Colonialism

Benjamin Rush, prominent colonial physician and signer of the Declaration of Independence, wrote a treatise on alcohol in 1784 that still influences how medicine views substance abuse today.

Meet the Doctor Who Convinced America to Sober Up

Meet Benjamin Rush, father of the temperance movement, signer of the Declaration of Independence

A giant rice rat specimen from the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, France

How Settlers Wiped Out the Caribbean’s Rodents of Unusual Size

The eradication of rice rats in the Lesser Antilles was part of a massive mammal extinction event

The tropical fire ant is the first known ant to travel the world by sea.

How 16th Century Trade Made Fire Ants an Early Global Invader

By inadvertently stowing away in Spanish ships, one pesky little insect quickly spread throughout much of the world

The red fox is among two European imports that researchers say play a big part in the loss of some of Australia's native species.

One-Tenth of Native Mammals in Australia Are Extinct: Blame Cats And Foxes

No other country on Earth has lost a greater proportion of land mammals over the last two centuries; now, a new study zeros in on the cause

Stony Ground by Edwin Austin Abbey

The Second Divorce in Colonial America Happened Today in 1643

The Massachusetts Bay Colony Puritans weren’t as conservative as you may have thought

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John Smith Coined the Term New England on This 1616 Map

After Jamestown, Smith pushed the English to settle the northeast, identifying Plymouth as a suitable harbor four years before the Pilgrims landed there

Skeletal remains being dug up at La Isabela, the first European settlement in the New World, founded by Christopher Columbus is 1493.

Scurvy Plagued Columbus' Crew, Even After the Sailors Left the Sea

Severe scurvy and malnutrition set the stage for the fall of La Isabela

Did the English discover Canada's west coast hundreds of years before it was officially charted by Spanish explorer Juan Perez?

Francis Drake May Have Discovered Western Canada Hundreds of Years Earlier, Kept Quiet About It

The discovery of a 16th century coin is threatening the story of British Columbia's history

A statue of Captain James Cook.

The Dutch Nearly Beat James Cook to New Zealand

A shipwreck discovered off New Zealand dates to a time before Cook's arrival

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Yankee Go Home — and Take Me with You!

More than 50 years after independence, Filipinos still chafe—and cheer—at the lingering legacies of U.S. colonialism

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