Kat Eschner

 

Kat Eschner is a freelance science and culture journalist based in Toronto.

Roosevelt became known for meeting with conservation figures like John Muir, something that detractors thought was "unpresidential."

With This One Quotable Speech, Teddy Roosevelt Changed the Way America Thinks About Nature

In a speech at the start of the 1908 Conference of Governors, Roosevelt changed the national conversation about resource use

Today, apples are one of the most valuable fruit crops in the United States, according to the Agricultural Marketing Resource Center.

Apple Pie Is Not All That American

Neither apples nor the pie originally came from America, but Americans have made this dish their own

Henri IV depicted as Hercules vanquishing a hydra. All in a day's work.

The Second Life of Henri IV’s Severed Head

Whether it's lying in the grave or sitting in a Paris bank vault, the monarch's cranium has been the subject of much debate since his untimely demise

Sidney Bechet, one of the early jazz greats, made his name on the clarinet, not the cornet or trumpet.

Listen to This First 1920s Recording By One of the Kings of Jazz

Sidney Bechet was one of the first big jazz soloists, and brought the soprano saxophone into the jazz fold

Learn why fudge like this is sold at every tourist attraction in the country

Why Does Every Tourist Attraction Sell Fudge?

One thing that places as different as Niagara Falls, Disneyland and Ellis Island have in common? Fudge

Irving Berlin and Ellin Mackay Berlin.

Songwriter Irving Berlin's Interfaith Marriage Caused 1920s Gossip

The songwriter made headlines when he and writer Ellin Mackay got married against her millionaire father's wishes

Savannah, Georgia during the Civil War. The southern landscape is often a key element of southern gothic fiction.

Why People Love Southern Gothic

From the 19th century to S-Town, it’s a compelling genre that’s as flawed as its most grotesque characters

The practical advice in the handbook was intended to help married couples from having too many children.

This Infamous 19th-Century Birth Control Pamphlet Got Its Writer Imprisoned

Charles Knowlton did three months hard labor and was fined $50

Botanists might see fruit, but to a tariff collector, there's nothing but vegetables here.

Tomatoes Have Legally Been Vegetables Since 1893

Okay, so it's technically a fruit. But we don't eat it like one

Ukraine's Jamala (right) at the press conference after she won Eurovision 2016 with "1944."

The Eurovision Song Contest Rocks Europe This Week. Here’s How It All Got Started

It was the idea of the European Broadcasting Union, who wanted to put the relatively new technology of television through its paces

Belle Boyd in an image taken between 1855 and 1865.

Belle Boyd, Civil War Spy

The so-called “Siren of Shenandoah” stole weapons and carried letters in service to the Confederacy

From the outside, the James Beard House is easy to miss. But as they say, it's what's inside that counts.

This Unassuming NYC Home is the Legacy of America's First Foodie

James Beard’s culinary philosophy helped shape American cuisine

Many women who choose midwife-assisted birth do so because it's associated with fewer medical interventions like caesarean sections.

U.S. Home Births Aren't As Safe As Many Abroad

Home birth doesn't have to be a dangerous and deadly proposition–but in the United States, it often is

Idaho Gem, the first cloned mule, only two days old in this photo but already aww-inducing.

How Mule Racing Led to Mule Cloning

It was a huge advance in cloning in the early 2000s

John Scott Haldane at his laboratory in Oxford.

To Protect Allied WWI Soldiers, This Researcher Tested an Early Gas Mask on Himself

John Haldane developed a rudimentary respirator that protected wearers against chlorine gas—at least for a few minutes

The canned precooked meat product is significantly less ubiquitous than its digital counterpart.

People Have Been Email-Spamming Since the Dawn of (Internet) Time

This is why we can't have nice things

Elijah McCoy.

This Prolific Inventor Helped Give Us The Phrase “The Real McCoy”

There are many stories about how we got this phrase. But there was only one Elijah McCoy

This copy of the first chart of the Gulf Stream was printed in 1786, ten years after Benjamin Franklin first drew it up.

Benjamin Franklin Was the First to Chart the Gulf Stream

Franklin's cousin, Timothy Folger, knew how the then-unnamed current worked from his days as a whaler

Illustration of the cat piano from 1657.

Music or Animal Abuse? A Brief History of the Cat Piano

In the early 1800s, the katzenklavier was hailed as a treatment for distracted people

Garment workers and union members from the Puritan Underwear Company taking part in the 1916 May Day parade in New York. While these parades were common early in the century, they began to disappear over time.

The US Declared “Loyalty Day” in the 1950s to Erase Worker Protest

Under Eisenhower during the Cold War, "Loyalty Day" was declared to paper over International Workers' Day

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