The Roman empire gave the world architectural and engineering feats like the Colosseum and aqueducts. Additionally, their intellectual contributions continue to shape how we think…
New technologies are later understood to have had a huge impact on history. Two related inventions, the vacuum tube and the electric microphone, utterly transformed modern life,…
Can you imagine a world without GPS, handheld electronics, and services like online banking and online dating? Our current tech-heavy world is heavily dependent on these advances…
The events of September 11, 2001, are seared into the memories of all who witnessed it, including the horrific spectacle of the twin towers’ collapse. Engineering allows us now to…
The James Webb Space Telescope launched at the end of 2021 and, since it reached its target destination, has graced observers on Earth with amazing images of objects from the…
The allure of true crime is undeniable, but some stories focus less on the victims and more on the perpetrators themselves. Are true crime aficionados contributing to the…
Urban legend or portal to another world? The Elevator Game purports to blur the lines of reality for players, if they follow the rules and don’t make a potentially fatal mistake.…
Many women have a harmless fascination with true crime, but there’s another category of individuals who develop sexual fixations on criminals themselves. There’s a name for it:…
As far back as our earliest depictions, we’ve imagined justice is about judgment, reward, and punishment. From the ancient Egyptians to today’s courtrooms, images of justice…
Known as the longest building in the world, the Great Wall of China is an impressive architectural feat. Encased within its walls lies a history of forced laborers and of the…
Marco Polo introduced the Far East to Europe. His travels fostered innovation and exploration for centuries. Do the facts bear him out, or was he a fraud who stole work from…
Julius Caesar altered the course of the Roman republic, yet the greatest impact he had came about in the aftermath of his assassination in 44 BCE. His death would change the…
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January will feature dozens of new releases on MagellanTV across all genres, from Space to True Crime, Ancient History to Nature, and much more. Check out some highlights and a…
December is a month for family and friends, and MagellanTV offers dozens of debuts in December, from Leonardo to the International Space Station – perfect for group viewing during…
Debuting a century ago, documentary films employed the newest camera systems to bring startling views of the world to their audiences. Today’s digital technology has allowed…
NASA revolutionized the trajectory of space exploration through its Apollo program in the 1960s and 1970s. Over four and a half years they sent a dozen men to the Moon, and…
There are, unfortunately, numerous extinction-level threats to Earth, but one for which we’re conspicuously unprepared is impact by an asteroid. However, many scientists are…
Saturn was visible to our ancestors, but its rings weren’t seen until Galileo took a look. The rings are made from remnants of moons, asteroids, and comets. Now, we wonder why it…
Is Pluto a planet? Astronomers agreed in 2006 to rename it a “dwarf planet.” But planetary scientists disagree. They say its status as a planet should never have been changed.…
Operation Pied Piper during World War II saw millions of people evacuated from Great Britain’s largest cities. The youngest generation to live through the war had their childhoods…
WWII gave rise to military tactics that targeted psychological weaknesses in the enemy. It redefined what constituted a battlefield. At the expense of civilians and civility,…
World War I shook mankind to its core as nations mobilized for a war unlike any other. A new age of carnage came about by technological advancements, but the causes of WWI…
Humans have waged wars for millennia, but is war ever justifiable? Just war theorists offer principles that explain when war is justified and how war should be conducted.
Famous for his exquisite poetry, and his notorious affairs, Lord Byron is also known today as the father of Ada Lovelace, considered to be the first computer programmer. Her…
He defeated Napoleon and saved Europe, but the British establishment wouldn’t acknowledge his love for the mother of his child. Admiral Nelson was smitten with Lady Hamilton.…
Venezuelan political activist Leopoldo López has sacrificed many things, including his freedom, to oppose the regimes that have caused endless misery for the people of his…
Over 900 people died gruesomely at Jonestown, a symbol of “doomsday” cults. Charismatic, autocratic Jim Jones ruled with brute force, leading his followers to madness and beyond.…
In retrospect, the American Civil War was inevitable. The conflict’s fundamental issue was human rights, and the basic cause was freedom. But these principles were made real by…
The history of the United States is complicated and often distressing. Public schools that ignore or gloss over the difficulties do a great disservice to the children who will…
The myth of Santa Claus began with a real-life monk named St. Nicholas, and evolved through the poetry and lore of Dutch immigrants, political propaganda during the American Civil…
A huge victory for American conservation came after magazine reporters witnessed the 1894 arrest of a notorious buffalo hunter in Yellowstone Park. Promoted ever since as a lucky…
What is Christmas without Santa Claus? The men interviewed for this article represent three different approaches to being Santa in contemporary America. Each of their stories is…
Jack London was the most successful American writer of the early 20th century, earning a fortune writing books that are still read today. He was also an accomplished photographer…
Zen meditation reached the U.S. from Japan after World War II. Broadly gaining followers in the 1960s, American Zen has become its own distinct stream of Buddhist practice,…
The hippies’ Summer of Love was seeded in the early 1960s and blossomed during 1967 – but it withered before year’s end. Here’s the incredible story behind why it flowered, how it…
The Monterey Pop Festival, an unprecedented gathering of young people and performers, many of them high on LSD, launched 1967’s Summer of Love, merged music and film, and…
One lesson of History is that hubris and military aggression are inevitably followed by defeat. Overestimating one's own power while underestimating the strength of an adversary…
The U-505 was taken on the high seas by a U.S. Navy task force through planning, valorous action, and a lot of luck. Slated for demolition after the war, it was saved again by a…
The geysers of Yellowstone National Park are magnificent to behold, as millions of tourists can attest. Intriguingly, such powerful natural phenomena may have contribute to the…
The ongoing well-being of insects is being threatened by worldwide habitat destruction, deforestation, the introduction of large-scale monoculture agriculture, and other factors.…
The movements of tectonic plates hundreds of millions of years ago created the geography of Earth as we know it today. The landforms left behind by shifting land and glacial paths…
Invasive species degrade biodiversity, incur large economic costs, and threaten indigenous plants and animals with potential extinction. Literally thousands of such species have…
Pearls are among the most sought after gems in the world. As an global phenomenon, they have defined a fashion sensibility spanning centuries. The humble beginnings of pearls…
I started out making ponds for fish and ended up attracting a bunch of green frogs (Lithobates ranidae), which I collectively named Fred. I came to learn that green frogs require…
A dog will change your life. But finding your next best friend will be based on one of two very different philosophies. It’s highly important to research your dog’s backstory and…
Take a step on the wild side and discover some of the coolest creatures you’ve never heard of. From Sparklemuffins to Jabiru storks, there are amazing and unbelievable animals all…
Many cancers have been shown to be related to lifestyle. To combat the risk, and to improve health, try changing a few habits. It may seem like a lot, but compared to the risk of…
We’ve had a fraught relationship with money for millennia. Money both reflects and determines value, and it’s often difficult to distinguish the two. Perhaps thinking about the…
Some of us are excited about the possibility of conscious computers, while others among us recoil in horror at the notion. But what does it mean to say that a computer could be…
Our unconscious mind controls many of our actions and our thoughts. But science-backed methods of influencing our brain, such as meditation and visualization, can put us back in…