Author: Ms. R.

When I was a child in New Jersey, summer meant berry picking. As the wild raspberries ripened, the emerald woods around our house became spotted with bright bursts of deep purple. We would plunge through the brambles to collect enough juicy, tangy-sweet berries to make a pie. We didn’t realize that the local black raspberries were a cousin of the plumper, red variety we bought at the grocery store. We just knew that they were delicious. These berries are……

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As anyone who’s visited Florida knows, the state’s sweet calling card is Key lime pie. But Key lime’s cousin—sour orange pie—is not nearly as famous in the Sunshine State. And yet, their recipes are almost identical. Both have a graham-cracker crust topped with a tangy, condensed milk–based custard. The only real difference is the fruit that’s supplying each pie’s signature flavor. The story of how one pie was catapulted into the spotlight, while another remained an obscure, though beloved,……

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Junaluska provides valuable insight into North Carolina‘s history, Black Mennonites, and race in Appalachia.  Thousands of tourists and Appalachian State football fans walk down King Street in Boone, North Carolina, past farm-to-table cafes and the Mast General Store, without knowing about Junaluska. The Junaluska community sits just north of the university, and it remains one of the most important and unique sites of Black history in Appalachia.  During the 1850s, two free Black men—Johnson and Ellington Cuzzins—moved to Boone…….

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Ilsan Lake Park first opened in May 1996. It was constructed over a period of about three years, an impressive feat considering its size. The lake’s surface area is well over 3,o00,000 square feet making it the largest man-made lake in Asia. The park was designed to provide a natural-looking outdoor space in an urban area. There are recreational facilities, such as a promenade road and a bicycle path, along with inline skating, walking, and jogging trails that encircle the……

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Step back in time inside one of the largest video stores on the east coast.  As a non-profit, VisArt Video is a movie museum of sorts and is an educational resource for the community regarding all things related to the filmmaking process. With more than 35,000 movies for rent, there are more than enough titles to choose from. The knowledgeable staff is always willing to answer questions and help visitors find those rare, obscure titles. VisArt Video also sells……

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Rotterdam is known for its modern and daring architecture that draws many people to the city’s center. The center is also home to reminders of when the city was bombed by Nazi Germany in 1940.  The local government has fought hard to make certain the city’s history and links to the past are not forgotten. To bring this history to the forefront, the Rotterdam municipality decided in 2006 to mark the border of the bombarded area with specially designed……

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The latex glove was a streaky, dirty, yellow-gray, the color of a plastic bag that somersaulted into a tree and got tangled in the branches. When citizen scientists in the Netherlands spotted it in August 2020 while collecting trash along Leiden’s Oude Vest canal, they noticed something unsettling. The glove was torn, and wedged inside a gash beneath the thumb, they saw a tail. It was fringed and a bit rufous, and belonged to a creature that swam in……

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