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History

A collection of 249 issues

Tipping U.S.A.

We like quirky little history lessons of obscure subjects. This is an excellent example: > Restaurant workers in the United States make more than twenty-five billion dollars a year in tips, so it's natural that people think of the custom as quintessentially American. But it wasn't

Spiritualism and ID Today

John Mark Reynolds recounts the rise and fall of spiritualism in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He uses the narrative to draw parallels to today's Intelligent Design movement. The parallels seem stretched, and we suspect he does no favors to the ID movement by comparing it to

Crack and Meth Not Revisited

Frustrating piece at Slate this week about the meth problem. It's frustrating because the writer has a good article idea, but then he blows it. He draws parallels between the crack cocaine scare of the 1980s with today's methamphetamine panic. He basically says, "meth is

Strange Deaths

From The Know-It-All by A.J. Jacobs, p. 284: > I've read about blues singer Robert Johnson, who died after drinking strychnine-laced whiskey in a juke joint. And Marie Blanchard, an aviation pioneer who died when her hot air balloon was set ablaze by fireworks. Explorer David Livingstone

Happy Big 7-0-0, Wallace

> Today is the 700th anniversary [http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,1554805,00.html] of Scottish hero William Wallace [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Wallace] being gruesomely killed in Smithfield market in the City of London. > There are a series of memorial events

Life in the 1500s

There is apparently an e-mail letter touring cyberspace that tells outlandish lies about life in the Middle Ages. It identifies the 1500s as the Middle Ages, which is ridiculous, but no matter. An expert on the Middle Ages sent us this antidote (along with a disclaimer to the effect that,

The Early Moviegoing Experience

From David Thomson's The Whole Equation (2004), p. 62. > Nickelodeons got their product from local exchanges, and there was a ravenous demand for fresh material. Louis B. Mayer knew the risk in having nothing new to show. The business was chronically unstable, vulnerable locally to gangsterism. The

Double Deaths

Two music legends died this week: > 1938, the legendary Robert Johnson dies in Greenwood, Mississippi ... Johnson's moonshine had been poisoned days earlier ... known for his womanizing, the murderer was presumed to be the angered spouse of one of his paramours ... it was rumored that Johnson's

Thinking About the Taj Mahal

Eric Schwappach at The American Thinker brings this controversy to our attention. Link [http://americanthinker.com/comments.php?comments_id=2859]. Excerpt: > Controversy surrounds the Taj Mahal. This recent dispute pitted a Muslim trust which claims Islamic ownership of the great Mogul monument against the Indian government, which asserts

St. Petersburg

The incorrigible yet talented Christopher Hitchens has written a beautiful piece about St. Petersburg's history and nights. Link [http://www.vanityfair.com/commentary/content/articles/050725roco02]. Excerpts: > The city is so utterly classical, with its piazzas and canals and bridges and fortresses and cathedrals, that it doesn&