April 13, 2022

SCIENCE TALES  What’s The Biggest Bee?  Okay, let’s get this out of the way. The biggest bee is Megachile pluto, also known as Wallace’s giant bee, and is four times larger than a honeybee, measuring about the length of a human thumb. The bee hadn’t been seen alive since 1981 and was feared lost, until researchers found the bee again in the Indonesian islands of North Maluku. They were thrilled. Who wouldn’t be? Unfortunately for them, things did not quite go as they’d hoped.  READ MORE → REVIVING AGRICULTURAL HISTORY A Franken-Forest of Fruit Trees On Governors Island, a five-minute ferry ride from Manhattan, there’s a fantasy orchard in the works. Art professor Sam Van Aken plans on opening a public park with 50 blossoming trees—not just any trees, though. Specifically, Van Aken is hoping to bring back an orchard containing rare varieties of peaches, plums, apricots, cherries, and apples, which is at once a breathtaking art installation and also a living library that documents New York’s lost agricultural history. READ MORE → ATLAS OBSCURA TRIPS 10% Off Select Trips Save 10% on over twenty of our trips departing before the end of June. Space is limited, so book today! Offer expires April 15. VIEW ALL DISCOUNTED TRIPS → ASHEVILLE, NORTH CAROLINA Odditorium A 17th-century bezoar, dirt from an infamous site, and other curios decorate this unusual bar. Between black walls saturated in red and purple lighting and a parade of entertainers, the Odditorium can feel as if Ripley’s Believe It Or Not collided with the backstage of a high school drama-club production. There are drag shows, burlesque nights, and comedy events; there’s live music ranging from Appalachian folk to punk to rap; there’s even an authentic Zoltar. READ MORE → ANIMAL BEHAVIOR Tracking Orangutans After Fires During the dry season, roughly March through October, the swampy ground in Borneo’s rainforests hardens, and trekking becomes relatively easy. But there’s another danger here—the swamps are made of peat, slowly decaying dead stuff that is highly combustible. The slightest spark can set the forest ablaze. That’s what happened in 2015, when fires ravaged Borneo’s rainforests and smoke smothered the habitat for months. Researchers are now investigating the dire long-term effects of these fires on orangutans, and how the animals changed their behavior in response. READ MORE → ATLAS OBSCURA COURSES The Art of Death Death is taboo, private, mysterious. In this five-part seminar, we’ll explore notions of death and dying around the world, drawing from biology, history, and beyond. We’ll learn about unusual practices in rituals surrounding dying, death, and mourning, and draw upon materials and experts in all kinds of death-related fields, from death doulas and morticians to scientists. ENROLL NOW → GIRVAN, SCOTLAND Snib's Cave Henry Ewing Torbet, also known as Snib Scott, lived as a hermit in Bennane Cave. As he never gave his own name, it is thought that he inherited the name Snib from the previous cave dweller. Torbet was born in 1912 and passed away in 1983, and for the last three decades of his life, the cave was his home. READ MORE → ANCIENT HISTORY The Amazon’s Oldest Burial Sites In 2019, in the Llanos de Moxos region of the Amazon rainforest in northern Bolivia, a team of researchers found what was perhaps one of the oldest burial sites ever discovered in southwest Amazonia. Five human burials, along with snail shells, fish bones, and mammal bones, were discovered in the region. The discovery could change what we understand about the rainforest’s ancient settlements, establishing the foundation for more complex societies in the region 10,000 years earlier than previously thought. READ MORE → TOMORROW - FREE MEMBERS-ONLY EVENT Global Moves: Learn Bhangra Join us tomorrow night to feel the exhilaration and joy of Bhangra during this edition of Global Moves, where we explore the world through movement and dance! Bhangra is a traditional Punjabi dance that was developed by Sikh farmers in Punjab. RSVP NOW → DEEP RIVER, CONNECTICUT The Grave of XYZ They were a gang of four: bank robbers who set their sights on the Deep River Savings Bank in 1899. Once the shooting was over, the number was down to three. The lead man, caught trying to pry open one of the bank’s tall windows, was shot and killed. With a body unclaimed by family or friends, the town buried him in Fountain Hill Cemetery where his small block of a headstone sits in a remote corner. It’s marked only with the initials “XYZ,” and for 40 years, people claimed to see a woman in black visiting his grave. READ MORE → GASTRO OBSCURA Wild Chickens Chickens as we know them are a human invention. The most common chicken species, Gallus gallus domesticus, owes its existence to the domestication of four species of wild jungle fowls, a group of colorful birds that once roamed the tropical forests of Southeast Asia. Today, poultry is the second most common type of meat around the world after pork. But most contemporary chickens no longer enjoy the freedom of their distant cousins. Massimo Rapella, a 48-year-old chicken farmer from northern Italy, is bent on changing that, and is helping chickens rediscover their wild side. READ MORE → SPONSORED BY DISCOVER SOUTH CAROLINA Tavern at Rainbow Row Historic letters and maps hand-drawn by a Scottish seafarer indicate that the exact location of today’s Tavern at Rainbow Row liquor store was a “Seafarer’s Tavern” as far back as 1686. It’s changed names and forms since then, but never stopped distributing booze (even during Prohibition), making the nation’s longest-operating liquor store the oldest commercial building in Charleston as well. LEARN MORE →