Journey to the Centre of the Earth in a Rubber Dinghy

Deep beneath the earth’s surface, in mountain tunnels, Antarctic ice, and abandoned zinc and gold mines, physicists search for the elusive ‘ghost particle’ known as neutrino. Spat out of supernovas, colliding galaxies, and the Big Bang itself, about 100 trillion of these ghostly subatomic entities careen through our bodies at nearly the speed of light every…

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The Lost American Museum that Had It All

He may be best known for the famous circus that bears his name, but before its founding, P.T. Barnum was the creator and owner of one of the largest, strangest attractions to ever exist. Barnum’s American Museum wasn’t what we think of as a museum today. In one five-story building, Barnum offered many different forms…

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Get in the Mood for Lurve with the Best Cookbook to Come out of the 80s

There were some things that were just accepted in the 80s and Barbara Cartland’s cookbook was one of them. Published in 1984, The Romance of Food features over 170 pages of kitschy technicolour plates that were all photographed at Cartland’s own Hertfordshire estate (the former home of Beatrix Potter), using her own antique porcelain and knick-knacks alongside the food.…

Don’t Trust that Giant Abandoned Listening Device in Chernobyl

It looks like something out of a science fiction movie– close– it’s inside the Chernobyl exclusion zone. A former top secret military object used by the Soviet Union, the mysterious giant antenna system called the Duga-3, was the origin of an extremely powerful but anonymous signal between 1976 to 1989. The sharp, tapping signal came without warning,…

I Refuse to Believe these are Paintings

I consider this a super human talent. Alien in fact. Seriously, why aren’t they checking this painter’s DNA for extra-terrestrial origins? His name is Yigal Ozeri, an oil painter from Isräel best-known for his cinematic-scale portraits of pretty girls hanging out with nature in perfect sunlight. Let me know when you see a brushstroke… Oh…

Marilyn Monroe’s Forgotten Hollywood Sorority

If you had knocked on the door of room 334 at the Hollywood Studio Club on Lexington Avenue in 1948, a 24 year-old struggling actress going by the name of Marilyn Monroe would have answered with eyes full of hope. Marilyn was one of over 10,000 girls who were housed at the Hollywood Studio Club during its sixty year history, providing film studios…

13 Things I Found on the Internet Today (Vol. CCXXIII)

1. Inside an Old Pencil Factory The oldest pencil factory in Portugal, Viarco, photographed by Daniel Sommer found on Slanted Magazine. 2. Office girl on Rollerskates Photo by Hank Walker found in the LIFE archives 3. TV Stove Found on the Afflictor 4. In 1982, someone thought it would be a good idea to market frozen dinners…

A Brief Compendium of Vintage Caravan Brochures

There’s a certain “je ne sais quoi” about the kind of person who owns a caravan, isn’t there? So you would expect the sales brochures for a caravan to be a little more … let’s say colourful than your average marketing material. In fact, they’re kind of a blast. I’ve spent just about my whole afternoon trawling through an online…

Oh, to have been in Venice on the Night of September 3rd, 1951

It’s my birthday today– no, no, please, hold the gifts! I couldn’t possibly accept. But if you insist, I suppose I wouldn’t turn down a ticket and a time machine to the costume party of the century– Le Bal Oriental, hosted by an eccentric millionaire at his Venetian palazzo in September of 1951… Hosted by Charles de…

The Dark Secrets of a Tiny Tropical Island Occupied by Descendants of Pirates

There’s a paradise island in the Pacific Ocean that no one wants to live on. Food and water is plentiful, the land is fertile, it’s surrounded by the most pristine ocean habitat in the world, and yet a potential extinction of the island’s current population (primarily direct descendants of pirates who shipwrecked themselves here 200 years ago)…