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Four mysterious objects spotted in Salem, Massachusetts, in 1952.

How the Pentagon Started Taking U.F.O.s Seriously

For decades, flying saucers were a punch line. Then the U.S. government got over the taboo.
Police aiming guns at unarmed black people

Police and the License to Kill

Detroit police killed hundreds of unarmed Blacks during the civil rights movement. Their ability to get away with it shows why most proposals for police reform are bound to fail.
Members of the Harvard branch of the KKK pose for 1924 graduation photo at the foot of John Harvard Statue

The Crimson Klan

The KKK was clearly present at Harvard. But the university rarely mentions the 20th century in its attempts to reckon with its past.
Coup leaders Admiral Massera and General Videla dressed in uniform

Argentina’s Military Coup of 1976: What the U.S. Knew

Declassified documents show the State Department had ample forewarning that a coup was being plotted, and that human rights violations would be committed.
the contra military group

Reagan and the Iran-Contra Affair

Reagan's commitment to deregulation, aggressive military spending, and diminished oversight created a cocktail of corruption that was worse than Watergate.
This 1856 political cartoon depicts the responses of the three candidates to the results of the election. Winning Democrat James Buchanan sits reading the returns of the election while newspaper editors approach from the left. Behind them the defeated Republican candidate John C. Fremont rides off into the West. To the right the second defeated candidate, Millard Fillmore, laments his fall into the “caverns of Know-Nothingism.”

Here’s What Happens to a Conspiracy-Driven Party

The modern GOP isn't the first party to embrace huge conspiracies. But the lessons should be sobering.
photograph of a woman from a carpeta

A New Photo Exhibit Looks at Decades of FBI Surveillance on American Citizens

A new book shares a cautionary tale of the American surveillance state.
Piles of boxes.

Historians Having to Tape Together Records That Trump Tore Up

Implications for public record and legal proceedings after administration seized or destroyed papers, notes and other information.
Doctor in white coat giving thumbs up

Presidential Physicians Don’t Always Tell the Public the Full Story

They are beholden only to their patient, not to the American people.
Covers of issues of One magazine, featuring line drawings and article titles including "I am glad I am homosexual," and "I Just Had to Write".

ONE: The First Gay Magazine in the United States

ONE is a vital archive, but its focus on citizenship and “rational acceptance” ultimately blocked it from being the safe home for all that it claimed to be.
A graphic featuring a plane dropping particles upon crouching people and a man looking into a microscope.

The Great Germ War Cover-Up

When Nicholson Baker searched for the truth about biological weapons, he found a fog of redaction.
A group of South Korean refugees during the Korean War.

The Korean War Atrocities No One Wants to Talk About

For decades they covered up the U.S. massacre of civilians at No Gun Ri and elsewhere. This is why we never learn our lessons.

Did an Illuminati Conspiracy Theory Help Elect Thomas Jefferson?

The 1800 election shows there is nothing new about conspiracy theories, and that they really take hold when we don’t trust each other.

On the Lost Lyric Poetry of Amelia Earhart

A missing pilot and her poems.

The Intelligence Coup of the Century

For decades, the CIA read the encrypted communications of allies and adversaries.
Marchers carry a banner that reads "Lesbian & Gay Rights - Human Rights"

The History of 'Coming Out,' from Secret Gay Code to Popular Political Protest

In the 1950s, 'coming out' meant quietly acknowledging one's sexual orientation. Today, the term is used by a broad array of social movements.
Thomas Jefferson.

Jefferson and the Declaration

Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence announced a new epoch in world history, transforming a provincial tax revolt into a great struggle to liberate humanity.

John Wheeler’s H-bomb Blues

In 1953, as a political battle raged over the US’s nuclear future, the physicist lost a classified document on an overnight train from Philadelphia to DC.

Secret US Intelligence Files Provide History’s Verdict on Argentina’s Dirty War

Recently declassified documents constitute a gruesome and sadistic catalog of state terrorism.
News correspondent inside Berlin Wall tunnel.

The Battle Between NBC and CBS to Be the First to Film a Berlin Wall Tunnel Escape

Declassified government documents show how both sides of the Iron Curtain worked to have the projects canned.

You Know About the Underground Railroad. But What About the Reverse Underground Railroad?

Few people know about the movement to kidnap free black Americans and traffic them into slavery. It's time to change that.

The Secret History of Fort Detrick, the CIA’s Base for Mind Control Experiments

Today, it’s a cutting-edge lab. In the 1950s and 1960s, it was the center of the U.S. government’s darkest experiments.

From Mind Control to Murder? How a Deadly Fall Revealed the CIA’s Darkest Secrets

Frank Olson died in 1953, but it took decades for his family to get closer to the truth.
A UFO in front of hills

More UFOs Than Ever Before

What explains the apparently sudden spike in intergalactic traffic after WWII? If Cold War anxieties are to blame, why have sightings persisted?

Aaron Burr — Villain of ‘Hamilton’ — Had a Secret Family of Color, New Research Shows

The vice president is best known for killing rival Alexander Hamilton in an 1804 duel. But he was also a notorious rake, historians say.

On America’s Wild West of Dinosaur Fossil Hunting

In 19th-century America, rare old bones were a resource like any other.
Police car.
partner

What the Loss of the New York Police Museum Means for Criminal-Justice Reform

Without historical records, we lose key insights into how law enforcement works — and how it fails.

Julius Scott’s Epic About Black Resistance in the Age of Revolution

"The Common Wind" covers the radical world of black mariners, rebels, and runaways banding together to realize their freedom.

Now You See It, Now You Don't

On the danger that the US government's habit of redacting official documents poses to democracy.

Redactions: The Declassified File

Mueller report censorship raises the question: what’s the government hiding?

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