Who Is Sadie Hawkins — And Why Is a Dance Named After Her?

High school dance, 1950

Author Kristina Wright

January 22, 2026

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The Sadie Hawkins dance is a familiar tradition to most Americans, best known for the custom of girls asking boys to the dance instead of the other way around. In a world where women run businesses, lead governments, and head nearly half of U.S. households, setting aside one special night for girls to take the lead can feel unnecessary and outdated. Still, the story behind Sadie Hawkins herself offers a fascinating window into Depression-era America and the surprising ways popular culture can shape real-life traditions for generations.

Mind you, Sadie Hawkins wasn’t a real person. She was a comic-strip creation dreamed up in the late 1930s by cartoonist Al Capp for his wildly popular comic Li’l Abner. At its peak, Li’l Abner ran in 900 newspapers in the U.S., and it remained in print until 1977. Set in the rural town of Dogpatch, Kentucky, the strip was filled with broad satire and a large cast of quirky, unforgettable characters. Among them were the handsome and gullible Li’l Abner Yokum, his eternally patient sweetheart Daisy Mae Scragg, the perpetually unlucky Joe Btfsplk, and the scheming industrialist General Bullmoose. But Sadie Hawkins proved to be the character whose antics took her from the comics page into real-life.

Sadie Hawkins Day

Sadie Hawkins first appeared in Li’l Abner on November 15, 1937, initially as a secondary character. She was introduced as the “homeliest gal in all them hills,” an intentionally exaggerated description that played on the intense social pressure for women to marry young. Her father, Mayor Hekzebiah Hawkins, was distressed that Sadie had reached the age of 35 without a husband, a situation he viewed as both humiliating and urgently in need of correction.

To solve the problem, he invented Sadie Hawkins Day, a new local holiday with a peculiar edict. All eligible bachelors were required to run through Dogpatch while Sadie — who was an excellent runner — chased them. According to the rules, any man Sadie managed to catch before sundown was obligated to marry her.

The sight of panicked men sprinting to avoid matrimony while Sadie pursued them delighted readers. Sadie caught — and married — John Jonston, but what began as a one-off gag quickly became one of Li’l Abner’s most memorable storylines, with Capp featuring a new Sadie Hawkins Day race every year until 1952, when Daisy Mae finally caught her beau, Li’l Abner.

The Tradition Leaps Off the Page

The popularity of Sadie Hawkins Day quickly spread beyond the comic strip. Readers embraced the idea so enthusiastically that they began organizing real-life versions of the event. The first Sadie Hawkins-themed celebrations were hosted in 1938 and included mock chases inspired directly by the strip, with students dressing up as Li’l Abner characters. Prizes were awarded for the best costumes, and men who were “caught” were expected to accompany the women who caught them to the Sadie Hawkins dance. In 1939, Life magazine reported that 201 colleges and clubs in 188 cities had hosted Sadie Hawkins Day events, and that number grew to more than 500 by 1941.

Over time, the dance became the centerpiece of these celebrations. The events typically featured a reversal of traditional dating norms, with women expected — or at least permitted — to ask men to attend the dance with them. The idea spread so rapidly that many participants assumed Sadie Hawkins was drawn from folklore or history rather than a newspaper cartoon.

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Sadie Hawkins Day resonated because it tapped into real anxieties about courtship and marriage in early 20th-century America. Marriage was widely viewed as the primary measure of a woman’s success, and unmarried women beyond their 20s were often stigmatized and labeled as spinsters. Al Capp’s exaggerated portrayal of these pressures allowed readers to laugh while still recognizing the social truth beneath the joke.

The Sadie Hawkins storyline inspired a real-life social experiment that revealed how deeply entrenched traditional gender expectations were. By imagining a world where women could pursue men — even if only for a single day — it introduced a socially acceptable framework for a temporary role reversal. For many young women, a Sadie Hawkins dance — sometimes called a “turnabout,” as in the expression “turnabout is fair play” — offered a rare opportunity to take the initiative without defying social norms.

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Sadie Hawkins Today

As Sadie Hawkins Day settled into American school culture, it evolved into the dance event most people remember today. Some schools leaned into rustic or comic-inspired themes as a nod to Dogpatch, while others treated it simply as a fun reversal of traditional gender roles. Over time, the direct connection to Li’l Abner faded, but the name endured.

