Through most of the 20th century, the Barbizon Hotel in Manhattan was a place where single women, mostly those new to New York City, could live in safety. Historian Paulina… Read the rest of the article: Secrets of the world's most famous women-only hotel

Covehithe is a village on the coast of Suffolk in the UK. It's been there a thousand years, but is doomed to be completely washed away by the sea somewhere… Read the rest of the article: The village that will soon crumble into the sea

While it's not true that pasta first came to Italy from China with Marco Polo, it did travel across the world due to its portability. It was in Italy that… Read the rest of the article: The stories behind 15 pasta shapes

It's time to make your predictions for the 2021 men's NCAA basketball tournament! You can get a bracket to fill out here. The tournament bracket is handy for keeping up… Read the rest of the article: The history of the March Madness bracket

Here's a cautionary tale about traveling alone to a country where you don't speak the language. What could possibly go wrong? But it's not a horror story, because instead of… Read the rest of the article: The bizarre tale of the world's last lost tourist

The Malpasset Dam in France was built in the 1950s to regulate the Reyran River, which was dry most of the year, but carried torrents of water in the winter… Read the rest of the article: How a failed dam legalized marrying the dead

In the early part of the 20th century, soda fountains were all the rage. In addition to a place to get tasty refreshments while shopping, a store's soda fountain was… Read the rest of the article: Remembering the golden age of hot sodas

Netflix is testing ways to keep people from using other people's accounts. A few users have been confronted with a prompt to verify their accounts. They are being somewhat soft… Read the rest of the article: Netflix would like you to get your own account

We all know about corsets for women, once a part of everyday life for certain social classes, and now representative of the struggle to appear attractive. But they weren't just… Read the rest of the article: When men wore corsets

When water was often unsafe to drink, people turned to wine. But beer takes a lot less time to make, and is somewhat nutritious besides. Brewing beer is akin to… Read the rest of the article: Women used to dominate the beer industry, so they were burned at the stake

The most notable difference between a Hollywood explosion and a real explosion is that a movie explosion does not kill the protagonist. That's a given. We've seen how our heroes… Read the rest of the article: How movie explosions look so much better than real explosions

Lent is the 40-day period, not including Sundays, leading up to Easter. It is a time of fasting and reflection, and in the Catholic church, part of that fasting means… Read the rest of the article: Why isn't fish considered meat during Lent?

A Japanese research team drilled into the sea floor under 6,000 feet of ocean in the South Pacific Gyre and pulled up sludge that had been sitting there for 100… Read the rest of the article: 100-million-year-old seafloor sediment bacteria have been resuscitated

It's been a year since the Skywalker saga closed for good. The latest Star Wars trilogy grossed $4.5 billion worldwide, outstripping what Disney paid for the franchise, and led to… Read the rest of the article: Post-mortem: the new 'Star Wars' trilogy wasn't worth it

Botanist and geneticist Nikolai Vavilov had a lifelong mission to prevent starvation by improving food production. His native Russia suffered numerous famines under both the tsar and the Soviets. The… Read the rest of the article: A too-typical tragedy of science in the Soviet Union

Don't you just love it when you watch a video for the comedy you expect, and end up learning something neat? In his latest episode of True Facts, Ze Frank… Read the rest of the article: Deception in the rainforest

In 1787, Richard Allen and Absalom Jones founded the Free African Society to support Black Philadelphia residents. Just a few years later in 1793, an epidemic of yellow fever descended… Read the rest of the article: How the politics of race played out during the 1793 yellow fever epidemic

How much of your knowledge of classical music comes from old cartoons? I thought so. Many of us cannot listen to "Ride of the Valkyries" without hearing "kill the wabbit"… Read the rest of the article: In which we learn where "that song" came from

QWOP, arguably the most difficult video game ever, was created by Bennett Foddy in 2008. The point is to control a sprinter with four keys that move his thighs and… Read the rest of the article: Artificial intelligence tries QWOP

By the time bedtime rolls around, parents are exhausted. However, their children do everything in their power to extend the day, which leads to more stress for the entire family.… Read the rest of the article: Six key steps for getting kids to sleep