Author: Ms. R.

Helene Marsh stood in front of a hotel conference room filled with other marine mammal researchers. It was December 1981, and the Australian scientist had spent years working with her mentor, Toshio Kasuya of the University of Tokyo, studying reproduction in short-finned pilot whales: dark, round-headed animals about the length of a pickup truck. She had big news. At the time, scientists thought that wild animals did not live beyond their reproductive years. But Marsh and Kasuya had been……

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A shopping center built across two continents. When town developers were looking for a suitable location to design a new shopping center and office block in southwest Iceland, then the town of Hveragerði located on Iceland’s main ring-road seemed like a good location. However, in 2003 while preparing the foundations for the newly planned four-story building, a deep crack in the ground was discovered that ran right through the center of the planned development. The crevice was in fact……

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Richard Serra is one of those artists that is devoted to bringing art to the larger public. His artworks are usually large in size, and custom-made for the place where they are displayed. In his work, he explores the three-way relationship between the viewer, the artwork, and the location. It was Sheikha Al-Mayassa who suggested that Serra build a sculpture in the Qatari desert, and in 2014 that idea came to fruition under the name of East-West/West-East. East-West/West-East encapsulates……

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Listen and subscribe on Stitcher, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and all major podcast apps. In this episode of The Atlas Obscura Podcast, we visit a giant abandoned dam in Sudbury, Massachusetts, which marks the inglorious failure of America’s champion of industry to triumph over nature. Our podcast is an audio guide to the world’s wondrous, awe-inspiring, strange places. In under 15 minutes, we’ll take you to an incredible site, and along the way you’ll meet some fascinating people and hear……

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Hidden among the Rangeley Lakes Trails are more than a dozen gnomes just waiting to be discovered.  The Gnome Home Roam, as it is known, is the result of a community project aimed at getting kids to explore the outdoors. Several years ago, a local carpenter built a number of small houses and mounted them on trees throughout the trail network. But there was just one problem: the houses were empty. Nini Christensen and Beth Flynn devised a plan……

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A statue of Dr. J. Marion Sims, known as the “father of gynecology,” stands in front of the Alabama State House in Montgomery. In fall 2021, another set of statues went up in Montgomery, in honor of his victims: Anarcha, Lucy, and Betsey, three enslaved Black women that Sims conducted brutal experiments on in order to develop new techniques in obstetrics. Men like Sims, for centuries, have gotten most of the credit in the history of gynecology. Far less……

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It was the eve of World War I and the mayor of Middlesbrough was worried. Specifically, Mayor Hugh Bell was worried that the war may cause a water shortage. So he came up with a solution. Bell hired the Arts and Crafts architect Walter Brierley to design a small water tower that would provide water to the towns of Ingleby Arncliffe and Rounton in the case of a shortage. Brierley’s three-story sandstone tower has a front entrance fitted with oak double doors,……

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Just off the road that passes the Hraunfossar and Barnafoss waterfalls lies a small circle enclosing more than a dozen rocks. But look closer and you may see the faces of 18 spirits on their way back to the underworld. Snorri Björnsson was the pastor of Húsafell from 1756 to 1803, but prior to that he served as a priest at Hornstrandir. He seems to have left on less-than-friendly terms, since a local legend tells of how other sorcerers,……

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When Germany invaded Belgium during the First World War, the Belgian parts of Baarle presented a bit of a problem for the Germans, because they were surrounded by neutral Dutch soil. Thus the Baarle-Hertog became a key strategic place for the Belgian army. Perhaps the most impressive act of rebellion was when the army smuggled in a complete communication array, pretending that it was part of the equipment used to build a refugee camp. Some of the materials smuggled in……

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The theatre was an important aspect of ancient Greek culture and was often one of the most significant areas of the city. Hundreds were built throughout the Greek world and many of their ruins still survive to this day.  The First Ancient Theatre of Larissa was constructed at the end of the 3rd-century BCE, during the reign of King Antigonus II Gonatas of Macedon. It is located on Frourio Hill, the most ancient part of Larissa, and is the……

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A decommissioned Antonov An-24 aircraft sits by the road, boxed in by buildings in a residential neighborhood of Ulaanbaatar. Antonov An-24 airplanes were produced in the Soviet Union between 1959 and 1979, and only 1,264 models saw the light of day. China produced another 103 models of an aircraft identical to the Antonov An-24, but under the name Xian Y-7. The Antonov aircraft was equipped with two four-blade propellers powered by a turbine engine (a turboprop). The Antonov An-24……

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