Immigrants View The Statue Of Liberty, 1887

Birth of A National Immigration Policy

Until the Civil War, regulating immigration to the US was left to individual states. That changed with Emancipation and the legal end of slavery.
Picture of Kerria lacca from the book, Indian Insect Life: a Manual of the Insects of the Plains by Harold Maxwell-Lefroy

As You Lakh It

How did an oleoresin produced by insects in Asia become a standard part of European furniture manufacture and conservation?
Acharya Shri Bhikshu, the founder and first spiritual head of Śvētāmbara Terapanth

Jain Ascetics in a Material World

The Jain Śvētāmbara Terāpanth sect began as an ascetic discipline, but it has increasingly emphasized physical health over renunciation of the body.
Rationale of the Dirty Joke by G. Legman

G. Legman and the Bawdy Eclectic

A fierce opponent of censorship, Gershon Legman helped legitimize the academic study of erotic folklore as manifested in jokes, limericks, and songs.
Deteriorating nitrate motion picture film

Combustible Cinema? The Nitrate Film Issue

The early plastic called celluloid was made of nitrocellulose and camphor. It made for spectacular pictures. It also made for spectacular fires.
A 1906 Postcard from the National Electric Light Association's convention held at the boardwalk in Atlantic City New Jersey

Generating Electricity…and Uncertainty

As the tobacco and electrical industries demonstrate, US corporations have a history of sowing doubt for profit.
A deep image from the Dark Energy Survey showing the field covered by one of the individual detectors in the Dark Energy Camera.

Astronomers Use AI to Shed Light on Dark Energy

A new measurement offers insights on the density of the mysterious force driving the Universe’s expansion.
American Mink in Surrey, England.

Take Back Your Mink

Could lab-grown fur be an ethical alternative to fur farming?
The Honeywell 316 Kitchen Computer

A Computer in Every Kitchen?

The 1969 Honeywell Kitchen Computer is a case study of early computer failures—or is it?
Walter Evans-Wentz and Lama Kazi Dawa Samdup, c. 1919

Where Tulpas Come From

Created through the power of the human mind, tulpas bear little resemblance to anything found in the Tibetan traditions in which they allegedly originated.