quote [ How a whip-wielding butcher became St. Nick's sidekick. ]

quote [ Originally going into production with the working title Black Panther, the filmmakers intended to cover the rise of the Black Panther Party?s Illinois chapter, with a focus on its charismatic leader, Fred Hampton. In the middle of production, the trajectory of the film pivoted quickly when, in the early dawn of December 4, 1969, at the direction of Cook County State?s Attorney Edward V. Hanrahan, officers raided Hampton?s apartment on Chicago?s west side, murdering Hampton and fellow Panther Mark Clark in their sleep. After Hampton was assassinated, the film suddenly became a two-part document of a stillborn revolutionary moment. The first half is an affecting portrait of Hampton; the leader is captured delivering speeches on social revolt and racism before large, rapturous crowds. The second part becomes an audacious piece of investigative journalism, making a compelling case that the police intentionally murdered Hampton, since they feared his oratorical power more than anything. ]

quote [ Inspired by a moment of empathy from President Theodore Roosevelt, the huggable toy had a rocky start before it became the stuff of legend ]

quote [ Near the village of Llanycefn, in Pembrokeshire, in south-west Wales, stands a small stone cottage. Legend has it that the cottage was built during the course of a single night following the tradition of t? unnos, which translates into English as ?house in one night?. ]

quote [ In the 1850s, as photography took its first steps toward commercial reproducibility, a more intimate use for light-sensitive plates briefly bloomed. It had a few names: heliographic drawing, photographic autography, or, as it is best known today, cliché-verre. Miya Tokumitsu takes us to the towns and forests of France where a group of friends began making marks on photographic plates, and finds their camaraderie cohere in lyrical arrangements of topography and light. ]

quote [ About 40 km southeast of Cairo, close to the town of Helwan, lie the ruins of the Sadd-el-Kafara, a large embankment dam built approximately 3,700 years ago. ]

quote [ In May of 1948, the British mandate ended, the British withdrew, Israel declared its independence and then was instantly attacked [by] Arab armies
During the war, there were massacres of civilians by Israeli forces. The most infamous was Deir Yassin, a village right on the outskirts of Jerusalem ...two Arab towns near Tel Aviv ? Lod and Ramle. ]

quote [ One of the ultimate icons of modernity and mass production must be the famously infamous wobbly plastic monobloc chair. Found across the globe, from homes to hospitals, gardens to grasslands, base camp Himalayas to frosty Antarctica, this migratory masterpiece of furniture has followed humanity to the far corners of the earth like a faithful hound. ]

quote [ At the mouth of the Singapore River, at a promontory known variously as Rocky Point and Artillery Point, there once stood a massive boulder 3 meters wide and 3 meters tall. The boulder was first discovered in 1819 by laborers clearing jungles at the behest of British officer Sir Stamford Raffles, who secured control over the island of Singapore in order to strengthen British?s presence in the region. ]

quote [ Well before the first climbing frame was patented as "jungle gym", mathematician Charles Hinton thought they might be able to teach kids four-dimensional thinking. ]