Valentine's Day | History
Adults History
How did St. Valentine become associated with love and romance? Get the full story behind the holiday.
A brief history of numerical systems
Adults History
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9... and 0. With just these ten symbols, we can write any rational number imaginable. But why these particular symbols? Why ten of them?
Google Timelapse Walks You Through Decades of Change in Seconds
Adults History
Three decades of change in five seconds.
Pigeon Story: How the Rock Dove Became the Sky Rat
Adults History
How the pigeon became known as the sky rat.
What the Fahrenheit?!
Adults History
The crazy story of the arbitrary temperature scale used in a tiny minority of countries.
The secrets of Mozart's "Magic Flute" - Joshua Borths
Adults History
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's "Die Zauberflöte" ("The Magic Flute") is widely regarded as one of the most influential operas in history.
Why do we feel nostalgia?
Adults History
Nostalgia was once considered an illness confined to specific groups of people. Today, people all over the world report experiencing and enjoying nostalgia. But how does nostalgia work? And is it healthy? Clay Routledge details the way our understanding of nostalgia has changed since the term was first coined in the late 17th century.
The Surprising Origin of Thanksgiving Foods
Adults History
I'm thankful for science. And also pie.
How the sandwich was invented
Adults History
Today, it is estimated that 50% of Americans eat at least one sandwich every day. And while it's all but impossible to imagine a world without them, sandwiches have only been around since 1762.
Plato's best (and worst) ideas
Adults History
Few individuals have influenced the world and many of today's thinkers like Plato. He created the first Western university and was teacher to Ancient Greece's greatest minds, including Aristotle.
How much of human history is on the bottom of the ocean?
Adults History
Sunken relics, ghostly shipwrecks, and lost cities aren't just wonders found in fictional adventures. Beneath the ocean's surface, there are ruins where people once roamed and shipwrecks loaded with artifacts from another time.
How coffee got quicker
Adults History
For the 64% of Americans that drink coffee daily, an expedient cup is practically essential. But preparing coffee hasn't always been easy.
Real life sunken cities
Adults History
Though people are most familiar with Plato's fictional Atlantis, many real underwater cities actually exist. Peter Campbell explains how sunken cities are studied by scientists to help us understand the lives of our ancestors, the dynamic nature of our planet, and the impact of each on the other.
Why the metric system matters
Adults History
For the majority of recorded human history, units like the weight of a grain or the length of a hand weren't exact and varied from place to place.
Why Salt & Pepper?
Adults History
They sit with us at every meal, but why?
Rosalind Franklin: DNA's unsung hero - Claudio L. Guerra
Adults History
The discovery of the structure of DNA was one of the most important scientific achievements in human history.
How North America got its shape
Adults History
North America didn't always have its familiar shape, nor its famed mountains, canyons, and plains: all of that was once contained in an unrecognizable mass, buried deep in Rodinia, a huge supercontinent that lay on the face of the Earth.
What Happened Before History? Human Origins
Adults History
Humans. We have been around for a while now. When we think about our past we think about ancient civilizations, the pyramids, stuff like that. But this is only a tiny, tiny part of our history.
Celsius Didn't Invent Celsius
Adults History
Celsius never devised nor used the scale that now bears his name.
Did The Past Really Happen? Vsauce
Adults History
Greece is full of wonderful new things and wonderful old things. But when WE become old things, will our ruins also be tourist attractions?
A History of Pizza in 8 Slices
Adults History
Pizza might be an Italian invention, but it is a worldwide phenomenon. Pizza has managed to evolve from a simple, rustic food item to something much more impactful.