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A miner carries a sack of ore at the Shabara mine near Kolwezi.

First They Mined for the Atomic Bomb. Now They’re Mining for E.V.s.

Miners in the Democratic Republic of Congo face few protections in the global rush for metals in energy transition—a toxic legacy from mining nuclear weapons.
by Roger Peet via The New Republic on August 30, 2023
A worker in the Shinkolobwe mine.

The Dark History ‘Oppenheimer’ Didn't Show

Coming from the Congo, I knew where an essential ingredient for atomic bombs was mined, even if everyone else seemed to ignore it.
by Ngofeen Mputubwele via Wired on August 21, 2023
People walking around and looking for rocks in front of the entrance to a cavernous mine in the bedrock.

Could This Be The End of a Historic New Hampshire Rockhound Paradise?

When Ruggles Mine went up for auction, mineral collectors feared it would never reopen to the public. After a last-minute reprieve, its future is still uncertain.
by Sarah Durn via Atlas Obscura on July 1, 2022
Museum diorama replica of miners eating.

How to Eat Like a 19th Century Colorado Gold-Miner

A confluence of cross-cultural foodways fed a series of Colorado’s mining booms, and can still be tasted across the state today.
by Ashawnta Jackson via Atlas Obscura on June 3, 2022

The Man Who Tried to Claim the Grand Canyon

Ralph H. Cameron staked mining claims around the Grand Canyon, seeking to privatize it. To protect his claims, he ran for Senate.
by Adam M. Sowards via JSTOR Daily on July 31, 2019

Historical Mining and Contemporary Conflict: Lessons from the Klondike

The local indigenous population was most affected by environmental change resulting from mining in the Klondike.
by Heather Green via NiCHE on May 2, 2018

The Strange Secret History of Operation Goldfinger

In the sixties, the U.S. government ran a secret project to look for gold in the oddest places: seawater, meteorites, plants, even deer antlers.
by James Ledbetter via The New Yorker on June 10, 2017
A postcard image of downtown Tonopah, Nevada ca. 1907.

Boomtimes Again: Twentieth-Century Mining in the Mojave Desert

A primary source set and teaching guide created by educators.
by Kerry Dunne via Digital Public Library of America on April 7, 2016
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Nuggets of Condescension

By universalizing their own economic history, Western observers have used the past to portray African economic culture as backward and inadequate.
by Bronwen Everill via HNN on December 17, 2024
Three workers taking a break inside a salt mine in the 1940s.

Salt of the Earth

In Winn Parish, an ancient salt dome has sustained life for centuries.
by Kelby Ouchley via 64 Parishes on September 1, 2024
A drilling crew in the Hawk's Nest Tunnel.

On Raymond Thompson’s “Appalachian Ghost”

Black miners were intentionally erased from the record of the Hawk's Nest Tunnel Disaster. A new book reinserts them into the narrative.
by Jody DiPerna via Belt Magazine on June 20, 2024
People celebrating the construction of the transcontinental railroad.

Lincoln’s Imagined West

In Lincoln’s view the West represented a space for opportunity, especially for the citizen-soldiers returning to their prewar pursuits.
by Cecily Nelson Zander via The Civil War Monitor on April 1, 2024
A young Black girl picking cotton.

Rings of Fire

Arsenic cycles through racism and empire in the Americas.
by Jayson Maurice Porter via Distillations on February 1, 2024
A few people are gathered at the Atoms For Peace bus, a mobile exhibit about nuclear power operated for a time by the Atomic Energy Commission. c. 1947.
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‘Atoms for Peace’ Was Never All That Peaceful—And the World Is Still Living With the Consequences

The U.S. sought to rebrand nuclear power as a source of peace, but this message helped mask a violent history.
by Tommy Song via Made By History on December 8, 2023
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The Richest Square Mile on Earth

Almost by accident, we find ourselves at the epicenter of the Colorado Gold Rush, which attracted prospectors to the Rockies a decade after the famous bonanza of ‘49.
by Ed Ayers on October 31, 2023
Marker at the Trinity test site in New Mexico.

