Mushrooms, Lizards, & Elderly Eels: The World's Oldest & Biggest Things...
What's the biggest living thing? What's the oldest? I was considering this the other day, and quickly found myself going head-first into an internet rabbit hole.For the oldest living animals, I was...
View ArticleOur Favorite Scandinavian Yuletide Burning Goat Is Back! Here's a Timeline of...
Everyone's favorite, flammable 40-foot Christmas goat is back! The Gävle Goat is a giant straw Yule Goat constructed each year in Gävle, Sweden, since 1966. Unfortunately, it's also become an annual...
View ArticleHelp Save the World's Rarest Skeletons
Quagga skeleton in the Grant Museum of Zoology (photograph by Emőke Dénes/Wikimedia)London's Grant Museum of Zoology, established in 1828, is home to an incredible range of about 67,000 specimens. Some...
View ArticleWaterfalls Frozen in Time: The Geothermal Beauty of Eight Travertine Terraces
Around the world are waterfalls that seem frozen in time. Known as travertine terraces, these step-like geological formations are the result of thousands of years of the Earth's thermal interior...
View ArticleOne of Seattle's Most Beautiful and Ghostliest Theatres Goes Dark
Harvard Exit Theatre (via Facebook)For decades, the three-story brick building on the corner of Broadway and East Roy in Seattle's Capitol Hill has felt like a portal into the past. Nestled on a...
View ArticleLajedo de Pai Mateus: Brazil's Spherical Boulder Hermit Homes
Sunset at Lajedo de Pai Mateus in Brazil (all photographs by the author)Each winter, tourists flock to northeast Brazil for its white sand and palm-lined beaches alongside turquoise waters. The Sertão,...
View ArticleSecret Rooms in Public Museums: The Hidden Homes of Ancient Erotica, Sacred...
Museum curators and caretakers work hard to make their buildings and collections inviting and accessible, but a lot goes on behind the scenes to keep these cultural edifices running, most of which the...
View ArticleNuclear Vogelsang: The Lost Soviet City Everyone Wants to Disappear
Vogelsang in East Germany (all photographs by the author)Lurking in a Brandenburg forest north of Berlin is a hidden city with a sinister past being quietly erased off the face of the Earth.It's so...
View ArticleThe True Practice of Binding Books in Human Skin
Paul Cézanne, "Still life with skull, candle, and book" (via Wikimedia)There are a few urban legends that poke up here and there that certain libraries — usually dusty, private, or academic ones which...
View ArticleWhimsical Natural Artworks in a French Forest
Sculpture #2 (all photographs by Lionel Bouffier)"My forest work is always ‘discovered,’ either by chance or by word of mouth," sculptor Spencer Byles told us in an email. Drawn to making site-specific...
View ArticleWhimsical Natural Artworks in a French Forest
Sculpture #2 (all photographs by Lionel Bouffier)"My forest work is always ‘discovered,’ either by chance or by word of mouth," sculptor Spencer Byles told us in an email. Drawn to making site-specific...
View ArticleWhimsical Natural Artworks in a French Forest
Sculpture #2 (all photographs by Lionel Bouffier)"My forest work is always ‘discovered,’ either by chance or by word of mouth," sculptor Spencer Byles told us in an email. Drawn to making site-specific...
View ArticleSiberian Permafrost Caves to Preserve a "Noah's Ark" of Rare Seeds
Yakustk Kingdom of Permafrost Tourist Center (photograph by Alex Cheban)Yakutsk, the largest city built on continuous permafrost, is the coldest major city in the world. There are several institutions...
View ArticleNatural Artworks in a French Forest
Sculpture #2 (all photographs by Lionel Bouffier)"My forest work is always ‘discovered,’ either by chance or by word of mouth," sculptor Spencer Byles told us in an email. Drawn to making site-specific...
View ArticleDenmark to Claim Ownership of the North Pole
photograph by Simon / PixabayDespite being 2,000 miles away, Foreign Minister Martin Lidegaard said Denmark will deliver a claim to the North Pole to the United Nations panel that will ultimately...
View ArticleWinter's Effigies: The Deviant History of the Snowman
Dutch queen Wilhemina & princess Juliana as snowpeople in the Netherlands (1913) (via Nationaal Archief)Humans are innately drawn to creating effigies of their own likenesses, often forging the...
View ArticleLife in a Town with a Population of Four
Amboy, California (screenshot from Other America)The town of Amboy, California, was a popular stop on Route 66 during the American roadway's heyday. When the Interstate Highway System put in speedier...
View ArticleWho Owns Lee Harvey Oswald's Coffin?
Lee Harvey Oswald's arrest card (photograph by Heritage Auction Gallery / Wikimedia)Lee Harvey Oswald, the sniper who launched a thousand conspiracy theories, was buried in Rose Hill Cemetery on...
View ArticleA British Tunnel Network Designed to Shelter 60,000 Opens for the First Time...
The Ramsgate Tunnels (all photographs by the author)The Ramsgate Tunnels in England were reopened this May after 75 years of lying dormant. Originally known as the "Tunnel Railway," a narrow gauge...
View ArticleAmerican Ancients: 10 of the United States' Most Intriguing Archaeological...
A centuries-old stone wall, stretching for miles; enormous pictures scratched into the ground of a desert; rocks arranged in a circle. You know what these landmarks are, right? Guess again. Instead of...
View Article
More Pages to Explore .....