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museums

Podcast: The Battle of Atlanta Cyclorama

Join us for a daily celebration of the world’s most wondrous, unexpected, even strange places.
The entrance to the Silver Cliff Cemetery leads visitors down roads less traveled.
cemeteries

What's Really Behind the Ghost Lights of Colorado's Silver Cliff Cemetery?

Tucked between rugged mountains, this lonely graveyard is home—allegedly—to ethereal, glowing orbs that dance among the headstones.
Sarah Scoles October 1, 2022
objects of intrigue

How One Tiny Bead Can Reveal A Global History

Hint: There is a laser involved.
Line Sidonie Talla Mafotsing September 30, 2022
Chertsey, England

Blanche Heriot and the Curfew Bell

A statue of the heroine who stopped time to save her betrothed.
Archaeological trenches inside the Old Fort of Stone Town in Zanzibar City reveal a new, longer history of the settlement.
history

The Hidden History of Zanzibar's Stone Town

The settlement is centuries older than historians once believed.
Line Sidonie Talla Mafotsing September 27, 2022
The cookbook on display at the Hungarian Museum of Trade and Tourism.
jewish

One Man's Search for the First Hebrew-Lettered Cookbook

The text is a snapshot of Hungary's Jewish middle class in the mid-1800s.
Sam Lin-Sommer September 26, 2022
Gold miners weren't especially good at baking.
gold rush

San Francisco’s Famous Sourdough Was Once Really Gross

Gold miners made themselves sick on smelly, hard loaves.
Amanda Herbert and David Woodworth September 21, 2022
Gregynog Hall
Tregynon, Wales

Gregynog Hall

A grand mansion in rural mid-Wales gifted to the Welsh people by two sisters.
The Valley of 10,000 Smokes, almost 50 square miles in area, was formed by the 20th century's most powerful volcanic eruption.
King Salmon, Alaska

Valley of 10,000 Smokes

In 1912, this idyllic Alaska landscape was blown apart in the largest volcanic eruption of the 20th century.
Reliquary
London, England

Hand of St. Etheldreda

One of the oldest remaining Catholic churches in England is home to the hand of a 7th-century saint.
A page from a mid-15th century Gutenberg Bible. Gutenberg's famous 42-line bible is known as the earliest book printed using mass-produced moveable metal type in Europe.
science

What Do We Really Know About the History of the Printing Press?

To get the whole story, you'll need a particle accelerator.
Line Sidonie Talla Mafotsing September 16, 2022
objects of intrigue

Was This Letter Written by Sherlock Holmes?

If you are “Playing the Game,” the answer is elementary.
April White September 15, 2022
Pune, India

Vishrambaug Wada

Spread across an area of 20,000 square feet, the grand mansion is a fine example of Peshwa architecture.
Krujë, Albania

Sari Salltik's Shrine

A temple dedicated to the 13th-century Alevi Turkish dervish credited with bringing Islam to the Balkans.
Medford, Massachusetts

Sagamore John Burial Monument

The monument is inscribed, "To Sagamore John and those Mystic Indians Whose Bones Lie Here”.
The Arctic is littered with tiny "islands" that appear and then vanish—for a century, scientists have been trying to figure out why.
maps

In 1931, Scientists Hunted Ghost Islands in the Arctic With a Zeppelin

The recent discovery of the world's northernmost "island" recalls the groundbreaking work of the international Polarfahrt team more than 90 years ago.
Kevin Hamilton September 13, 2022
history

Podcast: Grittiness and Romanticism in New York and Paris

Join us for a daily celebration of the world’s most wondrous, unexpected, even strange places.
The Podcast Team September 13, 2022
Port McNicoll, Ontario

Martyrs' Shrine

Within the church are the relics of the martyrs St. Jean de Brébeuf, St. Gabriel Lalemant, and St. Charles Garnier.