30 articles found
Centralia, Pennsylvania's Endless Underground Fire
Somewhere beneath the scrubby, cracked asphalt of what used to be Route 61 in Centralia, Pennsylvania, an underground coal seam has been on fire since 1962. Smoke still seeps through fissures in the ground. The earth radiates warmth underfoot. In win...
Gdańsk: One of Poland's Greatest Cities
At 4:45am on 1 September 1939, the German warship Schleswig-Holstein opened fire on the Polish military transit depot at Westerplatte, on the outskirts of Gdańsk. The 182 Polish defenders held for seven days against overwhelming German force. It was ...
Randers, Denmark
Most travelers to Denmark go straight to Copenhagen, maybe Aarhus, and call it a country. But drive into central Jutland, to the point where Denmark's longest river spills into a long sheltered fjord, and you'll find Randers — one of Denmark's oldest...
Portugal's Oldest Places: A Guide to Ancient Sites
Portugal is one of the oldest nation-states in Europe annd its borders have remained essentially unchanged since 1139 AD. Here are the ancient and historic sites that every visitor seriously interes...
Canal Street: The Grand Thoroughfare of New Orleans in the 1900s
Canal Street at the turn of the 20th century was one of the most impressive commercial boulevards in the United States. At 171 feet wide — one of the widest streets in the country, a width that required two sets of streetcar rails and still left room...
Ancient Persia to Modern Iran: 10 Historic Sites That Make This Country One of the Greatest Open-Air Museums on Earth
Iran isn't just old — it's one of the cradles of human civilization. When Rome was still a village, Persia was building an empire that stretched from Egypt to India. When most of Europe was in the Dark Ages, Isfahan was the "Half the World" — one of ...
How People Got Around Los Angeles in the 1940s — And How It Explains Everything About the City Today
Everyone knows Los Angeles as a car city. Five-lane freeways, parking minimums, the 405 at rush hour, the assumption that no one walks anywhere. But this wasn't always the case — and the story of how Los Angeles transformed from one of the world's be...
Laramie, Wyoming in the 1940s: Why People Came and Should I Visit Now?
Laramie is 7,165 feet (about 2,200 meters) above sea level in southeastern Wyoming, with the Laramie Mountains to the east, and the Medicine Bow Mountain Range to the west. Why People Came to Laramie in the 1940s The Union Pacific Railroad ...
Denver Union Station: From Wild West Railroad Hub to the Heart of a Modern City
Denver Union Station opened in 1881 and immediately established itself as one of the most important railroad junctions in the American West. At its peak, 80 trains a day passed through its platforms. Today, after a $500 million regeneration, it's the...
Denver's 16th Street Mall: The History Behind Colorado's Most Famous Boulevard
Walk the length of Denver's 16th Street Mall today and you'll pass chain restaurants, hotel lobbies, coffee shops, street performers, and the constant swoosh of free mall ride buses. It's pleasant and busy — Denver's version of a downtown promenade. ...
Angel Falls and the Tepuis: Venezuela's Natural Wonders Explained
In the Gran Sabana region of southeastern Venezuela, flat-topped mountains called tepuis rise like islands above the surrounding forest — some reaching 3,000 metres, their cliff faces vertical and unbroken, their summits isolated for so long that evo...
Why Is Greece Called Greece? What the Hellas that about?
If you ask a Greek person what they call their country, they will say Hellas (Ελλάς or Ελλάδα). They call themselves Hellenes (Έλληνες). The Greek language is Helleniki. Greece, in the eyes of the Greeks, has always been and remains Hellas. So where...