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History / World History

A rehearsal takes place at Teatro América, on Galiano Street in Havana. From the outside, the theater is nothing special, concealed behind a dull screen of gray polygon concrete. But step inside and you’ve entered the museum that is Cuban architecture.

Smithsonian Journeys Travel Quarterly: Cuba

Havana’s Hidden Architectural Gems

The city’s eclectic architecture is both extraordinary and imperiled

U.S. Ambassador to Russia, George F. Kennan, chats with a newsman after the Russian government told the U.S. State Department that Kennan must be recalled immediately. The Russians charged that the ambassador made completely false statements hostile to the Soviet Union. At the time, Russia demanded his recall (three days ago) Kennan was in Geneva, where he'd been visiting his daughter who is a student at the International School. U.S. Secretary of State Dean Acheson called the Russian charges, outrageous.

George Kennan’s Love of Russia Inspired His Legendary “Containment” Strategy

It’s impossible to overstate the impact the American diplomat had on the United States’ Cold War policy

Outside the Winter Palace stands a column honoring Alexander I, who took kindly to the presence of the Adamses when they lived in St. Petersburg.

The Russian-U.S. Relationship Goes Way Back to John Quincy Adams

Before he became president, Adams was the nascent country’s first ambassador to Russia

Today Santiago de Cuba, which lies at the foot of the Sierra Maestra, is a bustling cultural capital.

Tony Perrottet's Cuba

How Cuba Remembers Its Revolutionary Past and Present

On the 60th anniversary of Fidel Castro’s secret landing on Cuba’s southern shore, our man in Havana journeys into the island’s rebel heart

“Three days after the attack on the armored train, Churchill arrived in Pretoria, the Boer capital, with the other British prisoners of war. Surrounded by curious Boers eager to see the new prisoners, he glared back at them with unconcealed hatred and resentment. Although he respected the enemy on the battlefield, the idea that average Boers would have any control over his fate enraged him.”

Even When He Was in His 20s, Winston Churchill Was Already on the Verge of Greatness

The future Prime Minister became known throughout Britain for his travails as a journalist during the Boer War

April 5, 2014, Maarat al-Numaan, Idlib. At the time I made this picture, the area was controlled by Jamal Marouf’s Syrian Revolutionaries Front (SRF), but was still contested by Syrian Government forces from their Wadi Deif and Hamadiyah bases about 2K away. SRF, which had recently displaced ISIS from the area, was itself displaced by Al Qaeda Affiliated Jabhat al Nusra (JAN) later in 2014. Wadi Deif and Hamadiyah bases were captured by Islamist rebels including JAN and Ahrar ash-Sham in December of 2014.

Photographer Nish Nalbandian on Bearing Witness to the Violence in the Syrian Civil War

In a new book, “A Whole World Blind,” the American photographer documents the tragedy in the Middle East

A sculpture of Hendrick Verwoerd, the architect of apartheid in South Africa.

How Should South Africa Remember the Architect of Apartheid?

Fifty years after H.F. Verwoerd was assassinated in Parliament, the nation he once presided over reckons with its past

Refugees from Syria await much-needed supplies.

The Crisis in Syria

Smithsonian.com partners with the Wilson Center to provide some much-needed context on the deadly civil war

Oil painting of the Great Fire, seen from Newgate.

History of Now

The Great Fire of London Was Blamed on Religious Terrorism

Why scores of Londoners thought the fire of 1666 was all part of a nefarious Catholic conspiracy

Karl Marx by John Collier, 1977

Commentary

Karl Marx, My Puppy ‘Max,’ Instagram and Me

A historian tries hard to understand modern society and buys a #cutepuppy

Scenes from the 1984 Los Angeles Summer Olympics.

The Paris Olympics

The Rise of the Modern Sportswoman

Women have long fought against the assumption that they are weaker than men, and the battle isn’t over yet

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