Articles

Timber beams extend through a wall of Pueblo Bonito, the largest of the Great Houses in Chaco Canyon.

Where Did Chaco Canyon's Timber Come From?

In a nearly treeless desert, Ancestral Puebloans built Great Houses with more than 200,000 massive log beams

Americans will have a few extra days to file their taxes this year.

Why Is Tax Day in April?

These are the reasons behind the timing of many Americans' least favorite holiday

One-third of the world’s population can’t see the starry band of light in the night sky that makes up the Milky Way (above). The new show “Lights Out: Recovering Our Night Sky” at the National Museum of Natural History looks at the devastating impacts of artificial light.

Planet Positive

Why It’s Time for a Worldwide Lights-Out Program

A new Smithsonian exhibition delves into the issue of light pollution, with easy solutions offering an immediate change

Ravens prey on juvenile desert tortoises.

For Young Threatened Desert Tortoises, These Technologies Have Arrived to Help

Biologists are deploying 3D-printed replicas of hatchlings, lasers and drones to curb predation

The heist seemed like a mystery that would never be solved—until a deathbed confession by a career criminal led to the recovery of almost all of the missing timepieces.

The Time Thief Who Stole 106 Rare Clocks in a Daring Heist

Authorities eventually recovered 96 of the lost timepieces, including a $30 million watch commissioned for Marie Antoinette

The Smithsonian's podcast Sidedoor uncovers the climate change insights hidden in old paintings (above: Shivalal, Maharana Fateh Singh Crossing a River During the Monsoon (detail), c. 1893).

What Centuries-Old Indian Court Paintings Tell Us About Climate Change

This month’s Smithsonian podcasts include a deep dive into India’s monsoon weather patterns and discussion of animals in flight

The critically endangered ‘akē‘akē (the Hawaiian name for the band-rumped storm petrel) is one of the species that could benefit from rat-free habitat on Lehua Island, Hawai‘i.

This Tiny Hawaiian Island Is Free of Invasive Rats

Now scientists are trying to coax back lost seabird colonies

Darcelle XV, Portland, Oregon, 2019

LGBTQ+ Pride

The 92-Year-Old Queen Who Shaped the History and Future of Drag

Darcelle XV, the world’s oldest performing drag queen, died in March, but her spirit will live on

The fossil of Icaronycteris gunnelli

Paleontologists Discover 52-Million-Year-Old Bat

The fossil represents the earliest-known species of the flying mammal

The tightly stacked dwellings of Corippo are so close together they appear two-dimensional. 

How Alberghi Diffusi Turn Villages Into Hotels

Originating in Italy, "scattered hotels" turn alleyways into hallways and piazzas into living rooms

Halle Bailey as Ariel in Disney's live-action The Little Mermaid.

'The Little Mermaid' Has Been Subverting Expectations for Decades

The 1989 Disney movie musical may have saved the Disney corporation, but it also sent important messages about identity to its young audiences

Candy Wrapper Museum curator Darlene Lacey was 15 when she started collecting for her "roadside attraction." Building the online museum has led to all kinds of surprises—including being sent a Necco scrapbook saved from a dumpster (pictured above).

Take a Peek Inside the Candy Wrapper Museum

Your trash is my treasure—and a sweet reminder of the past

A hand-colored 1892 print of the Battle of Fort Pillow

At Fort Pillow, Confederates Massacred Black Soldiers After They Surrendered

Targeted even when unarmed, around 70 percent of the Black Union troops who fought in the 1864 battle died as a result of the clash

A candlelit dinner in Scandinavia

Mimi Sheraton’s 10 Most Memorable Meals

From dinner by candlelight in Denmark to Peking duck in China, the celebrated food critic reveals her most memorable culinary experiences

The total solar eclipse of 2017 as seen from Monmouth, Oregon

Everything You Need to Know About the 2024 Total Solar Eclipse

A veteran eclipse chaser explains how to get ready for one of the planet’s biggest celestial events

A revolutionary new tool, a collaboration between the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory and NASA, will monitor the chemistry and changing dynamics of major pollutants (above: an Arizona power generating station).

This Eye in the Sky Promises Major Insights Into the Air We Breathe

The satellite mission TEMPO will detect pollutants at a neighborhood scale across the nation

Tens of thousands of people in the United States may be connected to this album, which museum officials say offers an "unprecedented opportunity for people of mixed heritage, especially, to access never-before-seen ancestral portraits."

Find Out If Your Ancestor Is Among These 19th-Century Silhouettes in This Newly Digitized Collection

The itinerant artist William Bache’s portraits are contaminated by arsenic, but now the National Portrait Gallery offers easy access

Julius and Leni Löwin, a Jewish couple who met in Oberstdorf, with World War I hero Ernst Jünger

How the Nazi Regime Upended the Lives of These Bavarian Villagers

A new book draws on long-overlooked sources to chronicle how Oberstdorf's residents navigated the rise—and dictatorship—of Adolf Hitler

Xander Bogaerts hits his first home run with his new team, the San Diego Padres, at Petco Park in San Diego on April 1, 2023. 

Climate Change Is Making Home Runs Easier to Hit

A new study attributes more than 500 homers since 2010 to increased global average temperatures, an effect that will only increase the hotter Earth gets

In 1804, jurors in New Jersey indicted Vice President Aaron Burr for killing Alexander Hamilton in a duel. Burr’s friends persuaded state officials to drop the charges, but their success had nothing to do with any immunity that Burr enjoyed as an executive officer.

What the Nation's Founders Said About the Indictment of a Former President

Alexander Hamilton wrote that a commander in chief removed from office would be "liable to prosecution and punishment"

Page 33 of 1261