By the 1940s and ’50s, Sadie Hawkins dances had become a widespread social phenomenon that moved beyond college campuses to high schools and community groups across the country. Thousands of schools were hosting Sadie Hawkins or “turnabout” dances each year, making it one of the most common nonholiday social events on American school calendars.

Today, Sadie Hawkins dances are less ubiquitous than they once were, and dating roles have loosened considerably. Many schools have even retired the name, replacing it with events such as MORP dances — “prom” spelled backward — that keep the spirit of role-reversal while dropping the gendered framing altogether.It’s no longer taboo for a woman to ask a man to a dance, and being unmarried doesn’t carry the same stigma it once did. Yet when it comes to proposing marriage, tradition still holds firm. According to a 2022 survey, only 2% percent of heterosexual women in the U.S. propose to their partners. In that sense, Sadie Hawkins’ legacy still lingers, reminding us that while some social rules are easy to rewrite, others take much longer to change.

The Most Popular Dances in the 1800s

Dancing the quadrille, 1888

Author Tony Dunnell

January 22, 2026

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The American dance floor in the 19th century was a very different place than it is today — a far cry from TikTok dance challenges, flash mobs, and K-Pop-inspired choreography. It was a world in which European waltzes scandalized conservative society, Bohemian polkas spread like wildfire, and African American dances transformed the cultural landscape.

The 1800s were a century of great cultural exchange, both internationally and domestically. Dances traveled across oceans and crossed social boundaries, becoming more than just entertainment (or elaborate courtship rituals). Rather, they were social phenomena that reflected America’s cultural evolution. Here’s a fleet-footed look at five of the most popular dance movements that shaped America in the 1800s.

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The Waltz

The waltz arrived in the U.S. from Europe, bringing with it a wave of controversy. Prior to the waltz, most Americans — at least in high society — danced around each other without any real contact. The waltz was the first “closed” dance in which partners actually held each other — arm in arm, face to face, with their bodies close together.

In both Europe and the U.S., critics were aghast when the waltz first came on the scene, and they were swift to warn about what they saw as the dance’s sinful nature. The Gentleman and Lady’s Book of Politeness, published in Massachusetts in 1833, advised, “The waltz is a dance of quite too loose a character, and unmarried ladies should refrain from it in public and private.”

The criticism was all too little, too late, however. The waltz quickly revolutionized partner dancing by allowing couples to spin continuously around the dance floor in three-quarter time. Like many scandalous fads that once were thought to threaten the soul of the nation, it eventually became entirely acceptable. By the mid-19th century, the waltz was one of the most popular dances in America, helping to make physical closeness between dancing partners not just permitted but — as shocking as it may seem — even expected on the dance floor.

The Polka

Just as Americans were resigning themselves to the spread of the waltz, a new scourge arrived: the polka. The Bohemian folk dance exploded across Europe in the 1840s and quickly found its way to the U.S., leaving a trail of exhausted dancers, bewildered onlookers, and disapproving critics in its wake.

With its lively hopping steps and energetic two-four beat, the polka was a courtship dance with a democratic nature that most aristocratic dances didn’t possess, being relatively easy to learn and requiring more enthusiasm than refinement. The frowns of the upper class were not enough to discourage young members of the elite from polkaing, however, and the dance quickly spread through all levels of society, from the ballrooms of the upper crust to the dance halls of the working class.

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The Quadrille

While the waltz and polka surged in popularity, some people still preferred their dancing a little more restrained. The quadrille offered all this and more — a perfect social mixer for those who enjoyed memorizing complex dance instructions while wearing uncomfortable shoes.

The dance originated in elite Parisian ballrooms and was picked up by English aristocrats in the early 1800s. It then found its way to America, becoming one of the most popular dances during the latter decades of the century. Typically performed by four couples arranged in a square, the quadrille consisted of five or six different figures, or dance steps, performed in succession, each with its own specific music. The dance greatly influenced the development of American square dancing, which still has moves — allemande, promenade, do-si-do — that reflect the original French influence.

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The Cakewalk

The cakewalk is arguably the most significant American dance of the 19th century — and certainly one of the most culturally complex. It originated on Southern plantations when enslaved people created an elaborate parody of the ballroom dances of their enslavers. They dressed in their finest clothes and performed mocking imitations of European formal dances (particularly a couple dance called the Grand March), adding exaggerated high steps, theatrical bows, and backward tilts of the head — all in a highly satirical manner.

