County Kerry, Ireland is a windswept coastal region that is home to rolling hills, verdant fields, and mysterious dry stone beehive huts of unknown origin. The rounded beehive huts of Fahan—which are known as clochan—are some of the most well-preserved in all of Ireland. Visitors can explore the domed stone dwellings of the Dingle Peninsula…
In 1932, a fun-loving man named “Crawfish Eddie” Walker converted a small barge resting on a sand flat off the coast of Miami in Florida‘s Key Biscayne into a bait and tackle shop that served fresh seafood by day and functioned as a raucous gambling den that served copious amounts of bootlegged rum by night….
San Francisco, California, has long been celebrated as a haven for writers, musicians, and artists in search of a creative community. When beatniks started to drift into Northern California in the 1940s, some of them crossed the Golden Gate Bridge and landed in Sausalito, where a community of bayside floating homes that they helped popularize…
In the 1500s, German merchant Jakob Fugger became extravagantly wealthy. Historians estimate that, at the height of his success, Jakob Fugger’s fortune was valued at 400 billion USD. Fugger, often referred to as “Jakob the Rich,” is among the wealthiest people who ever lived. Moreover, Jakob Fugger was a devout Catholic who felt compelled to…
When Antoni Gaudi graduated from architecture school, the official who handed him his diploma famously remarked that Gaudi was either a genius or a fool. Gaudi’s fantastical Casa Batlló—which is the most distinctive house in a row of eccentric homes in Barcelona, often referred to as the “Island of Discord”—proves beyond a shadow of a…
From serving as suitable scenery for scary movies to keeping real-life secrets within its walls, the famous Sowden House knows how to attract both film enthusiasts and amateur detectives. In 1926, skilled architect Lloyd Wright designed this masterpiece of a house for painter and photographer John Sowden, who the Mayan-style residence is named after. The…
Artist and trash hauler Arthur Beal—who was also known as Captain Nitt Witt—lived by the old adage that one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. Captain Nitt Witt spent decades constructing a home in Cambria, California out of beer cans, bullet casings, and other natural and synthetic materials that he found along his garbage route….
Since the late 1700s, the World’s Fair has showcased the technological and cultural achievements of various countries around the world. In the early 20th century, the World’s Fair was a wildly popular event. In the early 1930s, the city of Chicago hosted a World’s Fair event called A Century of Progress which featured a handful…
