When a Game Is More Than Just a Game

There's far more to this photograph of Japanese American children playing Monopoly than meets the eye.

Zora Neale Hurston, In Her Element

When the famed writer went to Florida to capture the sounds of the South.

What Happened When Zora Neale Hurston Studied Voodoo in Haiti?

The renowned author and anthropologist went to the island nation in search of its religion—and its zombies.

He Met His Wife Over a Lie Detector. Then Things Got Interesting.

Leonarde Keeler, the inventor of the Keeler Polygraph, spent most of his life trying to tell if people were telling the truth. It turned out to be trickier than hooking them up to a machine.

The Man Behind Wonder Woman

William Marston falsely claimed to have invented the lie detector test. The truth about his life was a whole lot wilder than that—and it led to the invention of the most famous female comic book character ever.

The Roots of American Islamophobia

Khomeini and the hostage crisis provided the United States with a new face and faith to fear.

First the Iran Hostage Crisis Happened—then Fame Followed

As one of the hostages' wives, Barbara Rosen was thrust into the biggest media event of its era. 

How a Small Band of Students Set off the Iran Hostage Crisis

Who was behind the U.S. embassy takeover in 1979?

The Presidents and the Shah: A Strategic Partnership

Hunting the Plague

In 1900, doctors raced to save San Francisco from a disease that had killed hundreds of millions around the world.

Damming the American West

Do ideas from the past offer new ways of thinking about the environment?

Soledad Luna and the St. Francis Dam Disaster

How a 10-year-old girl survived one of the worst civil engineering failures in American history.