As foliage darkens in the fall, the pigments within the plant matter break down and transform

Read more at http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/science/2010/04/01/a-peep-experiment/ Our Surprising Science blogger tests whether stale peeps or fresh peeps are better for the spring tradition of peep jousting.

The CIA burglar who went rogue: http://j.mp/UpJtCJ Using the Enigma and the Sigaba, world powers encrypted their messages in hopes of catching their opponents by surprise.

The Marine Band, having played at nearly every presidential swearing-in ceremony since Thomas Jefferson's in 1801, readies for Barack Obama's inauguration (Meredith Bragg). Read more at http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/Inauguration-2009.html

Read more at http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/Nikita-in-Hollywood.html As part of a diplomatic mission, Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev traveled across the United States, meeting Americans from New York to Iowa to California.

Stanley Feder, founder of Simply Sausage, walks us through what it takes to make truly outstanding links.

This relic from ancient Persia had a profound influence on the Founding Fathers. More on the Cyrus Cylinder: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/the-cyrus-cylinder-goes-on-view-at-the-sackler-gallery-1334866/

Smithsonian magazine commissioned Drew Gardner for a project that connects Black Americans today to their lost ancestry. Read about Gardner’s project and process, as well as more details about the subjects of this incredible series here: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/descendants-black-civil-war-heroes-wear-heritage-pride-180983397/ Video produced by Sierra Theobald. Special thanks to Drew Gardner Additional credits: Emma MacBeath, WikiTree US Black Heritage project; Ottawa Goodman, research and coordinator; Sam Dole, Penumbra Foundation; Elizabeth Zuck, set design; Calvin Osbourne, props and costume; Angela Huff, hair and make up; Diego Huerta, Lexia Krebs, behind-the-scenes filming; background prints by Fujifilm USA

Jim Henson, creator of the Muppets, thought in images, as this clip from his early 1960s piece "Cat and Mouse" exemplifies. Henson's prolific mind is celebrated in the new Smithsonian traveling exhibition "Jim Henson's Fantastic World."

Read more at http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/aroundthemall/2008/12/music-of-the-tropics-balinese-drum-troupe-performs-at-the-sackler/ Bells and gongs are the sounds behind Gamelan music, which has different variants from one Indonesian island to the next.

From steaming the wooden planks to hoisting the ship into the water, this replica of a 17th century ship needed the work of many volunteers to set sail

Boston’s iconic lighthouse, the Boston Light, is managed by a single person: Sally Snowman. She is the 70th keeper of the lighthouse since it was built over 300 years ago.

While camouflaged on the ocean floor off the coast of Israel in the Red Sea, octopods use their arms to grab unsuspecting prey

Christopher Nolan's epic new film "Oppenheimer" is no mere biopic… nor is it the first attempt to capture the father of the atomic bomb in fiction. We look at prior dramatizations of this very complicated man—including one wherein J. Robert Oppenheimer played himself!—and examine why they worked or didn't. In the episode: Physicist-turned-photographer Minesh Bacrania shares his experience photographing inside the top-secret labs at Los Alamos National Laboratory, where J. Robert Oppenheimer and other scientists created the first nuclear weapon. Next, with Christopher Nolan’s film Oppenheimer exceeding commercial expectations, Smithsonian magazine writer Andy Kifer discusses the complexities of Oppenheimer's genius and how prior attempts to depict him in film and television and on stage have fared. Read Andy Kifer’s “The Real Story Behind Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer” here (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-real-history-behind-christopher-nolans-oppenheimer-180982529/) . See Minesh Bacrania’s photographs of Los Alamos and read Smithsonian senior editor Jennie Rothenberg Gritz’s text here (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/exclusive-behind-scenes-look-los-alamos-lab-where-robert-oppenheimer-created-atomic-bomb-180982336/) or in the July/August 2023 issue of Smithsonian. There’s More to That is a production of Smithsonian magazine and PRX Productions. From the magazine, our team is Chris Klimek, Debra Rosenberg and Brian Wolly. From PRX, our team is Jessica Miller, Genevieve Sponsler, Adriana Rozas Rivera, Terence Bernardo, and Edwin Ochoa. The Executive Producer of PRX Productions is Jocelyn Gonzales. Episode artwork by Emily Lankiewicz. Music by APM Music.

From decorative urns and plates to chandeliers, the Corning Museum of Glass features glass blown items from today to as far back as ancient Egypt.

The musicians of the Union and Confederate armies provided strong memories of the homes left behind for the battlefield.