Plantation owners sometimes came to watch these dances and even served as judges for contests. They would present cakes as prizes for the best dancers, often blissfully unaware that the performers were mocking them. After the Civil War, the cakewalk surged in popularity, and by the 1870s it had gone mainstream, marking the first time an African American dance had achieved national exposure. Yet the cakewalk became a staple of minstrel shows where white performers left out the satire and instead used the dance to perpetuate racist stereotypes, often performing in blackface, complicating the legacy of this influential dance.

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The Two-Step

By the end of the 1890s, America had created its own ballroom dance sensation: the two-step. Its exact origins are unclear, but it was likely influenced by earlier dances such as the waltz, polka, and galop. The evolution of these dances into a two-step is often attributed to the music of the famous composer John Philip Sousa. In 1889, one of his most popular compositions, “Washington Post March,” took the country by storm — but none of the existing dances matched its rhythm. So, eager dancers developed the two-step, a relatively simple and accessible dance (especially compared to the likes of the quadrille) that went perfectly with the march. It marked a shift in American dance culture, especially among a new generation who increasingly viewed the old European dances as relics of a bygone era.

7 Everyday Office Items You Never See Anymore

Vintage overhead projectors

Author Nicole Villeneuve

January 14, 2026

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American office life once looked very different than it does today. Through clouds of cigarette smoke, you’d see lines of desks in open-area bullpens or, starting in the late 1960s, separated by cubicles. It was common to find typewriters and many other analog gadgets on desktops through much of the 20th century before bulky early computers took over in the 1990s.

Technology, of course, continued to advance, and as office work itself became faster, more specialized, and increasingly online, many formerly essential workplace objects faded into obscurity. Here are seven once-common office fixtures that have all but vanished with time.

Rolodexes

Before contact information lived in the cloud, it was kept in a Rolodex. Patented in 1956 by the New York office supply company Zephyr American, the Rolodex took its name from a simple idea: a rolling index of contacts. A small wheel mounted on a rotating base held index cards that kept names, numbers, and notes accessible and easy to update with the turn of the knob. Simple, yes — and also one of the most iconic office supplies of all time.

By the 1960s and ’70s, Rolodexes were standard issue on desks in sales offices, C-suites, and newsrooms. A well-used Rolodex was highly valuable; it signaled a robust professional network that was carefully built and maintained over many years. Throughout the 1980s and ’90s, lawsuits were even filed over employees copying or taking Rolodexes upon leaving a company.

As computers (and eventually smartphones) took hold, the Rolodex’s role faded, but the item never entirely went away. Today, the term “Rolodex” remains shorthand for a person’s collection of contacts, and as recently as 2013, Newell Brands, which manufactures Rolodexes, claims that consumer demand has remained high.

Projectors

For much of the 20th century, no office presentation felt complete without the whir of a projector. Primitive projection devices such as the “magic lantern” had existed since the 17th century, but projectors didn’t become a common tool until the mid-20th century. During World War II, the U.S. Army relied on overhead projectors for training, a practice that helped usher the technology into civilian life after the war.

Offices (and classrooms) quickly embraced the product. Overhead projectors relied on a lamp and a flat glass surface to cast clear transparencies onto walls or screens. They were used to share charts, diagrams, or notes, or even collaborate by writing on the transparencies in real time.Starting in the 1960s (or earlier for some bigger companies), slide projectors filled a similar, but more polished, role. Using 35 mm slides arranged in carousels, they became staples in flashy sales pitches, their signature clacking sound immortalized in the memorable Mad Men episode “The Wheel” in 2007.

By the late 1990s, digital displays and computer software such as Microsoft’s PowerPoint, with its familiar slideshow functionality, rendered both formats all but obsolete.

Punch Clocks

Punch clocks were fixtures in all kinds of workplaces through the late 19th and 20th centuries, from factories to retail stores and, of course, offices. They emerged during the Industrial Revolution, when expanding workforces and hourly wages made keeping track of time a growing necessity. In the late 1800s, inventors began developing mechanical time recorders that stamped the time an employee arrived or left onto a paper card, turning time into something that could be monitored and paid out.

By the mid-20th century, punch clocks had become nearly universal in the workplace, replacing the timekeepers who manually tracked employees’ hours. Wall-mounted units with knobs or levers and slots for inserting cards sat beside rows of time cards. Some models rang bells; others used different colored ink for employees who were punctual and those who were late. As digital technology emerged in the 1980s and ’90s, paper cards and mechanical punches were replaced with online timesheets and the now-ubiquitous swipe badges.

