certain kinds of fish and can be found in everything from beer recipes to illuminated manuscripts. Ew? No way.
A pile of pots, pans, and kitchen utensils sits in front of a poster urging people to donate aluminum kitchen ware to help the US Air Force

The Environmental Costs of War

Using aluminum as a case study, a geographer shows how wartime "commodity chains" can devastate the Earth.
The Beatles performing in 1961

The Beatles Got Started in Hamburg. There’s a Reason for That.

The Beatles first played Hamburg's pleasure zone in 1960, in a former strip club near the infamous Reeperbahn.
A photo of Emmett Till is included on the plaque that marks his gravesite at Burr Oak Cemetery in Aslip, Illinois.

How Local Newspapers Helped Emmett Till’s Murderers Go Free

Emmett Till was a boy of fourteen when he was lynched in Mississippi. The press would influence public opinion, and the outcome of the trial.
The Castle Bravo hydrogen bomb blast at Bikini Atoll on March 1, 1954

How the H-Bomb Led to a Reckoning in Japan

For years, the trauma of the atomic bomb was hardly talked about in Japan. The H-bomb test at Bikini Atoll changed that.
Illustration: An illustration from The Experiences of Loveday Brooke, Lady Detective

Source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/britishlibrary/11305222256

Meet Loveday Brooke, Lady Detective

Fictional detectives usually reflect conservative values. But the first "lady detective" story written by a woman broke boundaries.
Lovers of the Sun by Henry Scott Tuke

The Market Will Bare It: Transnational Nude Tourism

As Europeans recovered from the devastation of World War II, nude beaches appeared in France.