In 2022, passengers at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport left behind $29,320.40 at security checkpoints.
Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call via Getty Images
Air travelers left nearly $1 million behind at TSA checkpoints in 2023.
A mathematical approach known as ‘true score theory’ can assess the contribution of luck to a team’s overall success.
Bruce Bennett/Getty Images
With low-scoring games and a preponderance of deflected shots, randomness is much more likely to color NHL teams’ records than those of squads in the other four major US pro sports leagues.
Democracy was enshrined in Roman currency.
American Numismatic Society
Fighting for voter access is an inevitable part of any democracy, from ancient Rome to the US today. Roman legislators were able to thwart elite political sway by introducing written ballots.
NZ Post Collectables
The surprising frequency of bees on coins through history shows the enduring importance to human societies of our buzzing companions.
The coin bearing the head of the mysterious Sponsian.
Hunterian Glasgow
Disregarded as ‘fakes’ for decades, new analysis of coins bearing the face of a mysterious emperor is providing answers about a heady gap in Roman history.
Wilma Mankiller served in the top leadership role of the Cherokee Nation from 1985 to 1995.
Peter Turnley/Corbis Historical via Getty Images
Wilma Mankiller’s groundbreaking tenure as chief of the Cherokee Nation introduced the US to the power of Indigenous women’s leadership.
Cash is pretty convenient.
Dilok Klaisataporn/EyeEm via Getty Images
Paying for the stuff you want with currency is way easier than relying on chairs you made or chickens you raised.
Mick Tsikas/AAP
It costs just 20 cents to make a $2 coin, and 32 cents to make a $100 note, but eventually the money making is going to stop.
Royal Mail stamps are one of the everyday items set to change following the death of the Queen.
Zurbagan / Shutterstock
The little changes people may experience following the death of the Queen.
Shutterstock
Rulers have used portraits on coinage to celebrate and reinforce their rule for centuries.
Royal Australian Mint
Celebrating the European honeybee is a misplaced opportunity to honour our forgotten native pollinators.
Anna May Wong appears alongside Akim Tamiroff in a promotional poster for the 1939 film ‘King of Chinatown.’
LMPC/Getty Images
The Asian American actress rose to fame in an era when white actors in yellowface were more likely to play Asian characters than Asian ones.
Elsie Passi
Uncle Segar is an expert on many things including the land, sea and sky. This knowledge is then captured in his artworks.
The Viking hoard being excavated.
Acta Konserveringscentrum
A Viking hoard of silver coins and jewellery expands our understanding of French history.
Soldiers used spent shells and casings to make trench art, like this brass bottle opener that was made during World War II.
Michael Riordan
One scholar spent a decade studying the ways everyday people drew, carved, glued, sewed and baked their own pornography.
The Seven Sisters Uncirculated Coin.
Royal Australian Mint
Two new coins released by the Royal Australian Mint celebrate Indigenous astronomers, who have used the stars to map changing seasons, inform the behaviours of plants and animals, and encode Law.
Shutterstock
Coins have always conveyed a message and, helpfully for historians, they are anchored to a specific time and space. Rome’s emperors used coins to push their political agendas.
Philip Pullman thinks this coin needs another comma. What do you think?
HM Treasury/PA
Philip Pullman’s call for a boycott against the new 50p coin is just the latest Oxford comma controvery.
Have you ever wondered why U.S. money is green?
Yulia Grigoryeva/Shutterstock.com
The color of American money goes back to the British colonies.
Cristian Storto / Shutterstock
In 2008, the first undated coin was introduced in the UK for more than 300 years.