How Chocolate Came to Europe
Pre-Columbian cultures valued chocolate highly as a drink, and often served it at important events. It wasn't made into a solid candy until 1847.
Fixing the Grassroots of the American Lawn
A citizen scientist bred low-mow, slow-grow grass that needs little water and fertilizer.
The African Roots of MLK’s Vision
“Ghana tells us that the forces of the universe are on the side of justice… An old order of colonialism, of segregation, discrimination is passing away now.”
Ralph Ellison on Race
Ralph Ellison believed fiercely in the American project and in the centrality of black people to it.
Jane Addams’s Crusade Against Victorian “Dancing Girls”
Jane Addams, a leading Victorian-era reformer, believed dance halls were “one of the great pitfalls of the city.”
Can We Live Without Air Conditioning?
Air conditioning is a profoundly paradoxical technology: the hotter it gets the more we use it, and the more we use it the hotter it gets.
How Women Crushed on One Another Back in the Day
Same-sex crushes and romantic friendships between college-age women were common throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
Was Christine Jorgensen the Caitlyn Jenner of the 1950s?
“What is femininity anyway?” Jenner writes in her new book, The Secrets of My Life. Perhaps the famous trans woman Christine Jorgensen knew.
The Battle Over Confederate Heritage Month
A Southern governor has proclaimed April to be Confederate Heritage Month. But how can you celebrate the confederacy without mentioning slavery?
A Brief History of US Drinking
In 1770, the average colonial Americans consumed about three and a half gallons of alcohol per year, about double the modern rate.