Sunday, May 5

Tag: years

Lessons From My Grandfather, 100 Years After The Tulsa Race Massacre
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EDUCATION

Lessons From My Grandfather, 100 Years After The Tulsa Race Massacre

When Viola Fletcher, 107, appeared before Congress in May 2021, she called for the nation to officially acknowledge the Tulsa race riot of 1921. I know that place and year well. As is the case with Fletcher – who is one of the last living survivors of the massacre, which took place when she was 7 – the terror of the Tulsa race riot is something that has been with me for almost as long as I can remember. My grandfather, Robert Fairchild, told the story nearly a quarter-century ago to several newspapers. Here’s how The Washington Post recounted his story in 1996: “At 92 years old, Robert Fairchild is losing his hearing, but he can still make out the distant shouts of angry white men firing guns late into the night 75 years ago. His eyes are not what they used to be, but he has no trouble s...
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20 Years After The First Stellar Tourist Space Tourism Is Here – Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin Plans To Send Civilians To Space
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SCIENCE

20 Years After The First Stellar Tourist Space Tourism Is Here – Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin Plans To Send Civilians To Space

For most people, getting to the stars is nothing more than a dream. But on May 5, 2021, the 60th anniversary of the first suborbital flight, that dream became a little bit more achievable. Astronaut Tracy Caldwell Dyson on the International Space Station with a view many more are likely to see soon. NASA/Tracy Caldwell Dyson/WIkimediaCommons The space company Blue Origin announced that it would start selling tickets for suborbital flights to the edge of space. The first flight is scheduled for July 20, and Jeff Bezos’ company is auctioning off one single ticket to the highest bidder. But whoever places the winning bid won’t be the first tourist in space. On April 28, 2001, Dennis Tito, a wealthy businessman, paid US$20 million for a seat on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft to be the first tou...
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20 Years In The Making – Space Tourism Is Finally Ready For Launch
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TECHNOLOGY

20 Years In The Making – Space Tourism Is Finally Ready For Launch

For most people, getting to the stars is nothing more than a dream. On April 28, 2001, Dennis Tito achieved that lifelong goal – but he wasn’t a typical astronaut. Tito, a wealthy businessman, paid US$20 million for a seat on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft to be the first tourist to visit the International Space Station. Only seven people have followed suit in the 20 years since, but that number is poised to double in the next 12 months alone. NASA has long been hesitant to play host to space tourists, so Russia – looking for sources of money post-Cold War in the 1990s and 2000s – has been the only option available for those looking for this kind of extreme adventure. However, it seems the rise of private space companies is going to make it easier for regular people to experience space. From...
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How Dining Out Has Evolved Over 200 Years – From Haute Cuisine To Hot Dogs And Is Innovating Further In The Pandemic
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LIFESTYLE

How Dining Out Has Evolved Over 200 Years – From Haute Cuisine To Hot Dogs And Is Innovating Further In The Pandemic

Dining out has for generations been a fun way to celebrate special occasions, meet friends or just enjoy a quiet evening with someone special. But for many, that ended almost overnight last year as the spread of COVID-19 shuttered businesses and forced people to stay home. The restaurants that survived scaled down and reworked their operations. Many have had to close permanently. Since March 2020, over 110,000 – or about one out of every six restaurants in the U.S. – have closed. This has affected not only individuals, but the overall economy. In 2017 the profits of the restaurant industry were estimated at US$800 billion, which experts expect have shrunk substantially in the past year. As a food historian, I follow the impact of global events on food culture and practices. Starting in l...
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Safety Is Still Nuclear Power’s Greatest Challenge, 10 Years After Fukushima
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ENVIRONMENT, VIDEO REELS

Safety Is Still Nuclear Power’s Greatest Challenge, 10 Years After Fukushima

Ten years ago, on March 11, 2011, the biggest recorded earthquake in Japanese history hit the country’s northeast coast. It was followed by a tsunami that traveled up to 6 miles (10 kilometers) inland, reaching heights of over 140 feet (43.3 meters) in some areas and sweeping entire towns away in seconds. An International Atomic Energy Agency investigator examines Reactor Unit 3 at the damaged Fukushima Daiichi plant, May 27, 2011. Greg Webb, IAEA/Flickr, CC BY-SA This disaster left nearly 20,000 people dead or missing. It also destroyed the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station and released radioactive materials over a large area. The accident triggered widespread evacuations, large economic losses and the eventual shutdown of all nuclear power plants in Japan. A decade later, the nucl...
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50 Years Ago A Shootout Happen Between Black Panthers And Law Enforcement And Why It Matters Today
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SOCIAL JUSTICE

