The World Health Organization has had an official and recommended method of hand-washing since 2009. It’s an 11-step process that, all done properly, takes 42.5 seconds. The WHO is following in an age-old practice — it was a doctor from Hungary, Ignaz Semm…
Decades after her death, Eva Braun, the long-time mistress of Adolf Hitler, remains a mysterious and notorious figure. This is the photographic life story of a woman who met Hitler as a teenager and, in the last days of the war, became the Führer’s wife—on…
Following World War II, pressures to recognize, challenge, and change inequalities for minorities grew. One of the most notable challenges to the status quo was the 1954 landmark Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas which que…
On April 9, 1940, Germany simultaneously invaded Norway and occupied Denmark, and the war began in earnest. On May 10, German forces swept through Belgium and the Netherlands in what became known as “blitzkrieg,” or lightning war. Three days later, Hitl…
Before the advent of AutoCAD and other drafting software, engineering drawings were made on sheets of large paper using drawing boards. Many types of equipment were required to complete a given drawing, such as drawing board, different grade pencils, er…
TIME magazine decided to create a list of the 100 most influential pictures ever taken. They teamed up with curators, historians, photo editors, and famous photographers around the world for this task. "No formula makes for iconic photos," the editors said. …
These photos picture the overflow filling facility that the FBI’s Identification Division started using during World War II for the purposes of clearance needs of the armed services. The building is the DC Armory, a multi-use arena facility — and someti…
In jails and prisons around the world, tattoos can become a significant part of an inmate's uniform, not only marking the crime they're in for but also serving as a way to communicate with others. Arkady Bronnikov, regarded as Russia's leading expert on…
In 1966, Italy was rocked by one woman’s courageous efforts to challenge the country’s treatment of rape victims — the lessons of which are sadly still relevant. Franca Viola became the first Italian woman to refuse a "rehabilitating marriage" ("matrimo…
From January 1918 to December 1920, a deadly influenza outbreak infected 500 million people across the world. Estimates suggest between 50 and 100 million people died from the virus, in other words, up to 5% of the planet's population. It killed more peopl…
These photographs, taken for LIFE magazine in the fall of 1969, explored the "freaky new freedoms" of fashion seen on high school students across the United States. Some of the women show the strong influence of the “hippie” movement—long hair, beads, f…
In 1908, the National Child Labor Committee hired Lewis Hine, a New York sociologist, and photographer, to document the exploitative working conditions of child laborers in dozens of occupations, from mining and manufacturing to farming and newspaper selli…
On September 1, 1939, the world was shocked as Nazi troops invaded Poland. Tensions soared in Europe, and world leaders recognized that this invasion could be the final straw that would lead to war. German military leaders had begun planning for war with P…
Hollywood sex symbol Marilyn Monroe had her fair share of lovers, none of them stuck around long. She was divorced three times before dying of an overdose at age 36 in 1962. Marilyn's first husband was James Dougherty, a Los Angeles police officer. They…
In 1920, a group of revolutionary socialists attended a meeting at the Cannon Street Hotel in London. The men and women were members of various political groups including the British Socialist Party (BSP), the Socialist Labour Party (SLP), Prohibition and …
The history of medicine is filled with wild stories of bizarre treatments methods and medical procedures that aimed to make people feel better. Some of the stranger treatments of old-time medicine would turn out to be useful; while cautery—heating an ir…
Long before the age of computerized printing presses and journalists being able to file stories via computer, the process of creating the day’s newspaper was a much more arduous, hand-made process. In September 1942, Office of War Information photograph…
John F. Kennedy was born into a rich, politically connected Boston family of Irish-Catholics. He and his eight siblings enjoyed a privileged childhood of elite private schools, sailboats, servants, and summer homes. During his childhood and youth, "Jack…
In the spring of 1906 San Francisco was a city boasting 410,000 inhabitants — a world-class metropolis whose citizens, at the dawn of a new century, looked forward with a sense of civic pride and growing confidence. San Francisco’s very existence was th…
Isolation was a long American tradition. Since the days of George Washington, Americans struggled to remain protected by the mighty oceans on its border. When European conflicts erupted, as they frequently did, many in the United States claimed exceptionalism.…