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The 226 people trapped on board the City of San Francisco endured freezing temperatures, carbon monoxide poisoning and food shortages.

When a Deadly Winter Storm Trapped a Luxury Passenger Train Near the Donner Pass for Three Days

Snowdrifts stranded the vehicle in the Sierra Nevada in January 1952, imprisoning 226 people traveling from Chicago to California

The Ness of Brodgar—roughly, “headland of the bridge farm” in Old Norse. The isthmus separates the lochs of Harray and Stenness.

Discover the Astounding Secrets of Scotland's Stone Age Settlements

In the Orkney Islands, archaeologists close the chapter on a legendary excavation, capping two decades of remarkable Neolithic discoveries

Atop Faneuil Hall sits a grasshopper weather vane, imitating a similar one on London’s Royal Exchange.

Why Faneuil Hall Is the Perfect Metaphor for the American Revolution's Complicated Definition of Liberty

How a lively market on Boston Harbor became part of many defining moments of the Colonial and Revolutionary eras

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The Dramatic Rescue of the Citizen Sailors Who Patrolled the Atlantic Coast Looking for Nazi U-Boats

During World War II, the crew of the Zaida were among the everyday Americans who risked their lives watching out for enemy submarines

“In postwar America, fast food was seen as a ladder to the middle class,” says journalist and author Adam Chandler. “If you were part of a familiar chain, banks were willing to lend you money, and people would come to your establishment right away because you were a proven entity.”

The Roots of U.S. Work Culture—and Why the American Dream Is So Difficult to Achieve Today

A new book examines the evolution of the American workplace, interrogating the idea that hard work is enough to ensure success

Captain John Voss, left, aboard the Tilikum in Samoa. “So diminutive,” one Australian reporter wrote of the boat, “one wondered and admired the pluck, perseverance and skill displayed in bringing her across the 9,200 miles of trackless ocean.”   

The Death-Defying Attempt to Circumnavigate the World in a Canoe

How Captain John Voss put his dugout canoe—and himself—to the ultimate test

Harriet Bell Hayden 

The Remarkable Life of One of Boston's Most Fervent and Daring Abolitionists

Harriet Bell Hayden is believed to have helped hundreds of people fleeing slavery from her Beacon Hill residence

Did colonial Americans wear wristwatches? 

Did Colonial Americans Wear Wristwatches? And More Questions From Our Readers

You’ve got questions. We’ve got experts

Between July 1776 and June 1826, Jefferson recorded weather conditions in 19,000 observations across nearly 100 locations.

Discover Why Thomas Jefferson Meticulously Monitored the Weather Wherever He Went

The third president knew that the whims of nature shaped Americans' daily lives as farmers and enslavers

Illustration from a 16th-century Falnama, or Persian Book of Omens

How People of the Past Predicted the Future, From Spider Divination to Bibliomancy

A new exhibition spotlights the ways in which cultures around the world have sought answers in the face of uncertainty

Major Pierce Butler, a U.S. senator representing South Carolina and an original signer of the United States Constitution, left the 1,500-acre rice plantation—and its enslaved laborers—to his grandsons when he died. For locals whose ancestors were forced to work there, it’s considered a sacred place.

Inside the Struggle to Preserve Georgia's Butler Island, Home to a Notorious Plantation

Descendants of people enslaved at the site are grappling with its complicated history while also honoring the region's rich culture

Martin Van Buren in 1860. 

Martin Van Buren Created America's Partisan Political System. We're Still Recovering

The eighth president of the United States, the so-called little magician, saw political parties as the key to achieving power

James Earl Carter, Jr. by Robert Clark Templeton, 1980

The Lasting Legacy of Jimmy Carter, Dead at 100

Smithsonian curators remember and honor the 39th president’s uncompromising idealism

Maritime archaeologist Tamara Thomsen discovered this 1,200-year-old dugout canoe in Lake Mendota, Wisconsin, in June 2021.

Archaeologists Are Finding Dugout Canoes in the American Midwest as Old as the Great Pyramids of Egypt

In the waterways connected to the Great Lakes, researchers uncover boats that tell the story of millennia of Indigenous history

Timothée Chalamet as Bob Dylan in A Complete Unknown, a new James Mangold film

The Real Story Behind 'A Complete Unknown' and Bob Dylan's Early Career, From His Arrival in New York City to When He 'Went Electric'

A new film starring Timothée Chalamet tracks Dylan's evolution from an acoustic folk singer to a rock 'n' roll superstar

Engraving of General Sherman's "March to the Sea"

General Sherman Offered Savannah as a ‘Christmas Gift’ to President Lincoln. The Victory Signaled the End of His Brutal March to the Sea

Unlike much of Georgia, the historic port city was preserved from Sherman’s wrath, but suffered psychological terror nonetheless

By age 16, “being on some occasion made ashamed of my ignorance in figures, which I had twice failed in learning when at school,” Benjamin Franklin wrote, “I took Cocker’s book of arithmetic and went through the whole by myself with great ease.”

After Failing Math Twice, a Young Benjamin Franklin Turned to This Popular 17th-Century Textbook

A 19th-century scholar claimed that "Cocker's Arithmetick" had "probably made as much stir and noise in the English world as any [book]—next to the Bible"

The mailbox for letters to Santa Claus at the home of the Parsons family in Pennsylvania, on December 10, 2020

Kids Send Thousands of Letters to Santa Each Year. Here's What Really Happens to Them

The United States Postal Service and volunteers have responded to North Pole holiday correspondence over the past century

Photographs of “disappeared” Argentines inside a courtoom in September 2024, during one of 17 ongoing trials of former junta officials.

Four Decades After the Fall of Argentina’s Dictatorship, a Fight Over the Country’s Darkest Chapter Is Reopening Grievous Wounds

Inside the fight to memorialize victims of the military junta that ruled over the South American nation in the 1970s and '80s

An 1812 illustration of a private from the Fifth West India Regiment. In the 1790s, the remaining members of the Carolina Corps became part of the newly established First West India Regiment.

These Black Soldiers Fought for the British During the American Revolution in Exchange for Freedom From Slavery

The Carolina Corps achieved emancipation through military service, paving the way for future fighters in the British Empire to do the same

Smithsonian Channel

Preview thumbnail for video 'How the Meaning of Thanksgiving Has Changed

How the Meaning of Thanksgiving Has Changed

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Preview thumbnail for video 'This Object in History: Fernandomania

This Object in History: Fernandomania

Preview thumbnail for video 'This Ancient Egyptian Mega-Tomb Is the Largest of Its Kind

This Ancient Egyptian Mega-Tomb Is the Largest of Its Kind

Photo of the day

Walruses can weigh up to 1.5 tonnes. They use their sensitive whiskers to search for food on the seabed. They are also surprisingly intelligent animals that can learn complex tricks, solve problems and have a long memory. Sea Beauty