Tag: Atlas Obscura

Atlas Obscura -> One Artist’s Mission to Illustrate All the World’s Mythical Beasts, Very Large Pizza, Winding Tower and more

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Illustrating All the World’s Mythical Beasts
Every culture has its own distinctive mythological creatures. With such rich and broad source material to sketch from, the artist Iman Joy El Shami-Mader has been drawing one such creature a day. Atlas Obscura spoke with her about the project and the challenges of depicting magical monsters.
 
 
 
 


Very Large Pizza
A Michigan restaurant cooked a 100-pound pie that it will deliver right to your doorstep—provided that your doors are wide enough.
 
 
 
 


Masochistic Games
Consisting of pieces that are not only shaped the same, but all the same color, hell puzzles are both entertainment and punishment.
 
 
 
 


VENICE, ITALY Winding Tower
This palatial spiral staircase is named the Scala Contarini del Bovolo. “Del Bovolo” translates to “of the snail” in the Venetian dialect.
 
 
 
 

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Atlas Obscura: February 11, 2018

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Where Old, Unreadable Documents Go to Be Understood
For hundreds of years, history was handwritten. However, sometimes our ancestors’ handwriting was very bad. From her Isle of Man home, Linda Watson transcribes illegible historical documents that stump average readers.


Kissing Chicken
Last year, 23 percent of Americans who reported contracting salmonella from homegrown fowl had recently kissed or snuggled their birds.


Atlas Obscura TripsIn Search of Tiny Owls
This June, hike into the Wasatch Mountains and observe a secretive owl species with Atlas Obscura and an expert avian biologist.

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Atlas Obscura – The First Girl Scout Cookie Was Surprisingly Boring

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Cookie Ancestor
From Thin Mints to decadent Peanut Butter Patties, Girl Scout cookies come in exciting flavors. Yet, the original recipe was surprisingly kind of boring.
 
 
 
 

The Borrowing Records of Famous Readers
The New York Society Library is a subscription library that has been around since 1754. With a few small gaps, the institution has preserved the circulation records of its members, including Alexander Hamilton, Willa Cather, and Nora Ephron.
 
 
 
 


HILLSBORO, OREGON Secret Jewels
An unassuming ranch house hides a treasure trove of unique gems and minerals.
 
 
 
 
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Atlas Obscura:  February 05, 2018

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Inside the Winchester Mystery House
Under new management, the labyrinthine mansion is giving up more of its closely guarded secrets. As visitors get to know the house, they also get to know Sarah Winchester, the famously private and eccentric woman who built it—and no ghost stories are necessary to marvel at its creativity and ambition.
 
 
 
 

A Floating Landmark
One stormy January day, a historic brining shed, normally based in Lubec, Maine, got swept away and made landfall in Canada.
 
 
 
 

Naskart Racing
The world’s largest indoor go-kart racetrack is hiding in Connecticut.
 
 
 
 

Homewood Cemetery
PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA: These tranquil resting grounds are home to recognizable souls like the Heinz family.
 
 
 
 
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How One Scottish Town Revived a Local Tradition After 80 Years

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The “Stromness Yule Log Pull” is officially back.
Happy New Year! While people around the world celebrated the beginning of 2018 with typical revelry, the town of Stromness in Scotland’s Orkney Islands did one better and revived a local tradition that hadn’t been observed for 80 years. All it took was a huge log and a willingness to indulge in some neighborly rivalry.

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How One Scottish Town Revived a Local Tradition After 80 Years

The Underground Pentagon

Fairfield, Pennsylvania
Raven Rock Mountain Complex
The Cold War-era “underground Pentagon” is a sprawling subterranean hideaway for the Defense Department.

The Cold War-era complex is a sprawling subterranean hideaway for the Defense Department.

Take a slight detour off Pennsylvania Route 16 near the Maryland state line and you’ll notice the rolling farmland and bucolic rural homesteads give way to a double wall of razor wire, with tall antenna masts visible atop the hillside beyond.

Officially referred to by a handful of monikers including the Raven Rock Mountain Complex, Site R, and the Alternate Joint Communication Center, the facility was best described by the local press half a century ago: the “Underground Pentagon.”

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The Underground Pentagon

Student Life at the First Medical College for Women

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The pioneering women who faced jeers and discrimination to become doctors.

In early November 1869, Anna Broomall, a student at the Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania (WMCP), was passed a note. It had made the rounds among her male counterparts at the University of Pennsylvania Medical School before a clinical lecture at Pennsylvania Hospital. For the first time, WMCP students were to attend this lecture, which was an essential, hands-on experience for medical students. The message on the slip of paper was significant enough that Broomall kept it for more than 50 years: “Go tomorrow to the hospital to see the She Doctors!”

On Saturday, November 6, Broomall recalled, she arrived at the lecture along with 19 other young women. What happened next became known as the “Jeering Incident.”

“When we turned up at the clinic, in what was then the new amphitheater, pandemonium broke loose,” Broomall said in a later interview. “The students rushed in pell-mell, stood up in the seats, hooted, called us names and threw spitballs, trying in vain to dislodge us.” Joanne Murray, Historian and Director at the Drexel University Legacy Center Archives and Special Collections, describes another account: “The men greeted the women students with yells, hisses, caterwauling, mock applause, offensive remarks on personal appearance, etc.”

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Student Life at the First Medical College for Women