50 Years Ago A Shootout Happen Between Black Panthers And Law Enforcement And Why It Matters Today

In the early hours of Feb. 10, 1971, police surrounded a property in High Point, North Carolina, where members of the Black Panther Party lived and worked. In the ensuing shootout, a Panther and a police officer were both wounded. Members of the Black Panther Party outside the High Point property raided by police. Sonny Hedgecock/High Point Enterprise, CC BY-SA The incident did not receive much national attention at the time – armed conflict of this type was relatively common during the late 1960s and early 1970s. But 50 years on, as the U.S. reckons with a year that saw militarized police confront Black Lives Matter protesters and fail to prevent an attack on the U.S. Capitol, I believe the circumstances of this shootout are relevant today. As a historian who has interviewed participan...
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I Spent Years Actually Talking To Them – The Reality Of Black Men’s Love Lives And Marriages Is Very Different Than What’s Usually Shown On TV
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Journalism

I Spent Years Actually Talking To Them – The Reality Of Black Men’s Love Lives And Marriages Is Very Different Than What’s Usually Shown On TV

Finding and keeping a good Black man in a relationship has become a cottage industry. From celebrities and reality TV stars to social media influencers, for better or worse, there is no shortage of relationship advice to people seeking to figure out Black men. And while much of this content is understood to be for entertainment purposes only, some of it is presented and received as legitimate and data-driven. This is a problem because too many people cannot distinguish what they see onscreen from reality. Media portrayals are often hyperbolic and sensationalized to attract public attention. Equally troubling is that the majority of academic research in this area also perpetuates many of the same, negative patterns that are common in popular culture. As a graduate student and university ...
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For More Than 60 Years The Black Church Has Been Getting ‘Souls To The Polls’
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POLITICS, Religion

For More Than 60 Years The Black Church Has Been Getting ‘Souls To The Polls’

At Black churches up and down the U.S., religious slogans have been supplanted with another message in the run up to Nov. 3: Vote! The landscape of the 2020 general election has been dotted with efforts by the Black Church – churches that have traditionally had predominantly African American congregation – to encourage voter registration, mobilization and protect against efforts to suppress the vote. Under slogans including “Souls to the Polls,” “AME Voter Alert” and “COGIC Counts,” Black denominations and national bodies such as the Conference of National Black Churches have partnered with civil rights organizations including the NAACP in a concerted effort to increase voter turnout among African Americans. The push comes amid deliberate tactics to make it harder for Black and Latino A...
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The Arctic hasn’t been this warm for 3 million years – and that foreshadows big changes for the rest of the planet
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ENVIRONMENT, VIDEO REELS

The Arctic hasn’t been this warm for 3 million years – and that foreshadows big changes for the rest of the planet

Every year, sea ice cover in the Arctic Ocean shrinks to a low point in mid-September. This year it measures just 1.44 million square miles (3.74 million square kilometers) – the second-lowest value in the 42 years since satellites began taking measurements. The ice today covers only 50% of the area it covered 40 years ago in late summer. This year’s minimum ice extent is the lowest in the 42-year-old satellite record except for 2012, reinforcing a long-term downward trend in Arctic ice cover. Each of the past four decades averages successively less summer sea ice. NSIDC As the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has shown, carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere are higher than at any time in human history. The last time that atmospheric CO2 concentrations reached today’s level – ab...
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Homes in Black and Latino neighborhoods still undervalued 50 years after US banned using race in real estate appraisals
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VIDEO REELS

Homes in Black and Latino neighborhoods still undervalued 50 years after US banned using race in real estate appraisals

Racial inequality in home values is greater today than it was 40 years ago, with homes in white neighborhoods appreciating $200,000 more since 1980 than comparable homes in similar communities of color. Our new research on home appraisals shows neighborhood racial composition still drives unequal home values, despite laws that forbid real estate professionals from explicitly using race when evaluating a property’s worth. Published in the journal Social Problems, our study finds this growing inequality results from both historical policies and contemporary practices. In the 1930s, the federal government institutionalized a process for evaluating how much a property was worth. Often called redlining, this process used neighborhood racial and socioeconomic composition to determine home valu...
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