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History / World History

Ed Sullivan interviews Fidel Castro in January 1959, shortly after dictator Fulgencio Batista had fled the country.

Tony Perrottet's Cuba

When Fidel Castro Charmed the United States

Sixty years ago this month, the romantic victory of the young Cuban revolutionaries amazed the world—and led to a surreal evening on “The Ed Sullivan Show”

Herschel Grynszpan in a photo from the German archives

History of Now

How a Jewish Teenager Went From Refugee to Assassin to Puppet of Nazi Propaganda

Herschel Grynszpan wanted to avenge the crimes committed against European Jews. Instead, his actions were used as a justification for Kristallnacht

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America at War

This Map Shows Where in the World the U.S. Military Is Combatting Terrorism

The infographic reveals for the first time that the U.S. is now operating in 40 percent of the world’s nations

A map of the moon with labeled features, from Selenographia by Johannes Hevelius.

The 17th-Century Astronomer Who Made the First Atlas of the Moon

Johannes Hevelius drew some of the first maps of the moon, praised for their detail, from his homemade rooftop observatory in the Kingdom of Poland

A mini-loaf of homemade panettone

A Culinary History of Panettone, the Italian and South American Christmas Treat

The holiday pastry has been a multicultural phenomenon since the very beginning

1921 Christmas greetings slide by Arthur Earland

The Nerdiest Christmas Cards Ever May Be These Microscope Slides Composed of Shells

The unusual holiday exchange, which lasted decades during the early 20th-century, hints at the drama between the two colleagues

The card game Spot It! has become one of the most popular family games in the country, but the secret to how the game works has its roots in the logic puzzles of 19th century mathematicians.

Education During Coronavirus

The Mind-Bending Math Behind Spot It!, the Beloved Family Card Game

The simple matching game has some deceptively complex mathematics behind the scenes

An aerial shot of North Sentinel Island

Inside the Story of John Allen Chau’s Ill-Fated Trip to a Remote Island

Questions abound about the ethics of the missionary’s trip and what will happen next

A police officer directs traffic in London in the 1890s.

When the Street Light First Came to London, Disaster Ensued

First introduced in 1868, the device was meant to prevent accidents—but then it caused one

As biographer Antonia Fraser explains, Mary’s story is one of “murder, sex, pathos, religion and unsuitable lovers"

Based on a True Story

The True Story of Mary, Queen of Scots, and Elizabeth I

Josie Rourke’s film sees Saoirse Ronan and Margot Robbie transform from allies into rivals, but in actuality, the queens’ relationship was far more complex

U.S. Air Force C-130 Hercules aircraft fire chaff and flare countermeasures over the Nevada Test and Training Range Nov. 17, 2010.

The Woman Whose Invention Helped Win a War — and Still Baffles Weathermen

Her work long overlooked, physicist Joan Curran developed technology to conceal aircraft from radar during World War II

A famous Enlightenment era writer and philosopher, Voltaire made a splash with his first play, Oedipe.

How Voltaire Went from Bastille Prisoner to Famous Playwright

Three hundred years ago this week, the French philosopher and writer began his career with a popular retelling of Sophocles’ ‘Oedipus’

The NIST-4 Kibble balance, an electromagnetic weighing machine that is used to measure Planck's constant, and in turn, redefine the kilogram.

Scientists Are About to Redefine the Kilogram and Shake Up Our System of Measures

After more than 100 years of defining the kilogram according to a metal artifact, humanity is preparing to change the unit based on a constant of nature

An illustration of Blackbeard, the famed pirate

Three Centuries After His Beheading, a Kinder, Gentler Blackbeard Emerges

Recent discoveries cast a different light on the most famous—and most feared—pirate of the early 18th century

The new, animated Grinch

Top 10 Real-Life Grinches Who Did Their Best to Steal Christmas

These historical humbugs rival Ebenezer Scrooge and the Grinch in their lack of holiday spirit

Bruce is alternately painted as a patriot whose perseverance secured his nation’s independence and a more shadowy figure with dangerous ambitions

Based on a True Story

The True Story of Robert the Bruce, Scotland’s ‘Outlaw King’

Chris Pine stars as the Netflix film’s eponymous hero, who secures his country’s independence but leaves behind a tangled legacy

The Notre Dame de Lorette military cemetery near Arras in northern France is the burial place of 40,000 French soldiers. Each grave is marked with a simple white cross bearing the soldier's name.

35 Places to Commemorate the 100th Anniversary of the End of World War I

These cemeteries, memorials and museums around the world remember the millions who died in the Great War

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Special Project

The Scars of World War I

One hundred years after the end of the bloodshed, one photographer finds personal connections to the war

Renia in Skole in the 1930s

The Unforgotten: New Voices of the Holocaust

Learn About Renia Spiegel, the Author of an Unforgettable Holocaust Diary, by Hearing From Her Family Who Survived

In an event held at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., Elizabeth Bellak recalls the remarkable story of her sister

Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus.

History of Now

Lessons in the Decline of Democracy From the Ruined Roman Republic

A new book argues that violent rhetoric and disregard for political norms was the beginning of Rome’s end

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