Newspapers

Visitors gather at the foot of Monkey Mountain, an attraction at Frank Buck's Jungle Camp in Massapequa, New York, around 1939.

When 170 Wild Monkeys Escaped From a 'Jungle Camp' and Terrorized New York

In 1935, dozens of rhesus macaques absconded from Frank Buck's Long Island menagerie. Nearly a century later, 43 members of the same species broke out of a South Carolina research facility

J. Frank Duryea and his American-made "motocycle" won first place in the Chicago Times-Herald race on November 28, 1895.

Six Cars Raced to the Finish Line of the U.S.'s First Automobile Race—at Speeds of Seven Miles Per Hour

Held on this day in 1895, the 54-mile round trip took more than ten hours and involved accidents with streetcars, horses and snowbanks

Manatees have rebounded since the 1970s but still face myriad threats.

Archaeologists Piece Together the Origin Story of Florida's Manatees, Revealing They Were Once Tourists

A new study suggests manatees weren’t permanent residents in the Sunshine State until around the 20th century, drawn in by a warming climate and construction of power plants

Alice Beatrice Rhinelander, née Jones (seated at center), looks at her father, George Jones, as they await the verdict in the Rhinelander v. Rhinelander case.

How an Interracial Marriage Sparked One of the Most Scandalous Trials of the Roaring Twenties

Under pressure from his wealthy family, real estate heir Leonard "Kip" Rhinelander claimed that his new wife, Alice Beatrice Jones, had tricked him into believing she was white

On September 4, 1967, six identical silver disks appeared at equidistant locations along a plumb-straight line that bisected southern England.

How British College Students Convinced Authorities That Flying Saucers Were Invading the U.K.

To raise awareness for a charity event, aspiring engineers planted six UFOs across southern England on a single day in 1967

A depiction of the 1833 Leonids, based on a first-person account of the 1833 storm by a minister, Joseph Harvey Waggoner, on his way from Florida to New Orleans.

Americans Fell in Love With Science When the Breathtaking Leonid Meteor Shower Lit Up the Skies Across the Nation

In 1833, hundreds of thousands of shooting stars inspired songs, prophecies and a crowdsourced research paper on the origins of meteors

A white mob poses outside of the razed office of the Daily Record, a Black-owned newspaper in Wilmington, North Carolina, on November 10, 1898.

When White Supremacists Staged the Only Successful Coup in U.S. History

The 1898 Wilmington massacre left dozens of Black North Carolinians dead. Conspirators also forced the city's multiracial government to resign at gunpoint

Brian Cleary poses with a newly published copy of Bram Stoker's "Gibbet Hill," illustrated by Irish artist Paul McKinley.

Amateur Historian Discovers Lost Story by 'Dracula' Author Bram Stoker Hiding in Plain Sight at a Dublin Library

History forgot about "Gibbet Hill" for more than a century—until a fan of the Gothic horror writer stumbled upon the haunting tale at the National Library of Ireland

NBC News' 1988 electoral map marked states won by Republican George H.W. Bush in blue and states won by Democrat Michael Dukakis in red.

When Republicans Became 'Red' and Democrats Became 'Blue'

The 2000 presidential election cemented the color-coded nature of political parties. Prior to that race, the colors were often reversed on electoral maps

John Kunst (left), Ambassador Robert Neumann (center) and David Kunst (right) in Kabul, Afghanistan, on September 30, 1972

Why a Minnesota Man Walked Around the World, Traversing 13 Countries and 14,450 Miles in Four Years

Fifty years ago, on October 5, 1974, David Kunst completed the first verified circumnavigation of the globe on foot. Along the way, he met Princess Grace of Monaco, raised money for UNICEF and lost a brother to bandits

Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick so angered authorities that they shut it down after just four days.

Why the Debut Issue of America's First Newspaper Was Also the Publication's Last

On this day in 1690, "Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick" attracted colonial officials' ire by repeating a scandalous rumor and condemning a British alliance with the Mohawk

An 1860 photo of New-York Tribune editor Horace Greeley, who challenged President Ulysses S. Grant in the 1872 election

This Defeated Presidential Candidate, Once the 'Best-Known Man in America,' Died in a Sanatorium Less Than a Month After Losing the Election

Newspaper editor Horace Greeley unsuccessfully ran against incumbent Ulysses S. Grant in November 1872. Twenty-four days later, he died of unknown causes at a private mental health facility

An inside spread in the newspaper featured photos of some of the victims, including the Titanic's captain Edward J. Smith.

After the Titanic Sank, Families and Friends of People on the Ship Anxiously Waited to See Who Survived and Who Perished

A newspaper detailing the accounts of loved ones, published on April 20, 1912, was recently discovered in a wardrobe and sold at auction

Frustrated residents of Sheridan, Wyoming, coalesced around the idea of secession, allying with nearby communities to petition for their own state.

How the Great Depression Fueled a Grassroots Movement to Create a New State Called Absaroka

In the 1930s, disillusioned farmers and ranchers fought to carve a 49th state out of northern Wyoming, southeastern Montana and western South Dakota

A 1959 photograph of William "W.R." Saxon, who is standing third from left

This Little-Known Civil Rights Activist Refused to Give Up His Bus Seat Four Years Before Rosa Parks Did

William "W.R." Saxon filed a lawsuit against the company that forced him to move to the back of the bus, seeking damages for the discrimination and mental anguish he’d faced

In "Lady in the Lake," Natalie Portman plays a fictional journalist who investigates a pair of mysterious deaths. The cases are inspired by the real-life disappearances of Esther Lebowitz and Shirley Lee Parker.

The Real Story Behind the Baltimore Deaths That Inspired 'Lady in the Lake'

A new mini-series offers a fictionalized take on two unrelated 1969 cases: the mysterious disappearance of bartender Shirley Lee Parker and the murder of 11-year-old Esther Lebowitz

The origins of the word "OK" have long been a subject of scholarly debate.

How One Man Discovered the Obscure Origins of the Word 'OK'

From Civil War biscuits to a Haitian port town, theories about the word's beginnings abounded

A woman named Evelyn Thaw dodges a camera, 1909

How the Rise of the Camera Launched a Fight to Protect Gilded Age Americans' Privacy

Early photographers sold their snapshots to advertisers, who reused the individuals' likenesses without their permission

These rare early copies of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights will go under the hammer on June 26.

You Could Own Rare Copies of the Nation's Founding Documents, Just in Time for the Fourth of July

Sotheby's is auctioning early printings of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, as well as a 1790 Rhode Island broadside

Some of the newspaper articles describe the buying and selling of enslaved people, while others offer rewards for the return of runaways.

Ancestry Releases Records of 183,000 Enslaved Individuals in America

The genealogy company has digitized and published 38,000 newspaper articles from between 1788 and 1867—before Black Americans were counted as citizens in the U.S. census

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