The Franklin Expedition
Two ships, 129 men, and a note left in a cairn. Nobody walked out.
Essays
Longer reads
Fact-checked write-ups of the stories behind the Shorts. Each opens with a short summary, separates what we know from what we don’t, and lists its sources at the bottom.
The Cadaver Synod
A pope dug up his predecessor, sat him on a throne and found him guilty.
The Radium Girls
They were paid well to paint glowing watch dials. They were told the paint was safe.
The Plague Village of Eyam
A village of about 800 sealed itself in when the plague arrived. It cost a lot of lives.
Radithor and Eben Byers
A golf champion drank a radium tonic for years. His jaw had to be removed.
Carl Tanzler and Elena Hoyos
A hospital technician, a patient who died, and a body that went missing for seven years.
The Great Molasses Flood
A tank in Boston let go in 1919 and a wave of syrup killed 21 people.
The Dancing Plague of 1518
Strasbourg danced for weeks. The city’s fix was a band.