The Fatal Relationship Between Marvin Gaye and his Disturbed FatherMarvin Gaye’s prolific career spanned over 25 years, from his beginnings in Motown to his evolution to socially-conscious funk, his music soothed the world a...
What happened at AC/DC's first British gigOn April 23, 1976, AC/DC played live in the UK for the first time. Classic Rock's Malcolm Dome was there - The Red Cow was an unpretentious West London booze...
That time when David Bowie and Iggy Pop were caught in a marijuana drug bustWhen looking through famous mugshots, the chances are you’ll have stumbled across David Bowie’s effortlessly stylish picture. It’s enough to make you think a...
Bessie Coleman the first African American, and the first Native American woman pilotBessie Coleman soared across the sky as the first African American, and the first Native American woman pilot. Known for performing flying tricks, Coleman’s ...
That Bonkers Thelonious Monk CoverYou may have wondered about the circumstances of the cover photograph for Thelonious Monk’s 1968 album Underground. As you might imagine, when the recording ...
While His Maniac Brother was Busy Killing Jews, Albert Göring Worked Tirelessly to Save ThemWhat would happen to your family should one of your siblings join a deadly political beast? If you were a member of the Göring family in the first half of th...
Ansel Adams: 10 Things To Know His love of nature was sparked by his native California Born in 1902, Ansel Adams grew up in a house amid the dunes of the Golden Gate — the strait between S...
On This Day In 1980 We Lost BonOn 19th Feb 1980, Bon Scott, singer of AC/DC, was pronounced dead on arrival at a London hospital after a heavy night’s drinking. Scott was found in the pass...
James Dean, Alone in the Rain, in the Middle of Times Square, 1955This image, shot by Dennis Stock in early 1955, shows Dean walking alone in an eerily empty Times Square. It’s a lousy day. Wearing a long, wool coat, hunche...
10 Delightful Icelandic Words and Phrases1. "I COME COMPLETELY FROM THE MOUNTAINS." Ég kem alveg af fjöllum. This phrase throws some shade at mountain dwellers, and means, “I have no idea what you’r...
The Origin of the English Alphabet (and all its 26 letters)The English alphabet has a fascinating history, and the development of each letter of the alphabet has its own story. Although English is widely spoken, for ...
Woody Guthrie’s Doodle-Filled List of 33 New Year’s Resolutions From 1943On January 1, 1943, the American folk music legend Woody Guthrie jotted in his journal a list of 33 “New Years Rulin's." Nowadays, we'd call them New Year's ...
Jonas Salk (1914–1995): A vaccine against polioThose who lived through the 1940s and 1950s will not forget the devastating ravages of poliomyelitis, a spinal cord motor neuron disease caused by the poliov...
Where art thou, Mother Christmas? by Roald DahlIt’s a great shame that Roald Dahl never actually wrote any full-length Christmas stories. The subject is the perfect territory for him. Christmas delivers a...
Illustrations from the Soviet Children’s Book 'Your Name? Robot', by Mikhail Romadin As we approach three full decades of a world without the Soviet Union, certain details about life in the societies that constituted it inevitably begin to fa...
Jane Austin and her use of pins to edit her workThe common consensus is that writers hate editing, but that’s not always the case. Truman Capote once said, “I’m all for the scissors. I believe more in the ...
"It's Just A Ride" - Bill HicksInspiration comes in all shapes and sizes, and today I want to share with you a short 3-minute video clip I watch from time to time. It's called Just a Ride,...
In 1988, Kurt Vonnegut Writes a Letter to People Living in 2088, Giving 7 Pieces of AdviceThe mind of Kurt Vonnegut, like the protagonist of his best-known novel Slaughterhouse-Five, must have got "unstuck in time" somewhere along the line. How e...
The occupation of Alcatraz by Native Americans in 1969On March 8, 1964, a small group of Sioux made landfall on Alcatraz Island, which had been abandoned as a prison the previous year. They invoked the 1851 Tr...
c. 1321-1941Death masks. Faces from beyond the graveGustav Mahler (1860-1911). While decorative funeral masks have been used to adorn the dead since ancient times, from those gracing Tutankhamen to Agamemnon, ...
Farewell, My Dear Brother On October 15th of 1944, with support from Nazi Germany, the far-right Arrow Cross Party took control of Hungary and immediately began to kill large numbers ...
In 1908, racers attempted to drive from New York to Paris in the dead of winter. It got complicated.On the frigid morning of Feb. 12, 1908, a quarter of a million people lined the streets of New York City to witness the start of a contest without precedent:...
Why It Mattered: The Rolling Stones’ ‘Let It Bleed’The album opens with a whisper. Haunting vocals conflate the imagination and inject a certain sense of desperation for what will happen next. This is the fi...
Woody Guthrie, ‘Old Man Trump’ and a Real Estate Empire’s Racist FoundationsIn December 1950, Woody Guthrie signed his name to the lease of a new apartment in Brooklyn. Even now, over half a century later, that uninspiring document p...