Charles River Editors

Uranium is best known for the destructive power of the atom bombs, which ushered in the nuclear era at the end of World War II, but given the effectiveness of nuclear power, nuclear power plants were constructed around the developed world during the second half of the 20th century.

Ancient Greece and its mythology has fascinated people for thousands of years, and few elements have intrigued people quite like the Eleusinian Mysteries....

During the first half of the 1st millennium CE, an empire arose in Persia that extended its power and influence to Mesopotamia in the east, Arabia in the south, the Caucasus Mountains in the north, and as far east as India.

Since the early days of human warfare, which may date back to the Stone Age, combatants have sought to gain an advantage through the acquisition of secret information. With the growth of technology, a parallel advantage was sought through the application of numerous types of torture....

As technological advances and the creation of flying aircraft became realities, the sighting of UFOs increased, as did the interest in potential contact with aliens....

The Partition of Ireland and the Troubles: The History of Northern Ireland from the Irish Civil War to the Good Friday Agreement analyzes the tumultuous events that marked the creation of Northern Ireland, and the conflicts fueled by the partition....

Since the Battle of the Little Bighorn, George Armstrong Custer has possessed one of the most unique places in American history....

Despite losing the 1948 War, Arab nations throughout the Middle East had still refused to recognize Israel’s right to exist. After the Suez Crisis, Egyptian leader Gamal Abdel Nasser envisioned creating a unified Arab world, commonly referred to as pan-Arabism....

The OSS and CIA: The History of America’s Intelligence Community during World War II and the Establishment of the Central Intelligence Agency looks at the agencies’ organizational characteristics, historical inception, early Cold War growth, and recent influence....

While people still romanticize the Wild West, many Americans are still all too familiar with the fate of the Donner Party....

Worship of the Feathered Serpent can be traced back 2,000 years, and the Serpent’s cults appear all across Mesoamerica. The Olmec, the Aztec, and both the Yucatec and K’iche Mayans all had different names for this deity, including Kukulkan, Q’uq’umatz, and Tohil....

Perhaps America's most innovative and prolific architect, the works of Frank Lloyd Wright are almost too vast and diverse to list....

The hurricane that struck Galveston, Texas, on September 8, 1900, made landfall with winds at 145 miles per hour. In the days before radio, few people knew about impending hurricanes....

Jesús de Nazareth fue un maestro judío de origen rural que vivió en el primer tercio del siglo I de nuestra era. Durante una celebración de la Pascua en Jerusalén fue condenado a la pena de muerte - específicamente crucifixión - por la autoridad imperial de Roma, que en ese momento tenía el control de su país....

Mysterious Polynesia: The Myths, Legends, and Mysteries of the Polynesians chronicles some of these remarkable stories, as well as lingering mysteries across the region. You will learn about Polynesia like never before....

To the Aztecs, Huitzilopochtli wore a blue-green hummingbird helmet and was draped in pure white heron feathers. He carried a smoking mirror, an obsidian mirror, a shield, darts, and the serpent Xiuhcoatl that carried with it the fury and might of the sun....

Historians believe that even Jim Bridger’s prodigious travels were eclipsed by that of New York-born Jedediah Strong Smith, whose uncharacteristic personal life set him apart from the rough-edged mountain man reputation....

Although the city had been destroyed, the legacy of the Persians survived, even as they mostly remain an enigma to the West and are not nearly as well understood as the Greeks, Romans, or Egyptians....

The early history of Earth covers such vast stretches of time that years, centuries, and even millennia become virtually meaningless. Instead, paleontologists and scientists who study geochronology divide time into periods and eras....

A lot of ink has been spilled covering the lives of history's most influential figures, but how much of the forest is lost for the trees....