What Skulls Told Us
The pseudoscience phrenology swept the popular imagination, and its practitioners made a mint preying on prejudices, gullibility, and misinformation.
The Daguerreotype’s Famous. Why Not the Calotype?
William Henry Fox Talbot’s obsession with protecting his pioneering photographic process doomed his reputation and reduced his legacy to historical footnote.
Ireland’s Upper Sea
In medieval Ireland, ships that sailed across the sky were both marvelous and mundane.
Laura Bassi, Enlightenment Scientist
The Italian physicist and philosopher was the first woman to earn a doctorate in science and the first salaried female professor at a university.
Electrical Fashions
From the light-bulb dress to galvanic belts, electrified clothing offered a way to experience and conquer a mysterious and vigorous force.
The Marvelous Experiments of Amateur Plant Breeders
Over 100 years ago, a horticulturalist introduced hybrid plants to California gardeners. Up sprouted a movement of amateur experiments in plant biology.
The Souls of Magnets
Lodestones are dull, lumpy, and slate-gray, but their “magnetic intelligence” made them fabulously expensive.
The Curious Voyage of HMS Endeavour
Captain James Cook had secret orders to to search for a predicted Southern Continent. He ended up claiming New Zealand and part of Australia for the U.K.
Why Victorian Gardeners Loathed Magenta
For decades, British and American gardeners avoided magenta flowers. The color had associations with the unnatural and the poisonous.