Feb 12 America’s first big business? Not the railroads, but slavery By Sven Beckert For too long, historian Sven Beckert argues, historians have depicted slavery as a non-capitalist "Southern pathology." In his new book, "Empire of Cotton," Beckert shows how slavery was actually at the very roots of modern American capitalism. Continue reading
Feb 10 Ancient ceramics show skill sharing, social networking in pre-Columbian era By Shehryar Nabi Studying ancient ceramics shows that social networking and skill-sharing helped pre-Columbian civilizations survive longer. Continue reading
Feb 09 How a simple ‘hello’ became the first message sent via the Internet By Mike McDowall, OZY No fanfare. No cleverly contrived quote for the history books. And yet, at 10:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 29, 1969, three months after Neil Armstrong’s famous step, came another giant leap for mankind. Just months after the first manned moon… Continue reading
Feb 08 Forgotten copy of Magna Carta found in UK archive By Daniel Costa-Roberts A rare early copy of the Magna Carta, the medieval English charter that forms the foundation of modern democratic rights, has been found in a Victorian-era scrapbook in Kent County, England. Continue reading
Feb 03 Watch 5:49 San Francisco dancers confront history and human rights through video, text By PBS News Hour Continue watching
Jan 23 The White House broke a State of the Union tradition. Does it matter? By Colleen Shalby On Tuesday, the White House broke a longstanding State of the Union tradition. Rather than distributing an embargoed copy of the President’s speech to the press and press alone, the address was made public on the blogging site Medium… Continue reading
Jan 18 Long-lost audio of Martin Luther King Jr. speech found in UCLA storage room By Carey Reed An audio recording of a speech given by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in the 1960s, long thought to be lost in time, was made available to the masses this week online. Continue reading
Jan 07 What was is in that 219-year-old time capsule from Paul Revere and Sam Adams? By Colleen Shalby Last month, Museum of Fine Arts conservator Pam Hatchfield excavated a 219-year-old time capsule that Paul Revere and then-Governor Samuel Adams had buried under the Massachusetts State House. Continue reading
Dec 12 Centuries-old time capsule from Sam Adams and Paul Revere unearthed in Boston By Colleen Shalby A 219-year-old time capsule believed to be originally buried in 1795 by then-Governor Samuel Adams and Paul Revere was unearthed Thursday. Continue reading
Dec 05 Watch 4:07 To remember Pearl Harbor, a debate on restoring a last-of-its-kind military plane By PBS News Hour Seventy-three years ago, an attack on Pearl Harbor catapulted the U.S. into World War II. National Air and Space Museum curator Jeremy Kinney shows off a rare survivor from that day -- a military seaplane -- and explains how specialists… Continue watching