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Get Inspired By History’s Most Scandalous and Stunning Costumes
Have you picked your Halloween costume yet?
There’s still time, especially if you’re willing to brave the crowded, rubber mask–scented aisles of a costume store. There’s the standard witch hats and skeleton suits, tiny princess and superhero costumes for children, and supplies to dress as whatever’s in the pop-culture water. I imagine that this year, in 2024, we’ll be seeing a lot of Beetlejuices and Rayguns.
On the higher end, celebrities don’t hit up Spirit Halloween for their costumes. Thin
Lake Chelan in Washington
Lake Chelan invites superlatives. It is extraordinarily narrow: it extends over 50 miles into the heart of the Cascade Range, but averages only a bit more than a mile wide. It is the deepest lake in Washington (and the third-deepest in the United States) at 1,486 feet, behind only Crater Lake in Oregon (1,949 feet) and Lake Tahoe between California and Nevada (1,645 feet). It sits in a glacially carved valley, oversteepened by the glaciation, such that not only are the slopes extremely steep bu
Nankoweap Granaries in North Rim, Arizona
Seven hundred feet above the banks of the Colorado River, hikers can find what looks like a collection of square windows cut into the sandstone. The carvings were made around the year 1100 by the Ancestral Puebloan people. The cutouts served as grain storage facilities that were designed to be sealed, protecting food stores from seasonal flooding, rodents, and insects.
The ruins are most easily accessed from the Colorado River, at a beach 53 miles downstream from Lee’s Ferry. Once there, it is
'Diwalloween' Means Lights, Sweets, and Spooky Treats
This article is adapted from the October 26, 2024, edition of Gastro Obscura’s Favorite Things newsletter. You can sign up here.
Throughout my 20s, I hosted an annual birthday costume party with a different theme each year. The theme for my 21st was, of course, alcohol: I glued crystals to my face and went as Bombay Sapphire. But as my interest in food grew over time, the focus of my parties shifted from the costumes to the menu, and I stopped limiting myself to just my birthday. Last year, I p
St. Olave's Priory in St Olaves, England
Founded in 1216, St. Olave’s Priory was dedicated to St. Olav, the patron saint of Norway, which is unusual for religious sites in England. The priory was established by a local nobleman named Roger Fitz-Osbert to create a community for Augustinian Canons, who focused on both worship and helping the local area.
Today, the ruins of St. Olave’s Priory are all that remains of what was once a busy religious community. The most notable part still standing is the gatehouse, built in the 14th century
Les Cinq Tombes (The Five Graves) in Geer, Belgium
Situated between the cities of Liège and Brussels sits Omal, a small Hesbaye village which is intersected by the Roman road Boulogne-Bavay-Cologne. Driving along the street, it is nearly impossible to miss the burial mounds, called tumuli, on either side. The collection is referred to as "The Five Tombs," and is thought to date back to the second or third century.
Though there are forty or so tumuli sites in the Hesbaye—the natural region where almost all the tumuli in Belgium are located—thes
Tomizawa Site (Underground Forest Museum) in Sendai, Japan
In 1987-1988, an archaeological dig was undertaken at the Tomizawa site in Sendai as a preliminary inspection for the construction of an elementary school. It had been long known as the site of a prehistoric settlement, but no one expected to find what was buried underneath: a fossilized 20,000-year-old forest.
In favor of this unique archaeological site like no other, the construction project was immediately dropped and moved elsewhere. In 1996, the Sendai City Tomizawa Site Museum—commonly k
Ancient Melancholy Man in London, England
Among London’s oldest statues, the origins of some are very well known, such as the statue of Queen Elizabeth I outside St. Duncan-in-the-West on Fleet Street, while the origins of others are unclear, such as the lower half of the statue of Alfred the Great in Southwark.
The statue called the Ancient Melancholy Man in Holland Park falls within the category of statues with unknown origins. The approximately 180-centimeter-tall limestone statue depicts an indistinct bearded man with a cloak and
The Startling History of the Jump Scare
One of the most iconic moments in Brian De Palma’s 1976 movie Carrie comes right before the credits roll. By now the titular Carrie is dead, having massacred her high school bullies, stabbed her abusive mother, and destroyed her family home with herself inside. After the dust settles, we cut to a dream sequence with the sole survivor of this killing spree, a teenager named Sue.
For more than a minute, the camera lingers on Sue approaching the site of Carrie’s death and then laying down a bunch
How a Newspaper Revolution Led to the 'Wide Awakes'—and the Civil War
This story was originally published on The Conversation. It appears here under a Creative Commons license.
There’s one question I get every time I give a talk. I’m a curator of political history at the Smithsonian Institution, and when I discuss the deep history of political division in our country, someone in the audience always asserts that we can’t possibly compare past divisions to the present, because our media landscape is doing unprecedented harm, unlike anything seen in the past.
