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Bayard Holmes as a medical student

Cool Finds

Two Men Tried To Cure Schizophrenia by Removing Their Patients’ Intestines

Bayard Holmes and Henry Cotton were separated by a generation, but both thought that mental illness arose from toxins produced within the body

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How a Single Penny Became Worth More Than $2 Million

Fifteen years ago, few would pay $1 million for a coin—no matter how rare. That's changing.

Edwin L. Drake's first oil well.

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Oil Companies First Built Pipelines in the 1860s; They've Been Contested Ever Since

In the 19th century, reformers were happy to have oil come out of the ground—but they objected to the way oil companies controlled it

Hattie Wyatt Caraway on November 6, 1942.

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On This Day in 1932, America Elected Its First Female Senator

This year, a record number of women are serving in Congress; Hattie Wyatt Caraway was the first ever in the Senate

Cool Finds

Come for the Giant Rock, Stay for the UFO History

George Van Tassel believed he could communicate with aliens

Harvey W. Wiley and his Poison Squad in 1902

Early Food Safety Workers Tested Poisons by Eating Them

They were hailed as heroes and even had a song

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It’s Cheaper to Make Diabetes Test Strips of Silk Than of Paper in India

Skilled handloom weavers and abundant silk hold the key for an innovative solution

A new study shows that birds do not seem to recognize how fast a vehicle is approaching.

New Research

Planes Fly Too Fast for Birds to Dodge

New research shows that birds are not adept at avoiding obstacles at such high speeds

The Academy's live Lexias pardais with gynandromorphism

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A Museum’s Butterfly Emerged Half Male, Half Female

The rarity is like a natural experiment that tells scientists how genes and hormones interact to produce different sexes

Space Fence, a radar system sponsored by the U.S. Air Force and built by Lockheed Martin, should help the U.S. detect and track more of the estimated 500,000 pieces of space debris.

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U.S. Air Force Builds New Radar for Space Junk

It’s called Space Fence and should help us track the estimated 500,000 pieces of debris that orbit Earth

The soaring choir at Beauvais Cathedral was first constructed in the 1200s.

New Research

Europe's Great Gothic Cathedrals Weren't Built Just of Concrete

The designers and builders of Europe's great Gothic cathedrals weren't actually so innovative

Cattle graze on the open range in this shot from ca. 1920-1930.

Cool Finds

The 1887 Blizzard That Changed the American Frontier Forever

A blizzard hit the western open range, causing the “Great Die Up” and transforming America’s agricultural history

New Research

Monkeys Can Learn to Recognize Themselves in the Mirror

Generations of monkeys had tried and failed a classic test of intelligence, but the fault may have been in the way humans thought of the test

Marian Anderson as Ulrica in the Verdi opera Un ballo in maschera

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60 Years Ago, the First African-American Soloist Sang at the Met Opera

Marian Anderson performed as the fortuneteller Ulrica in Verdi’s Un Ballo in Maschera

Doctors, army officers and reporters protect themselves during the 1918 pandemic.

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The Flu Has Been Making People Sick for At Least 500 Years

The 1918 flu pandemic gets all the headlines, but the malady is thought to have first appeared in the 16th century—and possibly earlier

This portrait features Dr. Edward Jenner inoculating James Phipps, the first person to receive the smallpox vaccine.

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The Art of Vaccinations

The Art of Saving a Life is connected to a fundraising effort for an international group working to eradicate disease through vaccinations

European immigrants arrive in America.

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Ellis Island Isn’t to Blame for Your Family’s Name Change

A long-standing myth obscures the truth behind the Americanization of some European names

An atomic clock at the Physical Technical Federal Institution in Braunschweig, Germany.

Trending Today

2015 Will Be One Second Longer Than 2014

Because the Earth is rotating more slowly than the tick of our atomic clocks, says the International Earth Rotation Service

An artist's rendition of Kepler, on the hunt for planets like our own.

Cool Finds

Visit Kepler's Exoplanets—And Don't Worry About the Natives (At Least for Now)

NASA has made a set of travel posters themed to exoplanets while a nonprofit searches for life among them

New Research

Fossils Show How Flying Fish Started to Glide

In the quest to avoid being eaten, some fish took a leap into the open air

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