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Magazine

The Spiritualist Who Warned Lincoln Was Also Booth’s Drinking Buddy

What did Charles Colchester know and when did he know it?

Crowds make their way through the Shibuya District in Tokyo, home to a key railway station and one of its busiest neighborhoods.

What Makes Humans Different? Fiction and Cooperation

Historian Yuval Noah Harari previews his book on the past and future of Homo sapiens

A gala celebrated the opening of “Sade: Marquis of the Shadows, Prince of the Enlightment” at the Museum of Letters and Manuscripts.

Who Was the Marquis de Sade?

Even in the age of Fifty Shades of Grey, the 18th-century libertine is as shocking as ever

The scales on Fragment C divide the year by days and signs of the zodiac.

Decoding the Antikythera Mechanism, the First Computer

Hidden inscriptions offer new clues to the origins of a mysterious astronomical mechanism

History’s most impressive hoard of ancient Greek artifacts includes numerous amphoras, terra-cotta lamps, glass vessels, coins, jewelry and statues.

Exploring the Titanic of the Ancient World

Scientists search the wine-dark sea for the remains of a ship that sank 2,000 years ago—carrying what is believed to be the world’s first computer

From the Smithsonian National Museum of American History

Why Malcolm X Still Speaks Truth to Power

More than 50 years after his death, Malcolm X remains a towering figure whose passionate writings have enduring resonance

A New View of the Battle of Gallipoli, One of the Bloodiest Conflicts of World War I

The Turks are now rethinking their historic victory in the terrible battle

Tony the Tiger, a 550-pound Siberian-Bengal mix, lives in a cage at a Louisiana truck stop.

America Has a Tiger Problem And No One’s Sure How to Solve It

No one even knows how many of the big cats are in the United States

Can the Siberian Tiger Make a Comeback?

In Russia’s Far East, an orphaned female tiger is the test case in an experimental effort to save one of the most endangered animals on earth

Zhao Hua Hong is one of the last living foot-binding practitioners.

Why Footbinding Persisted in China for a Millennium

Despite the pain, millions of Chinese women stood firm in their devotion to the tradition

The International Space Station Will Soon Be Able to Measure Forest Density Using Lasers

Strengthening the planet’s forests is one critical way to combat climate change

Do Wolves Wag Their Tails Like Dogs and More Questions From Our Readers

Other questions ask if DNA testing has led to the redesignation of species

The Wrists of Birds Reveal Evolution Undoing Itself

Contrary to earlier claims, a new study shows that evolution may be reversible

The Clermont traveled the Hudson at an astonishing five miles per hour.

The Unbelievable Success of the American Steamship

How “Fulton’s Folly” transformed the nation’s landscape

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Discussion

From our readers

Unpublished Photos by Gordon Parks Bring a Nuanced View of 1950s Black America

An exhibit in Boston highlights unpublished photos from the acclaimed Life magazine photographer

Beware of this meat-eating Albertosaurus on the Royal Tyrrell Museum plaza.

Canada

Want to Excite Your Inner Dinosaur Fan? Pack Your Bags for Alberta

Canada’s badlands are the place to see fantastic dinosaur fossils (and kitsch)—and eye-opening new evidence about the eve of their fall

Guadalupe Peak and El Capitan: a landscape “lonely as a dream,” wrote Edward Abbey.

Evotourism ®

When Texas Was at the Bottom of the Sea

A hike to the “top of Texas,” the world’s most famous fossil reef, leads to a new sense of the sublime

The wounded soldiers above were photographed at a hospital in Fredericksburg, Virginia, between 1861 and 1865.

Ask Smithsonian 2017

Did Civil War Soldiers Have PTSD?

One hundred and fifty years later, historians are discovering some of the earliest known cases of post-traumatic stress disorder

“You could say that saving species is in my blood,” says Chris Darwin, a conservationist who lives in the mountains explored by his great-great-grandfather.

Evotourism ®

How Australia Put Evolution on Darwin’s Mind

The famous naturalist’s revolutionary theory first took shape not in the Galápagos but in the primeval Blue Mountains

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