Smart News History & Archaeology

Workers labor in the fields in the shadow of Mt. Williamson.

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View Daily Life in a Japanese-American Internment Camp Through the Lens of Ansel Adams

In 1943, one of America’s best-known photographers documented one of the best-known internment camps

This Roman road is part of a newly opened McDonalds.

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New McDonalds Has a Cool Design Element: an Ancient Roman Road

Have a bit of history with that Happy Meal

Prayer wheels are just one of the sounds preserved and remixed in a new project.

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Listen to the Sounds of Sacred Spaces Around the World

A new project documents, then remixes, religious and spiritual sounds

Sigmund Freud, G. Stanley Hall, C.G. Jung, A.A. Brill, Ernest Jones, and Sándor Ferenczi posed at Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts in September, 1909.

When Freud Met Jung

The meeting of the minds happened 110 years ago

Hugo La Fayette Black was a Supreme Court justice for over three decades, and is remembered as a defender of civil rights.

This Supreme Court Justice Was a KKK Member

Even after the story came out in 1937, Hugo Black went on to serve as a member of the Supreme Court into the 1970s

This later image shows the artist's interpretation of the Luddites breaking a loom. Byron was speaking up to oppose the Frame Breaking Act of 1812 that would make machine breaking a capital crime.

Byron Was One of the Few Prominent Defenders of the Luddites

Years later he even wrote them a poem, “Song for the Luddites”

This image, entitled "Doing Their Share, Too," celebrated the war work of black women.

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This African American Artist’s Cartoons Helped Win World War II

Charles Alston knew how to turn art into motivation

Playing the flute isn't easy even for some humans, but in the 18th century, inventor Jacques de Vaucanson figured out how to make a machine play it.

This Eighteenth-Century Robot Actually Used Breathing to Play the Flute

It was one of a trio of automata that had functions like living creatures

This animal hair toothbrush (horse hair, to be exact) is said to have belonged to Napoleon Bonaparte.

You Can Still Buy Pig-Hair Toothbrushes

There's an argument for it, given all the environmental destruction causes by plastic ones

John 'Babbacombe' Lee was convicted of murder in 1884 and sentenced to death by hanging. Then things got weird.

The Weird Story of “The Man They Couldn’t Hang”

John ‘Babbacombe’ Lee’s life and almost-death are matters of speculation

The Little Rock Nine escorted by soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division into Little Rock Central High.

That Time the U.S. Government Won an Oscar

Today, the award is kept on permanent display in the National Archives

Woodblock print on paper by Utagawa Kuniyoshi.

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Japan Is Getting a Ninja Museum

Officials hope the iconic warriors can sneak more tourism into the country

Walt Whitman photographed in 1854, two years after his serialized novella was first published anonymously.

A Graduate Student Just Discovered a Lost Work of Fiction by Walt Whitman

The serialized novella was first published anonymously in 1852

Tootsie Rolls contain small amounts of cocoa and also an ingredient you might not expect—orange extract.

Tootsie Rolls Were WWII Energy Bars

The candies were included in rations because they stayed fresh for a long time

Within Our Gates is the oldest surviving film by a black director.

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Watch the Oldest-Known Surviving Film by an African-American Director

<i>Within Our Gates</i> was Oscar Micheaux’s response to a racist classic

Dachau's gate had a chilling message for its inmates.

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Stolen ‘Arbeit Macht Frei’ Gate Returns to Dachau

The identity of the thieves remains a mystery

Hans Scholl, Sophie Scholl and Christoph Probst (pictured, left to right, in 1942) resisted the Nazis as members of the White Rose, a secret student group.

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The Secret Student Group That Stood Up to the Nazis

The White Rose was short-lived, but its words were hard to ignore

Aleutian people stand on the deck of a ship forcibly evacuating them to southeastern Alaska.

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The U.S. Forcibly Detained Native Alaskans During World War II

In the name of safety, Aleuts were held against their will under intolerable conditions in internment camps

The Daisy was a popular cocktail with many variations, including the Tequila Daisy.

Here’s How To Make the Margarita’s (Possible) Predecessor, the Daisy

This cocktail has its roots in the nineteenth century, and some of its first recipes are made with brandy, not tequila

This crop near Kagwada, South Sudan was destroyed first by armed rebels, then by roaming cattle who wiped it clean. South Sudan now faces a humanitarian crisis in the form of a famine.

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With Tens of Thousands Facing Starvation, Famine Is Declared in Parts of South Sudan

One million more are “on the brink” of famine

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