People

Michelle Obama's Dress Comes to the Smithsonian

The white chiffon dress that Michelle Obama wore to 10 inaugural balls will go on view at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History
March 05, 2010 | By Beth Py-Lieberman

Joyce Carol Oates Goes Home Again

The celebrated writer returns to the town of her birth to revisit the places that haunt her memory and her extraordinary fiction
March 2010 | By Joyce Carol Oates

How Dolley Madison Saved the Day

As invading British troops approached in August 1814, the first lady coolly took command of the White House
March 2010 | By Thomas Fleming

Abraham Lincoln, True Crime Writer

While practicing law in Illinois, Abraham Lincoln defended a man in a highly unusual case and later recounted the mystery as a short story
February 10, 2010 | By Laura Helmuth

Renoir's Controversial Second Act

Late in life, the French impressionist's career took an unexpected turn. A new exhibition showcases his radical move toward tradition
February 2010 | By Richard Covington

The Scurlock Studio: Picture of Prosperity

For more than half a century the Scurlock Studio chronicled the rise of Washington's black middle class
February 2010 | By David Zax

Woody Guthrie's Music Lives On

More than 40 years after the celebrated folk singer's death, a trove of 3,000 unrecorded songs is inspiring musicians to lay new tracks
January 05, 2010 | By Jim Morrison

A Forgotten Tennessee Williams Work Now a Motion Picture

Written in the 1950s, The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond was forgotten until it was recently adapted into a major motion picture
January 04, 2010 | By Chloe Schama

Sherlock Holmes' London

As the detective stalks movie theaters, our reporter tracks down the favorite haunts of Arthur Conan Doyle and his famous sleuth
January 2010 | By Joshua Hammer

The Truth About Lions

The world's foremost lion expert reveals the brutal, secret world of the king of beasts
January 2010 | By Abigail Tucker

Buckhannon, West Virginia: The Perfect Birthplace

A community in the Allegheny foothills nurtured novelist Jayne Anne Phillips' talent for storytelling
January 2010 | By Jayne Anne Phillips

Myths of the American Revolution

A noted historian debunks the conventional wisdom about America's War of Independence
January 2010 | By John Ferling

The Waldseemüller Map: Charting the New World

Two obscure 16th-century German scholars named the American continent and changed the way people thought about the world
December 2009 | By Toby Lester

The Glorious History of Handel's Messiah

A musical rite of the holiday season, the Baroque-era oratorio still awes listeners 250 years after the composer's death
December 2009 | By Jonathan Kandell

Artists' Homemade Christmas Cards

A new exhibition of seasonal greetings from artists such as Alexander Calder celebrates the handmade holiday card
December 2009 | By Abby Callard

Norman Rockwell's Neighborhood

A new book offers a revealing look at how the artist created his homey illustrations for The Saturday Evening Post
December 2009 | By Richard B. Woodward

Memoirs of a World War II Buffalo Soldier

In a recently published memoir written over 60 years ago, veteran James Daugherty details his experiences as an African-American in combat
November 06, 2009 | By Abby Callard

Decoding Jackson Pollock

Did the Abstract Expressionist hide his name amid the swirls and torrents of a legendary 1943 mural?
November 2009 | By Henry Adams

How Arlington National Cemetery Came to Be

The fight over Robert E. Lee's beloved home—seized by the U.S. government during the Civil War—went on for decades
November 2009 | By Robert M. Poole

Ansel Adams in Color

As a new book shows, not everything in the photographer's philosophy was black and white
November 2009 | By Richard B. Woodward

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