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History

Babe Ruth by Nat Fein, 1948

Babe Ruth Hit a Home Run With Celebrity Product Endorsements

The Great Bambino was one of the first athletes to be famous enough to require a publicity agent to handle his affairs

“Even the greatest things in the world need attention when they’re not as strong as they could be. It was a cry for freedom,” says Tommie Smith of his silent act at the 1968 Olympics.

The Paris Olympics

What You Don’t Know About Olympian Tommie Smith’s Silent Gesture

The simple act of civil disobedience, thrusting a black-gloved fist in the air, produced shock waves across the nation

Chuck Taylor All Star, circa 1957

The Paris Olympics

How Chuck Taylor Taught America How to Play Basketball

A shoe-in for the first ever basketball game in the Olympics, Converse All Stars have a long history both in and out of sport

What secrets do those lonely ice sheets hold?

Age of Humans

A Radioactive Cold War Military Base Will Soon Emerge From Greenland’s Melting Ice

They thought the frozen earth would keep it safely hidden. They were wrong

Pankration scene: the pankriatiast on the right tries to gouge his opponent's eye; the umpire is about to strike him for this foul.

The Paris Olympics

The Ancient History of Cheating in the Olympics

Punishment for cheating and bribery in the Olympics of Ancient Greece could include fines, public flogging and statewide bans from competition

What Does a Beer Historian Do?

The American History museum’s latest job opening made headlines. But what does the job actually entail?

Convicted bank robber, Patty Hearst arrest photo

How the Abduction of Patty Hearst Made Her an Icon of the 1970s Counterculture

A new book places a much-needed modern-day lens on the kidnapping that captivated the nation

How the American Civil War Built Egypt’s Vaunted Cotton Industry and Changed the Country Forever

The battle between the U.S. and the Confederacy affected global trade in astonishing ways

A falconer next to a runestone.

Learn to Be a Viking (Without the Pillaging) in Ribe, Denmark

Travel back in time in this Viking village

Lisa Kathleen Graddy and Jon Grinspan, curators with the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History

How Do Smithsonian Curators Decide What to Collect at the Political Conventions?

For Smithsonian’s Lisa Kathleen Graddy and Jon Grinspan, it’s trying to guess what people of the future will want to know about 2016

Sarah Winnemucca, the first Indian woman to write a book highlighting the plight of the Indian people.

Sarah Winnemucca Devoted Her Life to Protecting Native Americans in the Face of an Expanding United States

The 19th-century visionary often found herself stuck between two cultures

Concerns about patronage under the Grant Administration inspired Horace Greeley (depicted above Grant's left shoulder) to run for President.

History of Now

The Only Time a Major Party Embraced a Third-Party Candidate for President

Horace Greeley was the choice of the splinter grip named the Liberal Republican Party and that of the Democrats

Madame President

History of Now

The History of Women Presidents in Film

Why the science-fiction genre was the first to imagine a female commander-in-chief

How You Wound Up Playing ‘The Oregon Trail’ in Computer Class

From the 1970s to 1990s, the government-owned Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium dominated the educational software market with more than 300 games

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