Dresden’s Tobacco Mosque
Kaushik Patowary
Jul 15, 2019
Standing on the banks of the Elbe river, in the German city of Dresden, is a monumental building with a multicolored glass dome and high-ri...
Showing posts with the label Featured
Linnaeus's Flower Clock: Keeping Time With Flowers
Kaushik Patowary
Jul 3, 2019
Who needs a watch to tell time when we got flowers? Many species of flowering plants open and close their flowers at specific times through...
That Time When America Air-Dropped Pianos For Troops in Battlefields
Kaushik Patowary
Jul 2, 2019
You thought pianos dropping from the sky is a gag for cartoons? Then hear this story out. During World War Two, all kinds of production inv...
Hellburner: The 16th Century Weapon of Mass Destruction
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 29, 2019
In the age of sail, when ships were made of wood, fire was the number one enemy of sailors, and this fearsome tool was used in diabolic ways...
The Triumphal Arch of Emperor Maximilian I
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 27, 2019
Like many rulers, the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I had a fascination for large monuments, but instead of actually building them he roman...
The Longest Papal Election in History
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 26, 2019
The main attraction in the ancient city of Viterbo, in central Italy, is a 13th century palace built to serve as the country residence for t...
The World’s First Parachute Jump
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 25, 2019
On December 26, 1783, a crowd gathered outside the observatory in Montpellier, a French city near the south coast on the Mediterranean Sea. ...
Hermits As Garden Ornaments
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 24, 2019
Between the 17th and the 19th centuries, a certain reproachful and voyeuristic trend emerged among wealthy British landowners. Not content w...
Thomas Edison’s Forgotten Passion: Building Concrete Houses
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 21, 2019
Of all things Thomas Alva Edison is known for, concrete is not one of them. It was one of Edison's less successful ventures, but not one...
François Coignet’s Reinforced Concrete House
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 20, 2019
In a quiet suburb, north of Paris, by the River Seine, stands a derelict four-story building. Its windows and doors are broken, some are bar...
The Galloping Horse Problem And The World’s First Motion Picture
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 19, 2019
“The 1821 Derby at Epsom” by Théodore Géricault Horses have appeared in works of art throughout history. They have appeared in prehistoric...
Mocha Dick: The Whale That Inspired Moby Dick
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 15, 2019
About thirty kilometers off the coast of Chile is a small teardrop-shaped island called Mocha, inhabited by the indigenous Mapuche people. ...
Taiwan’s Giant Wall of Propaganda Spewing Speakers
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 13, 2019
Just off the southeastern coast of mainland China, lies a group of two islands collectively called Kinmen. For over seventy years, these is...
The Great Aurora of 1859
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 11, 2019
On the evening of September 2, 1859, after the sun went down on the western hemisphere, a spectacular show of light began on the skies abov...
Churches of Peace: The Churches That Defied The Holy Roman Emperor
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 7, 2019
In the towns of Jawor and Świdnica, in the Silesia neighborhood of Wroclaw, Poland, stand two magnificent timber-framed churches. The Holy ...
Telefon Hírmondó, The Telephone Newspaper
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 6, 2019
When cell phones were first introduced, they were unattractive, brick-like devices that could do nothing more than make voice calls and sen...
Kyshtym: The Nuclear Disaster That Was Kept Secret For 30 Years
Kaushik Patowary
Jun 4, 2019
Thirty years before the nuclear reactor at Chernobyl exploded, in what became one of the most devastating nuclear accidents in history, ther...
The Warship That Couldn’t Stay Afloat
Kaushik Patowary
May 30, 2019
During the American Civil War, the Union Navy designed a class of warships called “Casco” that could submerge its hull at will to make the b...
Gilbert Hill: Mumbai’s Forgotten 66 Million Years Old Heritage
Kaushik Patowary
May 28, 2019
Concrete buildings aren’t the only thing that rises vertically in the metropolis of Mumbai, India’s most populous city. In a suburb, north ...
Martha Gellhorn, The Only Woman Who Landed in Normandy on D-Day
Kaushik Patowary
May 27, 2019
On the eve of the Normandy landings in June 1944, there were over a thousand war correspondents all over Europe reporting back to the mill...
