CURRENT ISSUE

October 2022

Features

Founding Force

How America’s “first politician” galvanized a colony—and helped set a revolution in motion

By Stacy Schiff

Glen Canyon Reveals Its Secrets

Water woes threaten America’s second largest reservoir—but leave new vistas in their wake

Photographs and Text by Pete McBride

Tolkien's World

Haunted by the approach of another world war, the author of The Lord of the Rings created a new story of Middle-earth that few people even knew about—until now

By John Garth

Photographs by Kieran Dodds

Ray of Hope

Conservationists aim to save the giant fish, which faces threats from poachers and climate change

Photographs by Alex Mustard

Text by Terence Monmaney

Scents and Sensibility

From the lab to the art gallery, the latest efforts to understand the fragrant, musky, stinky and utterly baffling world of smell

By Abigail Tucker

Photographs by Caroline Tompkins

Departments

Discussion

Your feedback on discrimination in World War II, the treasures of Fossil Lake and Istria

Flying High

The National Air and Space Museum reopens to the public, transforming the way we tell the story of aviation

All That Jazz

The plucky institution that staged a brassy comeback for America’s signature music

Plugged In

In bold, symbolic canvasses, an artist connects Congo's present and past

The Drive for Equality

How Florence St. John and her co-workers at General Motors set the precedent for equal pay in the 1930s

Paper Trail

Unearthing the long-lost secrets of the country's earliest inventions

Breaking the Barrier

The speeding-bullet design that propelled Chuck Yeager into history

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