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Carbon Copy Paper

Every time we copy someone on an email, we’re technically recalling a vintage office relic. The “CC” line traces its origins to carbon paper, once an essential tool for making duplicates of documents. Invented in the early 1800s and widely used by the end of the century, carbon paper was coated on one side with a mixture of black carbon and wax. It would be sandwiched between a piece of paper that was being written or typed on, and another underneath. Whatever text was on the top piece of paper transferred onto the page on the bottom — along with some smudges here and there. This was known as a carbon copy, the origin of “CC.”

Modern photocopiers arrived in offices in 1959 when Xerox debuted its 914 model. While it was certainly revolutionary, the machine remained expensive — it sold at about $29,500 a pop, which is almost $330,000 today — and was prone to catching fire. Needless to say, carbon paper didn’t disappear overnight, but by the end of the 1980s, copiers were streamlined and printers were accessible to most workplaces. Today, carbon copy paper remains relegated to specialty stationery stores that cater to niche clientele.

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Adding Machines

Much to the chagrin of math teachers everywhere, arithmetic is something most of us outsource to a screen today. But before computers, somewhere between the abacus and the calculator was the adding machine. Early versions were imagined as far back as the 17th century, but reliable models didn’t appear until the late 19th century. In 1888, William Seward Burroughs, a former New York bank clerk (and grandfather of famed Beat writer William S. Burroughs), patented an adding machine that could accurately total long columns of numbers and print the results.

Burroughs called his machine the Arithmometer, and after gaining international attention at the 1900 Paris Exposition, it quickly took off. Within 10 years, an estimated 100,000 office workers in payroll, accounting, billing, and other departments counted on their adding machines. Electronic calculators arrived in the mid-20th century, and by the 1970s, microchip-powered devices made adding machines and their signature keystroke sounds a relic of the past.

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Pneumatic Tubes

When The Jetsons debuted in 1962, it envisioned a world of futuristic conveniences such as robot maids and flying cars. One of the predictions for the year 2062 was that air-pressurized tubes would transport people like high-speed elevators. It wasn’t entirely science fiction: At the time, pneumatic tubes were quite common in offices, quickly ferrying documents, cash, and small parcels between rooms and floors.

A person would drop a cylinder into a tube, and, after traveling at an air-pressurized speed of 24 feet per second, it would arrive at its destination shortly after. Entire transactions could happen almost instantly, making the tubes both practical and a bit magical. In their earliest days in the mid-1800s, these networks were indeed conceptualized as realistic transportation for humans and vehicles. Ultimately, that proved an impractical feat. Today, pneumatic tubes survive primarily in hospitals or, famously, as a trash removal system at Walt Disney World.

Dictaphones and Dictation Rooms

There was a time when important office correspondence wasn’t emailed, but spoken out loud. Early recording devices such as the Dictaphone, trademarked in 1907, allowed voices to be preserved on wax cylinders or magnetic tape for later playback. Managers dictated their intended documents aloud and typists produced them on the page. Some industries, including medicine and law, even maintained dedicated dictation rooms.

Word processors and personal computers began to disrupt this process in the late 20th century, putting drafting, editing, and formatting directly into the hands of the person composing the document. While dictation rooms have largely disappeared, dictation itself has not: Doctors and lawyers still rely on it today; only now, digital recorders and smartphone apps handle the transcription automatically, folding a once larger office workflow into a single device.

What Was Stonehenge’s Actual Purpose?

Stonehenge, Wiltshire, England

Author Tony Dunnell

January 13, 2026

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For thousands of years, Stonehenge has stood on England’s Salisbury Plain, shrouded in mist and mystery, its massive stones arranged in circles that continue to puzzle archaeologists and visitors alike. Built around 4,500 years ago — around the same time as the Sphinx and the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt — this historic monument has inspired many theories as to its purpose. Was it an ancient observatory? A burial ground? Or something else entirely?

As Stonehenge was built by a Neolithic culture that left no written records, little is known for sure about its origins. The first significant surveys and excavations of the monument were made by English antiquarians John Aubrey and William Stukeley in the late 1600s, and it was they who first suggested the Druids as the most likely engineers — a myth that stuck (and is widely repeated even today), despite Stonehenge predating the Druids by more than a thousand years. People have studied the site ever since and further discoveries are still being made, expanding our knowledge regarding who exactly may have built Stonehenge and why. And recent research suggests its purpose was more complex than anyone imagined.

