CURRENT ISSUE

January 2007

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine image Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine mobile image

Features

San Sebastian where condos dot the beach

Peace at Last?

Home to glittering beaches, robust wines, piquant foods and Bilbao's sparkling new Guggenheim Museum, the Basque Country of northern Spain has been riven by separatist violence for decades. Though political tensions linger, terrorists agreed to a cease-fire this past March. Will it mean peace at last?

Grand Teton herd of pronghorns

End of the Road?

Development threatens to block the ancient migration of a herd of pronghorn antelopes in western Wyoming. Without new protections, conservationists say, the speedy animals are running out of time.

Photo by Mark Michaelson of a thief described as a psycho

Arresting Faces

A new book argues the case for the mugshot as art

the Shandur Pass turns into the worlds highest polo grounds

Extreme Polo

There are no holds barred at the annual grudge match in northwest Pakistan's "land of mirth and murder"

The first Glidehouse

House Proud

High design in a factory-made home? Michelle Kaufmann believes she holds the key

John Singer Sargent captures the pearly light of dusk in Paris

Americans in Paris

In the late 19th century, the City of Light beckoned Whistler, Sargent, Cassatt and other young artists. As a new exhibition makes clear, what they experienced would transform American art

William Andrewes indicating the lateness of the hour in his garden in Concord, Massachusetts

The Shadow Knows

Why a leading expert on the history of timekeeping set out to create a sundial unlike anything the world has ever seen

Departments

Indelible Images

Time After Time

William Christenberry embraces the impermanent

My Kind of Town

Bleeve It, Hon

The tentative city the sportswriter grew up in has regained a bit of swagger

Phenomena & Curiosities

Paleozoic Vermont

What's the world's oldest communal ocean reef doing in the Green Mountain State?

Presence of Mind

Doctor Feelgood

Stricken by "vile melancholy," the 18th-century critic and raconteur Samuel Johnson pioneered a modern therapy

From the Secretary

Treasures Trove

America's most singular sensations are at the National Air and Space Museum

The Object at Hand

Gathering Rosebuds

Did a Native American actress inspire one of Hollywood's most celebrated symbols?

What's Up

What's Up

Live Orchids, Japanese art and African masks

From the Editor

Travelin' Man

Nailing stories from Timbuktu to the Basque Country

Wild Things

Wild Things: Life as We Know It

Tree frogs, conservation maps and the northern swordtail fish