In 1931, a seemingly ordinary photograph captured a woman embracing a young boy in front of a modest farmhouse in rural Kansas. The image, part of a larger donation to the Smithsonian’s archives, showed a tender moment between a mother and her son. But when Dr. Margaret Chen examined the boy’s face closely, she felt … Read more
In 1909, a young Black couple posed for a formal engagement portrait at Morrison Photography in Atlanta, Georgia. The woman, Clara Bennett, sat in an ornate chair wearing a high-necked white blouse with lace trim. Behind her stood Thomas Wright, a handsome man in a crisp dark suit, his hand resting on her shoulder. At … Read more
On 2 May 1930, a 45-year-old woman was taken from a house in Darmstadt, Germany, against her will. Doctors injected her with a combination of morphine and scopolamine, a sedative pairing used at the time to make patients compliant and blur their memory of what followed. She was then transported across the border into Switzerland … Read more
On November 16, 1937, a Junkers Ju 52 belonging to the Belgian airline Sabena was feeling its way down through fog toward an aerodrome at Steene outside Ostend. It was a scheduled service from Munich to London via Frankfurt, diverted because the weather over the coast had closed in. On board were eight passengers and … Read more
For decades, a formal family portrait sat forgotten in the archives of the Boston Historical Society. Dated June uth, the sepia image showed the prominent Matthews family posed in their Victorian parlor. Richard Matthews, a successful textile merchant, stood beside his wife, Elizabeth, while their three children sat properly in front. The family's wealth was … Read more
In December 1945, a letter arrived at the British political division in Lübeck, Germany. It was addressed to the Duke of Windsor, the former King Edward VIII. The correspondence contained an extraordinary proposal: would the Duke be prepared to accept the throne of Hanover? The letter came from Count Bentinck, a member of a prominent … Read more
In March 2024, Dr. Sarah Mitchell, curator of the Civil War Photographic Collection at the National Archives in Washington DC, received an anonymous package. The box contained a small carte de visite from 1863, showing two women posed in a formal studio setting. A typed note inside asked her to examine it carefully, warning that … Read more
In the final week of January 1901, an old woman lay dead in an upstairs bedroom at Osborne House on the Isle of Wight. For the first time in three days, the room was empty of her family. A man in his early fifties waited until the door closed. He was not a courtier or … Read more
In the summer of 1944, somewhere in occupied France, a German prisoner of war walked toward the fence of an American camp. He stared into the eyes of an American guard and laughed. It was not a nervous laugh. It was not a quiet one. He threw his head back and laughed like a man … Read more
On the afternoon of October 15, 1839, in a small private room at Windsor Castle, a 20-year-old woman did something no respectable woman of her century was permitted to do. She proposed marriage to a man. She had sent for him. That detail matters. She summons, he comes. He was her first cousin, 23 months … Read more