History
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Jodorowsky's 'Dune' Was the Greatest Sci-Fi Film Never Made
Emma M. | Tuesday, Jun 9, 2015
On today’s episode of Modern Notion Daily, director Frank Pavich joins us to talk about his 2013 documentary, Jodorowsky’s Dune. Alejandro Jodorowsky is an avant-garde filmmaker who plann...
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The Happiest (and Actually True) Gladiator Story There Ever Was
Jes G. | Tuesday, Jun 9, 2015
On the opening day of the Colosseum in 80 A.D., two conscripted gladiators entered the arena fully anticipating they could exit in defeat or even as a corpse. Instead, an incredibly rare...
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Charlie Chaplin's Proclivity for Underage Girls and the Scandal That Almost Took Him Down
Erin B. | Monday, Jun 8, 2015
Charlie Chaplin was on top of the world—and his game (a biographer writes that he once claimed to have slept with 2,000 women during his lifetime). But then it all almost came crashing do...
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The Bathing Machine Was Victorian England’s Answer to Averted Eyes
Erin B. | Friday, Jun 5, 2015
It’s a crowded day on the beach, and you just want to get your swim on. What’s a girl to do? In modern times, she’s likely to throw on a bathing suit and go for a swim. But things were a...
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Was Lavinia Fisher Really America's First Female Serial Killer?
Stephanie W. | Tuesday, Jun 2, 2015
Lavinia Fisher is credited as being America’s first female serial killer. She and her husband John owned an inn where people checked in and often did not check out. The legends about Lavi...
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Betsy Ross Probably Didn’t Sew the First American Flag but She Did Something Way Cooler
Erin B. | Friday, May 29, 2015
In 1776, George Washington visited a young woman named Betsy Ross and charged her with making the first American flag. Or so the story goes—in fact, it seems that this legendary act of pa...
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How Narcolepsy Drove Harriet Tubman to Free Slaves
Emma B. | Friday, May 29, 2015
For the last few months, an organization called Women on 20s has been waging a political battle, rallying to get the government to put a woman’s face on paper currency—something that’s be...
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How a Female Navy Admiral Helped Prepare Computers for the Masses
Erin B. | Monday, May 18, 2015
Navy Admiral. Programming genius. Force of nature. Grace Murray Hopper wasn’t just a groundbreaking figure in the history of computer science—she’s credited with helping computers go main...
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The 'Codex Gigas': A Bible Co-Written with the Devil
Jes G. | Friday, May 15, 2015
The Codex Gigas, or The Devil’s Bible, is the largest surviving medieval book. Written in the first half of the 13th century, the volume weighs about 165 pounds, has 620 pages, mea...
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Why Plague Doctors Wore Such a Terrifying Suit
Josh H. | Thursday, May 14, 2015
During the mid-1300s, the Black Death was responsible for the killing over 25 million people throughout Europe and Asia. With so many people sick and dying, doctors had to invent some sor...
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That Time Sweden and Russia Almost Went to War Over Fish Farts
Kristen M. | Tuesday, May 12, 2015
On October 27, 1981, a Whiskey-class Soviet submarine, U 137, zigged when it should have zagged and ended up running aground in Swedish waters. But why were they in Swedish territory in t...
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The Navy Once Built a Battleship in the Heart of New York City
Jes G. | Monday, May 11, 2015
When the U.S. entered World War I in 1917, the Navy only had about 75,000 enlisted sailors. So the government set out on a full-scale campaign to increase their troop numbers so they coul...