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An Astronomical Calendar

The idea of Stonehenge as an astronomical observatory has been around for a long time. As far back as the late 18th century, the antiquarian and polymath James Douglas concluded that the monument must have been an ancient solar temple due to its alignment with the midsummer sunrise. The theory of Stonehenge as some kind of Neolithic calendar gained traction from there, prompting many similar studies, including research in the 1960s when computers were used to make more precise calculations.

Archaeological studies have proved that solstitial alignment was almost certainly a consideration of the people who built Stonehenge. It appears, however, that marking the summer solstice was not the priority. Due to the form and layout of Stonehenge, many archaeologists now believe that midwinter was the more important marker — which makes sense given that winter was the most challenging time of year for ancient agricultural communities.

A Cemetery for the Elite

It’s clear that Stonehenge was closely associated with the dead — the collection of Neolithic cremated human remains discovered at the site is the largest in Britain. In 2013, archaeologist Mike Parker Pearson and his team excavated more than 50,000 bone fragments from 63 individuals buried at Stonehenge. Certain high-status artifacts found at the site, such as a mace head and what may have been an incense bowl, suggest that the people buried there were significant religious and political leaders, along with their families. The researchers also suspect that the burial ground could have been used by a single royal family over many generations.

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A Healing Center

In 2008, two of Britain’s leading archaeologists and world-renowned Stonehenge experts, Timothy Darvill and Geoff Wainwright, proposed a slightly controversial yet compelling new theory: Stonehenge was a site of healing, like a prehistoric Lourdes. The key to their theory is the presence of bluestones at the site — the smaller stones that form the inner circle of Stonehenge. These stones came from the Preseli Hills in Wales, more than 150 miles away, where they were associated with healing springs believed to be imbued with mystical properties. It was because of their healing properties, Darvill and Wainwright argue, that people went to such great lengths to drag the stones all the way to Salisbury Plain.

To support their claim, they point toward the large amount of bluestone chips scattered around Stonehenge, suggesting people had broken off pieces to heal themselves. They highlight one specific case, that of the “Amesbury Archer,” whose tomb was discovered near Stonehenge. Analysis revealed that the archer came from central Europe and suffered from a knee injury and infected jaw. He died around 2300 BCE, the same time the bluestones arrived at Stonehenge. Wainwright and Darvill speculate that he came to Stonehenge in search of healing.

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A Monument of Unity

The idea of Stonehenge as a place of worship has been around for centuries (albeit erroneously connected with Druids). Recent research, however, suggests that the site may have been a sacred gathering place of far greater significance than previously thought.

In 2024, new analysis revealed a truly astounding discovery: The central, 13,200-pound bluestone at Stonehenge was not brought from Wales, but was dragged (or perhaps floated) to the site from the far northeast of Scotland, a distance of at least 466 miles. With this in mind, researchers at University College London and Aberystwyth University, led by archaeologist Mike Parker Pearson, proposed a new theory: Stonehenge may have been built to unite early British agricultural communities.

Parker Pearson suggests that the large altar stone may have been brought all the way from a distant Scottish monument as a gift, or perhaps as a marker of political alliance or allegiance. If true, this would make Stonehenge a political monument as much as a religious one — a physical embodiment of unity among Britain’s diverse Neolithic communities.

While the full truth about Stonehenge may be lost to history, archaeologists continue to unearth tantalizing details about the monument’s purpose. And it now seems that Stonehenge was not limited to one specific role, but may have served a number of overlapping purposes, both practical and symbolic.

Why Do We Dial 911 for Emergencies?

Atlanta EMS and police, 1981

Author Tony Dunnell

January 13, 2026

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When Americans find themselves faced with an emergency situation, they instinctively reach for their phones to dial 911. These three digits are ingrained in the collective consciousness. Even toddlers know the number — take, for example, the case of little A.J. Hayes, a 3-year-old who made a lifesaving 911 call after his father accidentally stabbed himself with a chisel. Today, it’s hard to imagine any other number being used in times of crisis.

