Stream of Reading (Prepare to be Forwarded) – An Archive of What I'm Reading
Catch The Sun Amid recent (depressing) revelations that some cheap calculators have fake solar cells on them, a short history of real solar cells on calculators. Recently, a video has been making the rounds online that highlights a stunning fact: We so expect cheap calculators to have solar charging capabilities that manufacturers will go to…
In the spring of 1990, after he had helped the first George Bush reach the presidency, the political consultant Lee Atwater learned that he was dying. Atwater, who had just turned 39 and was the head of the Republican National Committee, had suffered a seizure while at a political fund-raising breakfast and had been diagnosed with…
CreditCreditMatt Chase “White men,” an obscure Australian academic named Charles Henry Pearson predicted in his 1893 book “National Life and Character: A Forecast,” would be “elbowed and hustled, and perhaps even thrust aside” by people they had long regarded as their inferiors — “black and yellow races.” China, in particular, would be a major threat….
The story of the plastic bag—the kind that is so ubiquitous in grocery stores, in gutters, in the branches of trees—is a story of persuasion, one that began with a battle between paper and plastic in the hearts of the American people. “People are fond of the old paper bag,” Peter Bunten explained to the…
Has Chris Mays gone the way of the dinosaur? The whereabouts of the man who helped bring life-size, robotic dinos to malls, museums, zoos and aquariums around the country is unknown. The company he co-founded in 1982, Dinamation International Corp., is in precarious straits. As for its 600 robots, 23 are currently on display at…
The Agony Of Repeat The tale of a guy who became famous for falling down once, only to have that fall replayed every single week on a legendary American TV show. Today in Tedium: I have fond memories of America’s Funniest Home Videos, particularly the early years hosted by Bob Saget. It was a show…
The members of the rock/new wave group the B-52s in front of a staircase. (Lynn Goldsmith/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images) By 1978, with the Beatles eight years in his rearview mirror, John Lennon had stopped making music — and found himself vacationing apart from his wife and muse, Yoko Ono. That same year, a group of eclectic…
You’ve probably seen that infamous photo of Madison Square Garden from 1939, where over 20,000 American Nazis held a “patriotic” rally in New York. But a new 7-minute documentary gives us an even more detailed (and terrifying) peek at just what happened that night on February 20, 1939. The documentary, produced by Field of Vision…
A decade after scribes walked out over digital pay, The Hollywood Reporter gathers key players to reflect on the tension and “traitors,” strategies and solidarity, picket-line romances and the ultimate deal that still impacts how the town runs today. It was early 2006 when Damon Lindelof headed down to the Third Street Promenade in Santa…
Cover Photo What do we know about her? Tonya Harding, shown at Mountain View Ice Arena in Vancouver, Wash., is back in the spotlight and has a few things she would like to clear up. Credit Kyle Johnson for The New York Times In the movie, “I, Tonya,” the disgraced figure skater looks back on…