Tech News

Ring-Tab Beer Cans Now Count as Historic Artifacts

Today’s junk can be tomorrow’s history. Now, fifty years after it was first introduced, the ring-tab beer can can already considered an historic artifact. Archaeology site Western Digs explains that the humble ring-tab design has passed the 50-year threshold after which it is eligible to be recorded as an archaeological find. “This means that even … Continued

Tech News

A 250-Year-Old Clock Claimed A World Record (And Vindicated Its Maker)

Shortly before his death in 1776, eccentric British clock-maker John Harrison claimed to have designed the ‘perfect’ clock, one that would keep time flawlessly. His rivals and peers wrote it off as the boastings of a bitter, 80-year-old failure — but in modern-day light, Harrison has finally been proved right. Back in the 18th century, … Continued

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The Strange, Bitter 19th Century Debate Over Where Toledo Was

From our smug (though extremely temporary) perch atop history, we can safely say that we know exactly where the U.S. city of Toledo is: It’s in Ohio, of course. But in the 1800s, the answer wasn’t so easy — and the resulting battle was incredibly bitter. Michigan and Ohio share a border and in 1800s … Continued

Tech News

Start the Season With This Historic Cocktail From Baseball’s Heyday

The start of this year’s Major League Baseball season is finally underway. That means sunny weather, high tech stadiums, and if you’re lucky, some really exciting games. It’s also a great time to read up on baseball history—ideally with a cocktail in hand. Last baseball season, I got a little bit lost in various bits … Continued

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Grim Discovery Confirms Cannibalism Among Early Britons

A recent analysis of human-chewed remains has provided some of the most compelling evidence to date that ice age Britons engaged in cannibalistic practices. Scientists from the Natural History Museum, University College London, with the help of specialists from several Spanish universities, have discovered the presence of human tooth-marks on human bones recovered from Gough’s … Continued

Tech News

Does Preserving the Past Keep Cities From Moving Into the Future?

In the last 50 years, the preservationist movement has become powerful—maybe too powerful in a place like New York City, where a third of the buildings are now protected. But the buildings we think of today as landmarks inevitably replaced older structures, ones we tend to forget were demolished in the path towards progress. This … Continued

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Radioactive WWII Aircraft Carrier Found Off The California Coast

The USS Independence — a World War II-era aircraft carrier — has been found in 2,600 feet of water off the coast of California’s Farallon Islands. Surprisingly intact after 64 years, it was exposed to atomic blasts during the Bikini Atoll tests until it was deliberately sunk in 1951. The newly completed survey of the … Continued

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How Lord Byron’s Scandals Led Ada Lovelace To Become A Mathematician

Ada Lovelace is now most famously known as the mother of computer science, but during her lifetime, she was also well known on account of her famous father: Lord Byron. Although Ada never met her father, his scandalous behavior had a profound effect on how she was raised — on a strict diet of mathematics. … Continued

Tech News

Abraham Lincoln Autopsy Notes Reveal The Horror Of An Assassin’s Gunshot

The Fenimore Art Museum in Cooperstown, NY just opened a new installation, “Autopsy for a Nation: The Death of Abraham Lincoln,” marking the 150th anniversary of Lincoln’s assassination. The exhibit’s key items include handwritten notes by the physicians who conducted the President’s autopsy. Lincoln was shot April 14, 1865 by John Wilkes Booth while watching … Continued

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The Dark Truth Behind California’s Strangest Tax Exemption

One of the very few interesting things about doing your taxes is reading about the odd exemptions. This year I learned that the government can’t claim any money I should get from the Ottoman Empire. It seemed funny. It’s not. There are lots of weird exemptions you can get from California; for instance, the state … Continued

ScienceSpace & Spaceflight

That Time the US Accidentally Nuked Britain’s First Satellite

When it comes to nations with a long and rich history of space travel and exploration, Britain isn’t normally a country that comes to most people’s minds. However, they were the third country in the world to operate a satellite in orbit. It’s just a shame America ended up accidentally killing it just a few … Continued

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Tell Us The Strangest Story Hidden In The Map Of Your Local Area

Maps are more than just instructions on how to get someplace, they’re also historical snapshots of what was going on when they were drawn — and they’re often very, very weird. Today, we want to know a few of the stories hidden behind the latitude and longitude of where you are. Maybe it’s the story … Continued

Tech News

How the Quest for a Perfectly Rational Calendar Created a 13th Month

A month is hardly a unit of measurement. It can start on any day of the week and last anywhere from 28 to 31 days. Sometimes a month is four weeks long, sometimes five, sometimes six. You have to buy a new calendar with new dates every single year. It’s a strange design. The calendar … Continued

Tech News

Peer Inside the X-Ray Scan of a Creature Millions of Years Old

How do you work out if a creature that’s only preserved as rock sank or swam? You create a complex 3D model of its stricture using X-rays is how. This image shows a 3D model of an ammonite—a kind of creature that lived in the sea up to 65 million years ago—created using a series … Continued

Tech News

Alan Turing’s Hidden Manuscript Just Sold For $1 Million

Alan Turing, Engima-breaking mathematician and Benedict Cumberbatch lookalike, never wrote much during his life — manuscripts and diaries are hard to come by. The best remaining example was a 56-page notebook working on “the foundations of computer science”, which just sold at auction for $1,025,000. The original Bonhams press release on the auction boasted a … Continued

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The Checklist Of What Had To Go Wrong For Apollo 13 To Fail Is Insane

Apollo 13 is often called a “successful failure” because of the way NASA managed to turn the situation around and successfully bring the astronauts home. But just how did the failure happen in the first place? Through a perfect storm of incredibly unlikely, but aligned, events. Commenter Spaceman3k set out the whole sequence — which … Continued

Tech News

Why Gas Is Priced in Tenths of Cents

The practice of pricing fuel with a fraction of a penny is thought to have started around the 1930s. While we can’t be sure who was the first to price fuel this way, it seems to have become relatively commonplace across the United States all the sudden around the same time. So what happened? In … Continued

Tech News

The First Photo Was Faked 150 Years Before Photoshop Existed

Not gonna lie, I rejoice in demonizing Photoshop for its role in spreading visual lies and viral fakeage. But pinning the blame solely on Photoshop is misplaced: Manipulating photos didn’t start with the digital era; the first faked photo dates back to the mid-1800s. New Statesman chronicles the history of fake or tampered images, which … Continued

Tech News

Nearly 200 Years Ago, Awful Crimes Were Committed In This Lovely House

New Orleans visitors interested in macabre history are required to pass by the LaLaurie Mansion, located at 1140 Royal Street. Its genteel exterior masks its horrifying history, revealed 181 years ago today when a fateful fire broke out and the secrets within its walls were unleashed. As the History Channel reports, the source of the … Continued

io9Television

Why the Hell Can’t I Watch Murphy Brown Online?

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer saysthat without the 1990s TV series Murphy Brown to inspire her, she wouldn’t have gotten where she is today. The show was so influential that Vice President Dan Quayle turned the main character, played by Candice Bergen, into a political meme. And yet this series isn’t available anywhere online. In her … Continued