How New York City's tabloids sensationalized the murder case that inspired the classic film noir Double Indemnity.

The feared gang MS-13 was born out of conditions resulting from U.S. policies in El Salvador in the early 1980s.

Many abolitionists seeking to end slavery in the British West Indies were concerned less with human rights, more with the preponderance of what they saw as "interracial sex."

The things travelers bring home reflect their worldviews. In 19th c. Niagara Falls, souvenirs revealed problematic stereotypes about Native Americans.

For many immigrants to the U.S. in the late 19th century, July 4th was deeply significant: Their own home countries were fighting for independence.

For the frontier women of the 19th century, the experience of childbirth was harrowing, and even just expressing fear was considered a privilege.

Susan Fenimore Cooper, known as her father James Fenimore Cooper’s secretary, is now being recognized as one of the nation's first environmentalists.

The “gay, frolicsome and amusing" rhymes of 1970s American prison slang.

Why did David Clark lead a successful campaign to keep kids working in the early 20th century? For one thing, child labor benefited his interests.

A few miles off the coast of the Bronx is Hart Island, a potter's field where New York City's poor and unclaimed dead are buried.