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P.D. East (above as a young man) proclaimed that his Petal Paper was “a sheet designed to keep everyone happy.” That did not last.

Secrets of American History

What Made P.D. East the Fearless Wit of Forrest County

The newspaper man’s bravery rocked the racist establishment of the South—and heralded a new era of political satire

When Was the Earliest Internet Search?

Years before the birth of the Google, a forgotten experiment laid the groundwork for the ubiquitous search engine

Southern Chivalry – Argument versus Club's, John L. Magee

Before the Civil War, Congress Was a Hotbed of Violence

A new book from historian Joanne Freeman chronicles the viciousness with which elected officials treated each other

Could Lava Incinerate Trash and More Questions From Our Readers

You asked, we answered

An American flag sits atop a gravestone in the cemetery of Oak Mountain Baptist Church in Shelby County, Alabama.

Secrets of American History

The Wild Road Trip That Launched the Populist Conservative Movement

How a fiery preacher and a maverick Army general took the nation by storm

LGBTQ students are five times more likely than straight peers to miss school because they feel unsafe.

How a Little Yellow Bus Came to the Rescue of a Persecuted Schoolboy

LGBTQ activist and journalist Bil Browning reminisces about the importance of a simple toy

The couch on which Freud’s patients lay became identified with psychoanalysis itself. He shipped it to London when he left Vienna.

Secrets of American History

What Drove Sigmund Freud to Write a Scandalous Biography of Woodrow Wilson?

The founder of psychoanalysis collaborated with a junior American diplomat to lambaste the former president

In 1776, the year she married, Julia Stockton Rush was painted by Charles Willson Peale.

Rediscovering a Founding Mother

Just-discovered letters herald the significance of an unsung Revolutionary woman, Julia Rush

Robert Smalls, memorialized in a bust at Beaufort’s Tabernacle Baptist Church, was sent to work in Charleston at age 12 after he started defying the strictures of slavery.

Secrets of American History

Terrorized African-Americans Found Their Champion in Civil War Hero Robert Smalls

The formerly enslaved South Carolinian declared that whites had killed 53,000 African-Americans, but few took the explosive claim seriously—until now

Bigfoot is still a big deal to many conspiracy theorists.

Why Do So Many People Still Want to Believe in Bigfoot?

The appeal of the mythical, wild man holds strong

How to Cipher Like a Soviet

See if you can figure out how the American code-breakers unraveled the complexities of the Russian codebook

Knights of the SMOTJ wear the red cross pattée, believed to have been first used by the Knights Templar in 1147.

Meet the Americans Following in the Footsteps of the Knights Templar

Disbanded 700 years ago, the most famous of the medieval Christian orders is undergoing a 21st century revival

Images of Vickie Jones for the March 1969 Jet profile.

The Counterfeit Queen of Soul

A strange and bittersweet ballad of kidnapping, stolen identity and unlikely stardom

Readers Discuss Our June 2018 Issue

Feedback from our readers

Do Marine Mammals Yawn and More Questions From Our Readers

You asked, we answered

Royal swan uppers now wear scarlet jackets, but they still pilot traditional rowing skiffs. The 2018 swan upping will begin July 16.

An Artistic Reimagining of London’s Past in ‘Old River Thames’

Tally ho! Photographer Julia Fullerton-Batten English looks at when swan lovers come to their census

The Epic Quest to Ride the World’s Biggest Wave

Welcome to the new Mt. Everest of surfing, a notoriously dangerous break off the coast of Portugal

At Surf Ranch in May (where Kelly Slater leaned into a cutback), 5,000 spectators gathered to watch 25 world-class surfers compete for prize money.

Engineering the Perfect Wave

A technology breakthrough allows surf legend Kelly Slater to manufacture the same wave over and over again

McNamara (in 2013 in Nazaré) still surfs its monster waves, despite the risks. Last year, a fall broke champion British surfer Andrew Cotton’s back.

What It Took to Set the World Record for Surfing

Brazilian surfer Rodrigo Koxa had to conquer PTSD before he was ready to break Garrett McNamara’s world record

In the foreground stand foundation remnants of a house where soldiers once searched for Jews. The family hid refugees in a secret compartment constructed between the interior walls.

The Dispossessed

This French Town Has Welcomed Refugees for 400 Years

For centuries, the people of the mountain village of Chambon-sur-Lignon have opened their arms to the world’s displaced

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