WEIRD HISTORY
By Melissa Sartore – Updated 2019 Nov 12 – The Aztec, a collective of Mesoamericans who thrived from the 14th to the 16th centuries, were the inheritors of ancient cultural traditions from their Olmec, Mayan, and Toltec predecessors. Aztec hygiene practices reflected …
By David Sharp Updated 2019 Dec 28 – City 40, or what is today known as Ozersk, is a closed city in Russia that the Soviet Union created during the Cold War. City 40 didn’t appear on any maps until 1991, allowed no outsiders to …
Scientific pioneer June Almeida is finally being acknowledged for virology breakthroughs she made a half century ago. Scientist June Almeida operates an electron microscope in 1963 at the Ontario Cancer Institute in Toronto, Canada. One year later, Almeida would become the first person …
By Stephan Roget Updated 2019 Mar 26 – The biggest political mistakes of both the past and present are debated ceaselessly, but governance-related blunders aren’t the only miscalculations that can change the world. In fact, some of the biggest mistakes in American …
By Michael Irving – A digital recreation of one of the main samples of Homo antecessor, which has now been placed on the family tree thanks to studies of ancient proteins in its teeth. Professor Laura Martín-Francés. – It’s hard to piece together the …
By Erin McCann – Although they are considered legends today, many favorite old Hollywood stars did not find instant fame and success. Some had to work exceptionally hard to get past all the closed doors in Tinsel Town. While some lucky celebrities from Hollywood’s golden age …
By Brent Landau, Lecturer in Religious Studies, University of Texas at Austin – On April 12, Christians will be celebrating Easter, the day on which the resurrection of Jesus is said to have taken place. The date of celebration changes from year to …
SEM photo of Neanderthal cord from Abri du Maras. M.H. Moncel – By Nell Greenfieldboyce – Tiny bits of twisted plant fibers found on an ancient stone tool suggest that Neanderthals were able to make and use sophisticated cords like string …
By Katie Hunt, CNN 2020 Apr 09 – Paleontologists crossing the Río Yurúa in Amazonian Perú, with the Santa Rosa fossil site in the background. – A crew of now-extinct monkeys made a treacherous transatlantic journey on a natural raft from …
By Genevieve Carlton – Updated 2019 Sep 20 – Though people pretend it’s written in stone, history features tons of famous mysteries – many of which remain unsolved. From the location of Genghis Khan’s tomb to the instructions for making a Byzantine weapon that …