But not all that long ago, no universal emergency number existed in the United States. Instead, people had to call their local police station or fire department directly, sometimes desperately fumbling through phone books to find the correct number. It wasn’t until the 1960s that 911 was created, revolutionizing emergency response in the country. But why were these three particular numbers chosen?

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A Nationwide Emergency Number

Up until the mid-20th century, there were two main ways Americans could get in touch with emergency services: by calling their local fire department or police precinct directly, or by pressing “0” for the operator. Both options were time-consuming, confusing, and unreliable. People were often unsure where exactly to call, and there was no guarantee that a police station would actually pick up.

In 1957, the National Association of Fire Chiefs recommended that a single set of numbers be used for reporting fires, as precious seconds — if not minutes — were being lost when panicked citizens struggled to find the right number. Then, in 1967, the President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice, established by President Lyndon B. Johnson, recommended the creation of a nationwide number for reporting emergencies. After all, the United Kingdom had been using its universal emergency number, 999, since 1937 (it was the first country in the world to roll out such a system)— so, why wouldn’t America do the same?

Why 911?

In 1968, in response to growing calls for a single emergency number, the Federal Trade Commission and AT&T announced that they had decided on a new, universal three-number sequence for emergency calls: 911. The number was chosen to satisfy multiple criteria. Most importantly, it was short, easy to remember, and quick to dial. On the rotary phones used at the time, “9” and “1” were both relatively easy to find, even in the dark. Dialing 911 was also faster than the 999 used across the pond, as “9” takes slightly longer to dial than “1” on a rotary phone. With the numbers being at opposite ends of the dial, it also meant that accidentally dialing 911 was less likely.

Another important characteristic in 911’s favor was its uniqueness — it had never been previously authorized as an office code, area code, or service code. According to the National Emergency Number Association, the choice of 911, purely on a technical level, “best met the long-range numbering plans and switching configurations of the telephone industry” at the time.

In other words, 991 didn’t conflict with any existing or planned numbers, and could be programmed into existing switches without major overhauls, meaning it was a good fit for both the existing telephone infrastructure and the industry's plans for future expansion. What’s more, AT&T had already helped standardize numbers such as 411 (the number for directory assistance), allowing it to use the same preexisting telephone system infrastructure to process and route 911.

A Slow Rollout

For the public, 911 was brief, catchy, and very easy to dial. And for the telephone industry, it offered a relatively hassle-free implementation. Dialing 911 would access a central operator that then routed to local emergency services by mapping landline phone numbers to addresses (or today, using location data from your cellphone). The nationwide rollout, however, proved to be a slow process.

The new universal emergency number was first dialed in 1968, but it took decades until most of the country could use it. One major obstacle was the fact that the new 911 number only worked through Bell System telephone companies — all of the nation’s independent phone companies, of which there were many, were not included in the emergency telephone plan. Local jurisdictions also had to fund the infrastructure upgrades, and some of them simply didn’t think the cost was worth it. By 1976, only 17% of the population had access to the service, rising to just 50% a decade later.

Eventually, however, 911 made its way across the United States, becoming arguably the most memorized and instantly recognizable number in the country. Today, around 240 million calls are made to 911 in the U.S. each year — more than 650,000 emergency calls every single day.

7 ‘Historical’ Movies That Got It Wrong

“The Last Samurai,” movie 2003

Author Michael Nordine

January 13, 2026

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Depending on whom you ask, historical accuracy isn’t always necessary when it comes to making a good historical movie. Some filmmakers consider it important, but not as important as telling a compelling story; others dismiss the notion entirely. The movies on this list belong in the latter category and have been widely criticized by historians as a result — though many of them proved quite popular with audiences despite (or perhaps because of) their deviations from the historical record.

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300 (2007)

At its core, 300 is based on the genuinely amazing true story of roughly 7,000 Greek warriors (including 300 Spartans) holding off somewhere between 70,000 and 300,000 Persian soldiers at the Battle of Thermopylae. Given that it’s a Zack Snyder adaptation of a graphic novel by Sin City author Frank Miller, however, the verisimilitude ends there. Not that 300, with its mythical creatures and saturated color palette, was ever pretending to be the least bit realistic. So deeply silly that it can’t help being a bit charming here and there, the movie spawned a less successful sequel and at least one memorable scene that was quoted endlessly throughout the rest of 2007 and beyond.

