In 2020, a catastrophic Michigan dam disaster left Smallwood Lake drawn down; six years and a $50.2 million rebuild later, water is finally returning to 721 waterfront properties
Lake status as of July 21 Six years after a catastrophic dam disaster left Smallwood Lake drawn down in Michigan, water is finally returning to the lake. The refill began on August 4, following the completion of a $50.2 million rebuild of Smallwood Dam,…
68-year-old Sheila Consaul bought Ohio’s abandoned Fairport Harbor West Lighthouse for $71,010 in 2011, then spent 15 years and over $300,000 restoring it as an off-grid home
Sheila Consaul transformed Ohio’s abandoned Fairport Harbor West Lighthouse into a unique off-grid summer home. At 68, Sheila Consaul owns one of America’s most unusual homes, a century-old lighthouse standing in Lake Erie. During a conversation with…
Where has Lindsay Clancy been for the last 3 years? Inside her medical custody after her children’s deaths
Lindsay Clancy has spent most of the past three years in medical and psychiatric facilities rather than a regular prison. After the January 2023 deaths of her three children, she was first treated at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston before moving…
In 2016, an Indiana family bought a former bishop’s residence with its own private chapel; after nine years restoring it, the century-old home is listed for $1.28 million
The century-old home is listed for nearly $1.28 million (Image Credit: Maggie Patterson via PEOPLE) An Indiana family spent nine years restoring a historic home that once served as a Catholic bishop’s residence and contains an elaborate private…
A forgotten American photographer captured one of the earliest clear images of a total solar eclipse 175 years ago; the photograph changed eclipse science
Berkowski made this first solar eclipse photograph at the Royal Observatory in Königsberg, Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia). Image Credit: Johann Julius Friedrich Berkowski/Wikipedia A total solar eclipse is one of nature’s most dramatic sights, but 175…
In 1831, Thornton and Lucie Blackburn escaped slavery in Kentucky and fled to Canada; 154 years later, archaeologists uncovered their lost home
On a summer day in 1831, Thornton and Lucie Blackburn left Louisville with little certainty about what awaited them. They were enslaved, newly married and facing the possibility that Lucie could be sold away from her husband. Their escape began on a…
Ancient humans in Israel ate snakes and lizards 15,000 years ago; 3,000 bones reveal what was on the menu
At a cave on the slopes of Mount Carmel, thousands of small reptile bones accumulated alongside the remains of animals hunted and gathered by people more than 11,000 years ago. For years, their presence raised a straightforward but difficult question:…
In 1885, New Zealand released European hedgehogs as garden pest killers; 140 years later, DOC calls them a major threat to native wildlife and one can empty an endangered tern colony of nesting birds
European hedgehog (Image Credit: Canva) What was once seen as a useful garden helper in New Zealand has become an unexpected threat to some of the country’s most vulnerable wildlife. European hedgehogs were deliberately introduced to New Zealand in…
In 1944, a Vermont woman used money meant for a fur coat to buy a 150-acre farm; 20 years later she gave it to Audubon for wildlife conservation
Representative Image of a 150-acre Vermont landscape where a historic dairy farm has become a thriving nature preserve (AI-generated image) In 1944, Christine Hires, a member of the family behind Hires Root Beer, was vacationing in Vermont when she fell…
In 2020, a $186 million cleanup began at Minnesota’s Spirit Lake; four years later, 1.3 million cubic yards had been remediated and a 14-acre fish-spawning bay created
For over a century, the industrial engines of Minnesota’s Iron Range drove the economy of Duluth. Raw iron ore moved down through the St. Louis River basin, feeding massive manufacturing plants along the shore. But that industrial output came with a…