Rather than pouncing on its prey, the larger Pacific striped octopus extends a tentacle and taps its victim, startling it into the octopus's deadly embrace. (Video courtesy Roy Caldwell, UC Berkeley)

Read more at http://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/colombia-dispatches.html In Valledupar, Colombia, Turco Gil operates a school to teach local children how to play vallenato music. Listen to Juan David Atencia, a blind 9-year-old prodigy play the accordion.

The Ouija board might seem like a simple game that sparks spooky childhood memories, but have you ever pondered its mysterious history? Even more importantly, does it actually…work? Uncover the fascinating truth behind the game and its unusual origins. ___ A little more information: In the late 19th century, Americans were captivated by Spiritualism, the belief that the dead could communicate with the living. Charles Kennard saw the commercial potential in this trend, leading to the creation of the Ouija board. Yet, the backstory behind its invention, its rules, and even its name are all wrapped up in uncertainty. One thing is certain: the more turbulent the times, the more popular the game became – particularly during World War II and the social upheaval of the late 1960s. Ultimately, the allure of the Ouija board lies in its ability to tap into human imagination and curiosity. Whether regarded as a nostalgic artifact or a mystical tool, the Ouija board is here to stay. #OuijaBoard #Ouija #history #Smithsonianmagazine Subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/@SmithsonianMagazine Read more about the history of the Ouija Board here: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-strange-and-mysterious-history-of-the-ouija-board-5860627/ Did you know that US Navy Officers rely on a system called the “ouija board” to track the movement of airplanes on a carrier? Learn more here: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/air-space-magazine/how-things-work-the-ouija-board-10048217/ For more videos from Smithsonian Magazine: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/videos/ Get More Smithsonian Magazine: Official Site: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/smithsonianmagazine/ X: https://x.com/smithsonianmag Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/SmithsonianMagazine/ Digital Editorial Director: Brian Wolly Director of Programming: Nicki Marko Manager of Programming: Michelle Mehrtens Scriptwriter: Dan Wolf Video Editor: Adam Benavides

Watch St. Augustine in Alaska erupt and create lightning

He is (K)enough… or is he? With filmmaker Greta Gerwig's Barbie breaking box-office records—and devoting much of its story to Ken's existential crisis—we wondered if there's any more to Barbie's perennial plus-one. Journalist and lifelong Barbie fan Emily Tamkin talks us through Ken’s development, or lack thereof, over the decades. Read Emily’s “A Cultural History of Barbie,” and Chris’s brief Ken history “Not Your Average Beau,” here (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/cultural-history-barbie-180982115/) or in the June 2023 issue of Smithsonian. Emily is the author of The Influence of Soros: Politics, Power, and the Struggle for an Open Society and Bad Jews: A History of American Jewish Politics and Identities. Learn more about Emily and her work here (https://www.emilytamkin.com/) , or subscribe to her Substack newsletter (https://emilyctamkin.substack.com/) . There’s More to That is a production of Smithsonian magazine and PRX Productions. From the magazine, our team is Chris Klimek, Debra Rosenberg and Brian Wolly. From PRX, our team is Jessica Miller, Genevieve Sponsler, Adriana Rozas Rivera, Terence Bernardo, and Edwin Ochoa. The Executive Producer of PRX Productions is Jocelyn Gonzales. Episode artwork by Emily Lankiewicz. Music by APM Music.

Sarah Parcak | Smithsonian Magazine’s 2016 American Ingenuity Award Winner for History This tech-savvy researcher of our past uses satellites and other remote-sensing tools to discover and explore stunning new evidence of lost cultures—including, just this year, another possible Viking site in North America. In addition, she has located an astonishing number of ancient Egyptian remains—thousands of settlements, lost tombs and hidden pyramids. A Yale- and Cambridge-trained Egyptologist and archaeologist, Parcak is a professor of anthropology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where she serves as founding director of the Laboratory for Global Observation. Read more about Parcak’s work: http://smithmag.co/ZuwTGP | #IngenuityAwards And more about the American Ingenuity Awards: http://smithmag.co/77xPqy

The Orkneys, an archipelago of islands off the northern coast of Scotland, are home to some of the greatest neolithic treasures in western Europe: from the settlement of Skara Brae to the Ness of Brodgar.