Nolan’s Oppenheimer Treats New Mexico as a Blank Canvas

There is no acknowledgement in the film of the existence of downwinders from the test, in New Mexico or elsewhere.
by Kelsey D. Atherton via Source New Mexico on July 28, 2023
Chainlink fence in a desert with a danger sign warning of arsenic poison

The Toxic Legacy of the Gold Rush

Almost 175 years after the Gold Rush began, Californians are left holding the bag for thousands of abandoned mines.
by Leah Campbell via Gizmodo on May 15, 2023
Chuquicamata in Chile

The Transformative and Hungry Technologies of Copper Mining

Our own world is built from copper, and so too will future worlds be.
by Robrecht Declercq, Duncan Money via Edge Effects on March 16, 2023
Addressing the problem, some scientists believe, may require reimagining agriculture from the ground up.

Phosphorus Saved Our Way of Life—and Now Threatens to End It

Fertilizers filled with the nutrient boosted our ability to feed the planet. Today, they’re creating vast and growing dead zones in our lakes and seas.
by Elizabeth Kolbert via The New Yorker on February 27, 2023
People watching uranium mill waste blow in the wind.

The Cold War Legacy Lurking in U.S. Groundwater

A catalog of cleanup efforts at the 50-plus sites where uranium was processed for nuclear weapons, where polluted water and sickness were often left behind.
by Mark Olalde, Mollie Simon, Alex Mierjeski via ProPublica on December 3, 2022
Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake holds a news conference as she tours the U.S.-Mexico border on Nov. 4 in Sierra Vista, Ariz.
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Cochise County Didn’t Used To Be the Land Of Far Right Stunts

How the rural Arizona border county embodies the political shift in much of America.
by Katherine Benton-Cohen via Made By History on December 2, 2022
1851 map showing Mexico and Texas

The Dentist Who Defrauded Two Governments—and a Historian, Part I

What happens when forged documents enter the historical record?
by David McKenzie via Contingent on September 26, 2022
A field of manoomin - wild rice - in northern Minnesota, with water and trees in the background.

What Minnesota's Mineral Gaze Overlooks

The tendency to favor interest in resource extraction over the protection of the state’s waters, vital to the native Ojibwe population, has deep historical roots.
by Andrew Hoyt via Edge Effects on July 14, 2022
Book cover of "The Chinese Question The Gold Rushes and Global Politics"

Who Digs the Mines?

A new book recognizes the global character of Asian exclusion.
by Andrew Liu via London Review of Books on July 13, 2022
Picture of the statue of Black Hawk.

Remembering Black Hawk

A history of imperial forgetting.
by David R. Roediger via Boston Review on March 1, 2022
Antiquated image of two Indigenous people, against the backdrop of a settlement.

What Slavery Looked Like in the West

Tens of thousands of Indigenous people labored in bondage across the western United States in the 1800s.
by Kevin Waite via The Atlantic on November 25, 2021
A black and white photo of historian Mae Ngai.

“We’ve Always Had Activists in Our Communities”

May Ngai uses her experiences as an activist in the 1980s and her research on the 19th century Chinese diaspora to debunk stereotypes about Chinese Americans.
by Mae Ngai, Jilene Chua via Public Books on October 13, 2021
Photo of California gold fragment found by John Sutter in 1848

A Pacific Gold Rush

On the roads and seas miners traveled to reach gold in the United States and Australia.
by Mae Ngai via Lapham’s Quarterly on August 25, 2021
Tarred as a “coolie race,” the Chinese were cast as a threat to free white labor. Train with fire around it and a face in the back.

America Was Eager for Chinese Immigrants. What Happened?

In the gold-rush era, ceremonial greetings swiftly gave way to bigotry and violence.
by Michael Luo via The New Yorker on August 20, 2021
Miners with pick axes sit on rocks.

How Yellowcake Shaped The West

The ghosts of the uranium boom continue to haunt the land, water and people.
by Jonathan P. Thompson via High Country News on July 30, 2021
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