Anonymous (2011)

There are a lot of good reasons to watch a Roland Emmerich movie, but historical accuracy isn’t one of them. The director of Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow, and Moonfall (in which the moon literally falls out of the sky) is among our finest purveyors of high-concept popcorn flicks, but a historian he is not. That made him a strange choice to helm a movie like Anonymous, which promotes the long-discredited theory that Shakespeare didn’t write his own plays. It instead posits that one Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, did, with Rhys Ifans playing the courtier who secretly moonlights as a literary genius. In addition to its central premise being bogus, the movie gets so many other basic historical details wrong that its Wikipedia page has an entire subchapter devoted to “Other departures from fact.”

Braveheart (1995)

Does the “Freedom!” scene still get the pulse going? Absolutely. Did it actually happen? Almost certainly not. The same can be said of pretty much everything else in Braveheart, which Mel Gibson both directed and starred in as Scottish folk hero William Wallace. The movie is wildly, famously inaccurate, beginning with its name: Wallace was not known as Braveheart; that nickname belonged either to King Robert the Bruce or to no one at all. The belted plaid, kilts, and blue face paint aren’t based on anything factual either, nor were several of the battle sequences.

Elizabeth Ewan, who teaches Scottish studies and history at the University of Guelph, has said that the movie “almost totally sacrifices historical accuracy for epic adventure.” Sharon L. Krossa, an expert on medieval Scotland, was even more blunt: “The events aren’t accurate, the dates aren’t accurate, the characters aren’t accurate, the names aren’t accurate, the clothes aren’t accurate — in short, just about nothing is accurate.” The general public didn’t appear to care in the least. Braveheart spent nine consecutive weeks atop the box office on its way to earning $213 million worldwide, won four Oscars (including Best Picture and Best Director), and led to an increase in Scottish tourism.

The Last Samurai (2003)

In a nice bit of intertextuality, one of The Last Samurai’s key scenes refers to the same ancient battle that inspired 300 — inaccurate movies think alike, it seems. Jonathan Dresner, an expert in East Asian history, penned an article describing the film as a “historical disaster” — a fair assessment of a movie positing that the last survivor of Japan’s legendary warrior caste was not a native samurai but rather a disenchanted Civil War veteran played by Tom Cruise. While acknowledging that “some of the background to the story is reasonably true to life,” Dresner pointed out that “almost everything else” is wrong. That didn’t prevent Edward Zwick’s admittedly effective historical epic from earning $455 million at the box office and four Academy Award nominations, however.

The Patriot (2000)

Bringing together two masters of historical inaccuracy in director Roland Emmerich and star Mel Gibson, The Patriot is uniquely off the mark in its depiction of the Revolutionary War. In a review of the movie, The Telegraph opined that “truth is [the] first casualty in Hollywood’s war.” Indeed, the film exaggerates the extent of British soldiers’ cruelty (no, they never locked women and children in a church before setting it on fire) and neglects to mention that the real-life figure who most inspired its protagonist was an enslaver. Among its fiercest critics was Spike Lee, who wrote in a letter to The Hollywood Reporter that “for three hours, The Patriot dodged around, skirted about, or completely ignored slavery.” He also called it “pure, blatant American Hollywood propaganda” and “a complete whitewashing of history.”

Pearl Harbor (2001)

“I miss you more than Michael Bay missed the mark / When he made Pearl Harbor,” goes one of Team America’s catchiest songs. Historical inaccuracy is only part of the song’s issue with Bay’s poorly received epic, but it’s an important one. There are exhaustive lists of every error and anachronism in Pearl Harbor, which is infamous for getting just about everything wrong — including basic storytelling. Writing for the Society of Military History, Evan Sarantakes decided it was simpler to list what the movie got right: “There was a U.S. naval base in Hawaii, it was called Pearl Harbor, the Japanese did attack with planes on December 7.”

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Pocahontas (1995)

There is precisely zero evidence that Pocahontas and John Smith (who was at least 17 years her senior) were ever in a romantic relationship, as portrayed in the 1995 animated Disney film about this influential Powhatan woman. Pocahontas did marry an English colonist, but his name was John Rolfe. (In a coincidence, Christian Bale, who played Rolfe in Terrence Malick’s The New World, also voiced a character in Disney’s Pocahontas.) There’s also the fact that the title heroine’s real name was Amonute, whereas Pocahontas was merely a nickname meaning something like “little wanton” or “playful one.” Roger Ebert wasn’t impressed by these deviations: “Having led one of the most interesting lives imaginable,” he wrote in his review of the Disney film,” Pocahontas serves here more as a simplified symbol.”