I
7 Stories of Ghosts in Weird Places
In countless tales of terror and other stories we tell to scare ourselves, ghosts usually haunt abandoned buildings or float through cemeteries—but why wouldn't they linger in everyday places too? From a post office to a margarita bar, spirits don't discriminate what they populate.
Here are some of our favorite stories of ghosts taking up residence in surprising spots, from lighthouses and grocery stores to dollhouses and town halls. These hauntings aren't always about apparitions, however. Sur
Pink Muhly Grass in Gyeongju, South Korea
When fall arrives in South Korea, it brings with it not just fiery reds and russets on tree leaves, but also carpets of an unusual pink grass known as muhly. The delicate flowers of this hardy plant bloom in fluffy clumps when the weather begins cool, giving the grass its famed pink (and occasionally, purple) hue.
Pink muhly grass (botanical name Muhlenbergia capillaris) is not native to this region, but was brought in from the United States, where, interestingly enough, it has been declared
Kokkala Gorge in Shayyr, Kazakhstan
The remote gorge of Kokkala dates as far back as the Jurassic era. Located in the Mangystau region of Kazakhstan, this landscape is the result of shifting tectonic plates, which hoisted layers of colorful limestone and clay sediments out into the open. The result was a prehistoric tableau with origins from a lost world.
You won't find bones here, but the rocks are infused with ancient wood and coal deposits originating from the days of the dinosaurs. The textures of the rocks are variegated a
Pentidattilo in Pentidattilo, Italy
The ghost town of Pentidattilo sits on the southern end of Calabria, at the edge of the Aspromonte Mountains. It was first settled back in the seventh century BC, and built underneath a big hand-shaped rock—the name derives from the Greek words penta and daktylos, or "five fingers."
Many legends have been linked to this strange place, but one of the most famous is that of a 17th-century murder. The tale tells of two noble families: the Alberti family of Pentedattilo and the Abenavoli family fr
Gollenstein in Blieskastel, Germany
Standing at 6.85 meters high, this menhir, or "standing stone," is the largest of its kind in Central Europe. The sandstone monolith is thought to date back at least 4,000 years, placing it around the end of the Neolithic period.
Although the exact origins are murky, it is believed to have been erected by a prehistoric ancestor cult. In the early 1800s, Christians chiseled a cross into the stone, thereby appropriating a pagan object of worship.
The Gollenstein stood undisturbed at the top of
Aktau Mountains in Kazakhstan
Occupying a swathe of desert that was an ancient ocean floor over 400 million years ago, the Aktau Mountains in Kazakhstan's Altyn Emel National Park were ravaged by millennia of tectonic shifts and battering from the elements. What remains are silver flat-topped mountains shaded in gradations of white, their ashy crags dropping off vertically at the sides where bone-dust scree crumbles into the crevices below like snowdrifts. The Aktau, meaning “white mountains” in Kazakh, derive their name fr
Ybykty Canyon in Koyulus, Kazakhstan
This ancient limestone canyon in Kazakhstan's Mangystau region has features that evoke imaginative comparisons, from porous white chocolate to a bleached coral reef. The canyon walls are etched with lattice rock in a honeycomb symmetry, the texture like a bare skeleton in places where the white sand has hardened into bone. The sea creatures, plant life, and minerals that comprise the canyon were deposited here over 40 million years ago when these lands were submerged under the long-gone Tethys
Finneas Talks Billie Eilish and New Music | Explain This | Esquire
Finneas explains to us the origins of his career and how writing songs for his sister Billie Eilish changed both of their lives. He takes us through the writing process of his new album "For Crying' Out Loud" and how it's differed from past albums, working with Billie or other artists, or writing for a soundtrack like James Bond or Barbie. Plus, he talks about some iconic moments of his career like hanging out with Joe Biden at the White House or QuestLove seeming to flip him off. Wat
Loja Monstra in São Paulo, Brazil
Raised from the ashes where the classic comic book store Gibiteria once stood, Loja Monstra opened in 2018 and offers a wide range of comics, from weird independent comics to the most classical and famous ones. This place is not only a shop but also a meeting point where every once in a while they host meet and greets with illustrators and authors, among other cultural events.
The shop has a unique look with pop culture references from B-Movies to 60s monsters, with paintings on the wall and w
Iglesia El Rosario in San Salvador, El Salvador
Completed in 1971, Iglesia El Rosario is considered one of the finest examples of modern architecture in El Salvador. Sculptor Rubén Martínez created the plans for this radically avant-garde cathedral in just six days. The structure, which abandons many of the traditional hallmarks of a basilica, was both so important and controversial in its time that Pope John XXIII himself came from Rome to oversee part of the construction.
The Brutalist concrete facade conceals a dazzling rainbow of staine