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A screencap from Looney Tunes featuring Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck.

Hungry Like the Rabbit

On the HBO Max streaming service, with their skipped numbers, the episodes omitted from the 31 seasons of Looney Tunes are easy to spot.
by James Panero via The Spectator on January 13, 2021
A collage including Betty Boop.

The Mixed-Up Masters of Early Animation

Pioneering cartoonists were experimental, satiric, erotic, and artistically ambitious.
by Adam Gopnik via The New Yorker on December 21, 2020
Wolfgang van Beethoven.

How Young America Came to Love Beethoven

On the 250th anniversary of the famous composer’s birth, the story of how his music first took hold across the Atlantic.
by Nora McGreevy via Smithsonian on December 16, 2020
A black and white picture of Bob Dylan

How Bob Dylan Wrote the Second Great American Songbook

The sale of the singer-songwriter’s catalogue is a reminder of his massive cultural legacy.
by Jeet Heer via The Nation on December 11, 2020
Alex Trebek at the Jeopardy host stand.

An Oral History of How Alex Trebek Became America’s Most Beloved Game-Show Host

Four decades of “Jeopardy!” contestants tell the story of Alex Trebek’s rise from affable Canadian TV host to cultural icon.
by Emily Yahr via Washington Post on November 17, 2020
A man in a t-shirt reading "Wanted: Jesus Christ"

The Protest Reformation

In the 1960s, youth counterculture spawned Christian rock.
by Johanna Fateman via Bookforum on November 11, 2020
A screenshot from the movie "You've Got Mail."

The Romance of American Clintonism

The politically complacent ’90s produced a surprisingly large number of mainstream American rom-coms about fighting the Man.
by Meagan Day via Jacobin on October 21, 2020
A magazine cover featuring a man with a rocket launcher.
partner

Fear of the "Pussification" of America

On Cold War men's adventure magazines and the antifeminist tradition in American popular culture.
by Gregory A. Daddis via HNN on October 11, 2020
Photo of Dolly Parton smiling.

The United States of Dolly Parton

A voice for working-class women and an icon for all kinds of women, Parton has maintained her star power throughout life phases and political cycles.
by Lauren Michele Jackson via The New Yorker on October 8, 2020
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott speaks during a news conference in Austin
partner

Though Often Mythologized, the Texas Rangers Have an Ugly History of Brutality

Teaching accurate history about white supremacy may be painful, but it's essential.
by Jonathan S. Jones via Made By History on September 21, 2020
Film depiction of airmail pilot from the 1940s; modern postal worker.

It’s Time to Make Postal Workers Heroes Again

Delivering the mail used to be sexy and thrilling. It can be once more.
by Jennifer Wilson via Slate on September 17, 2020

The Mod Squad, Kojak, Real-Life Cops, and Me

What I relearned (about well-meaning liberalism, race, my late father, and my young gay self) rewatching the TV cop shows of my 1970s youth.
by Mark Edward Harris via Vulture on September 8, 2020

Charles Averill’s The Cholera-Fiend: Fiction for a Pandemic

The 1850 novel reveals disturbing continuities between the 19th century cholera pandemics and global health crises today.
by Sari Alschuler, Paul Erickson via The Panorama on August 23, 2020
Great white shark

Sharks Before and After "Jaws"

The blockbuster "Jaws" (1975) provoked fear by portraying sharks as "mindless eating machines." But what did people think of sharks before then?
by Jess Romeo, Beryl Francis, Jennifer A. Martin via JSTOR Daily on August 14, 2020

The Long Reinvention of the South Bronx

Peter L'Official on the Mythologies Behind Urban Renewal.
by Peter L'Official via Literary Hub on August 3, 2020

The Complex Origins of Little Orphan Annie

"No one story can completely explain Annie."
by Jeet Heer via Literary Hub on August 3, 2020

Dylan, Unencumbered

"How long can it go on?"
by Katrina Forrester via n+1 on August 3, 2020
A printed advertisement for "The Bookman" depicting a fish reacting to "The Bookman" on a hook.

The Power of Flawed Lists

How "The Bookman" invented the best seller.
by Elizabeth Della Zazzera via Lapham’s Quarterly on July 27, 2020

Where Were You in ‘73?

In the turbulent 1970s, the balm of pop cultural nostalgia set the tone for today's political reaction.
by Jason Tebbe via Tropics of Meta on July 16, 2020
Carl Reiner on stage holding a microphone.

Carl Reiner’s Life Should Remind Us: If You Like Laughing, Thank FDR and the New Deal

Reiner, Stephen Colbert, Jordan Peele, Steve Carrell, Tina Fey, Julia Louis-Dreyfus: Their comedy descends directly from the Works Progress Administration.
by Jon Schwarz via The Intercept on July 4, 2020

Why We’ll Never Stop Arguing About Hamilton

Hamilton is an impossibly slippery text. The arguments over the show are part of what make it great.
by Aja Romano via Vox on July 3, 2020
A grilled cheese sandwich.

A Brief History of Comfort Food

Our newest culinary trend is also our oldest.
by Stacy Wood, April White via JSTOR Daily on May 30, 2020
Lou Gehrig holding a baseball bat

How Baseball Players Became Celebrities

Lou Gehrig and Babe Ruth transformed America’s pastime by becoming a new kind of star.
by Louis Menand via The New Yorker on May 21, 2020
Dr. Dre.

The Complicated Truths of Dr. Dre’s ‘The Chronic’

No rap album has quite the mythology attached to it—as a game changer, a king maker, a genre expander. But legends aren’t exactly fact.
by Justin Sayles via The Ringer on April 20, 2020
Graffito picture of Richard Nixon superimposed on lines an German text.

Richard Nixon, Modular Man

Even knowing every awful thing Richard Nixon would go on to do, you had to respect, as the phrase goes, his hustle.
by Phil Christman via The Hedgehog Review on April 6, 2020

The My Generation: An Oral History Of Myspace Music

Myspace changed the way we discovered music and fell apart after conquering the world.
by Michael Tedder via Stereogum on March 30, 2020
Stan and Mardi Timm show off Johnson Smith novelties they’ve collected. Stan wears X-Ray Spex and holds a Tark Electric Razor. Mardi wears a sailor’s hat that says “Kiss Me Honey I Won’t Bite” and holds a Little Gem Lung Tester and Bust Developer.

Fun Delivered: World’s Foremost Experts on Whoopee Cushions and Silly Putty Tell All

The Timms provide the history behind their collection of 20th century mail-order novelty items.
by Lisa Hix via Collectors Weekly on March 17, 2020
Drawing of earth encircled with celestial rings

The Protestant Astrology of Early American Almanacs

The wildly popular books helped people understand farming and health through the movement of the planets, in a way compatible with Protestantism.
by T. J. Tomlin, Livia Gershon via JSTOR Daily on March 15, 2020

How Film Noir Tried to Scare Women out of Working

In the period immediately following World War II, the femme fatale embodied a host of male anxieties about gender roles.
by Kristin Hunt via JSTOR Daily on March 12, 2020

An Oral History of the Members Only Jacket

On the fixture of white yuppiedom and icon of post-ironic millennial hipsterdom.
by Andrew Fiouzi via MEL on March 7, 2020
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