The answer…and why you should care

Discover how Ella Jenkins' joyful songs and storytelling have inspired generations of young listeners, while her commitment to advocacy has profoundly affected the world of music and beyond. --------- For more videos from Smithsonian Magazine: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/videos/ Digital Editorial Director: Brian Wolly Director of Programming: Nicki Marko Supervising Producer & Scriptwriter: Michelle Mehrtens Producer & Editor: Sierra Theobald Motion Designer: Ricardo Jaimes

OK Go, Damian Kulash Jr. and Trish Sie | Smithsonian Magazine’s 2016 American Ingenuity Award Winners for Visual Arts Specializing in the whimsical and unexpected, these artistic dynamos have collaborated on some of the most arresting music videos ever made. This year’s “Upside Down & Inside Out” showcases the OK Go band members in a gravity-defying gambol shot aboard a Russian jetliner flying parabolas to induce periods of weightlessness. (“Here It Goes Again,” a treadmill ballet released in 2006, won a Grammy Award for best short-form video.) OK Go, formed in Chicago in 1998 and now based in Los Angeles, features Tim Nordwind (bass), Andy Ross (guitar), Dan Konopka (drums) and Damian Kulash Jr. (vocals and guitar). “Upside Down & Inside Out” is the fourth video that Kulash has co-directed with Sie, an acclaimed choreographer and film director who is also his sister. Read more about their work: http://smithmag.co/HZ8vzr | #IngenuityAwards And more about the American Ingenuity Awards: http://smithmag.co/77xPqy

Put your hands together for our host, Eric Schulze, as he dives into history to answer your questions.

Mount Erebus in Antarctica erupts

How the American Ingenuity Award winner plans to build a self-sustaining civilization on Mars

A mesmerizing 10,000-shot video captures the dramatic life cycles of several species (Owen Reiser)

The American Ingenuity Award winner is using geographic information systems to map history's most iconic landscapes

In 1896, Thomas Edison set off to a remote Canadian district near the Alaska border, with cameras in tow. He succeeded in capturing fascinating images of the prospectors brought in by the Gold Rush.

Watch a selection from the Smithsonian Institution's submission for the UNESCO Memory of the World Register of historic artifacts

Curator Larry Bird takes you inside the history of the Bradford dollhouse

The Solar Dynamics Observatory captured this epic footage of Venus crossing the face of the sun on June 5, 2012

Regular dust bathing removes pest and parasites and keeps the wild bird's iridescent feathers in top condition. (Credit: Carla Rhodes)

The American Ingenuity Award winner is on the brink of using the human genome to provide better diagnostics for deadly diseases

Read more at http://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/Savoring-Puebla.html The streets of Puebla are filled with the sound of Mariachis who sing at most traditional Mexican ceremony.

Clues into the disappearance of the ancient Picts lie in the tiny Scottish village of Aberlemno: 1,700-year-old Pictish stones, marked with some very unusual carvings.

Capturing a piece of an asteroid and bringing it to Earth is even more difficult than it is time-consuming. After four years in space, NASA’s OSIRIS-REx craft made a brief landing on the asteroid Bennu to collect samples of the ancient rock. Six months later, part of the spacecraft began its journey home to Earth, and earlier this fall, that sample collection canister landed, via parachute, in Utah. Scientists will be studying those samples of Bennu for decades in the hope of unlocking the mystery of how life on Earth began — but they’ve already learned enough to get them excited. In this episode, we speak with Linda Shiner, the former editor of Air & Space / Smithsonian magazine, about the challenges and triumphs of the OSIRIS-REx mission, and what scientists hope it will teach us about how life on Earth began. Find prior episodes of our show here (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/podcast/) . There’s More to That is a production of Smithsonian magazine and PRX Productions. From the magazine, our team is Chris Klimek, Debra Rosenberg and Brian Wolly. From PRX, our team is Jessica Miller, Adriana Rosas Rivera, Genevieve Sponsler, Terence Bernardo, and Edwin Ochoa. The Executive Producer of PRX Productions is Jocelyn Gonzales. Fact-checking by Stephanie Abramson. Episode artwork by Emily Lankiewicz. Music by APM Music.

A melting glacier caused a mountain in Greenland to collapse into a narrow fjord, setting off an oscillating wave that rattled seismic detectors around the world

Experts have confirmed that the image of "Knight, Death and the Devil" is a real master engraving by the renowned German artist Albrecht Dürer

The annual award ceremony featured costumes, songs and paper airplanes as scientists recognized comedic research across ten disciplines

Kleptoparasitism, in which a bird harasses another to steal its food, might introduce avian flu to the continent, currently the only one without the severe H5N1 strain

Scientists identified traces of the drug in the brain tissue of two individuals buried in the crypt of a hospital in Milan

Experts are carefully uncovering traces of the original paint and fragments of gold leaf that once adorned the 2,000-year-old Temple of Edfu

The viewfinders are outfitted with special lenses that help people with red-green colorblindness distinguish between hues

The collaboration across species reveals a surprising social behavior of octopuses, researchers say

An acoustic survey in 2018 and new analysis with A.I. suggest the sounds are vocalizations from the elusive Bryde’s whale

Called the Australasian narrow-nosed spookfish, the cryptic species lives deep in the ocean off the coasts of New Zealand and Australia