For similar articles, subscribe to our sister brand Movie Brief, brought to you by our resident film critic Michael Nordine. You’ll receive a weekly review and recommendation of a new movie, whether in theaters or available to stream, as well as a list of 25 must-see movies when you first sign up.

What Were Wild West Saloons Really Like?

Playing poker in a saloon

Author Timothy Ott

January 8, 2026

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Anyone who’s frequented the movies or spent time in front of a TV over the past 70 years probably has a deeply embedded idea of what the inside of a typical Wild West saloon looked like. After all, it’s a setting where countless swaggering sheriffs and perhaps an antihero with no name have breezed through swinging doors to encounter shifty-looking cowboys playing cards and a piano player banging out a jaunty tune from the corner before the place inevitably gets upended by a shootout or furniture-smashing brawl.

Of course, Hollywood is notorious for playing up dramatic elements over an adherence to historical accuracy, as well as for rehashing popular ideas to the point where certain characters and outcomes become tropes. So how valid is this media-driven conception of the Old West watering hole?

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Early Saloons Were Bare-Bones Establishments

As detailed in Richard Erdoes’ Saloons of the Old West, American saloons first came into existence when pioneers began pushing westward in greater numbers in the early 19th century, and they weren’t even commonly known by the term “saloon” until the 1840s.

Like the dwellings in many of the early U.S. settlements, the first saloons provided the barest of essentials for those who were temporarily looking to forget the hardships of their rugged lives on the frontier. Many were simply a tent or a lean-to erected over a barrel of whiskey, with perhaps boards laid across empty barrels to serve as tables.

As a settlement became more established, its saloons went from temporary setups to more permanent structures built from local materials. Many were made of wood, while those in areas with scarce timber were built from sod or stone.

Swinging Doors and Wooden Counters

By the 1850s, the saloon had progressed from its primitive beginnings and was beginning to resemble the locale that persists in popular imagination.

Its entrance was guarded by the familiar batwing doors that pushed open from the middle. Although there was space to peer above and below the swinging doors, they were generally kept shut to help protect the privacy of customers. Most saloons had an additional set of doors with which to lock the premises, although some remained open for all hours of the day.

Once inside, a customer would typically spot the bar positioned on the left. This would be fronted by the wooden counter, which could reach several dozen feet in length and be made from sturdy oak, mahogany, or walnut in a more reputable establishment. Behind it stood one or more bartenders, often rough characters to handle the customers who got more unruly with successive drinks, but also known to be snazzily dressed with brocaded vests and diamond pins in the high-end venues.

Below the counter were a series of hanging towels with which to wipe one's mouth or facial hair, while a brass rail typically ran along the base of the bar. Close by the rail, stationed at strategic points along the sawdust-covered floor, were spittoons for the tobacco-chewing patrons to dispose of their mouthfuls.

Behind the counter rose the backbar or altar, which was lined by various bottles of rye, bourbon, or potent mixtures by such names as Taos Lightning and Red Dynamite. The backbar was typically built around one large mirror or multiple mirrors, with which a drinker was able to keep an eye on the people and activities behind them.

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Decor Varied by Region and Clientele

As saloon customers were overwhelmingly men, the walls typically featured at least one poster of a nude but generally tastefully posed woman. Other paintings were renderings of classical themes such as "Aphrodite Emerging From the Bath," while some talented artists found the local saloon to be a gallery for their original works. Interspersed with these creations were various signs, often displaying a humorous message such as "In God we trust — all others pay cash."

Other points of decor depended on the vocations of the regular guests. A saloon frequented by cowhands would perhaps have mounted longhorns along with other tools of the trade such as saddles, spurs, and branding irons. On the other hand, an establishment in a mining town might showcase displays of rock crystals, gold scales, and prospectors' lamps.

Most saloons featured iron stoves with which to warm visitors, while virtually all offered some sort of sustenance from salty snacks to meals of varying quality cooked from regional game. Guests who needed lodging for the night could retire to a partitioned-off area or backroom with blankets, or simply stretch out on a portion of sawdust that hadn't already been claimed by a customer who'd had too many drinks to find their way home for the night.

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Specialty Saloons

What else was found inside these venues depended on the type of saloon it was. It was common to see people gathered around a table engaged in games of poker, faro, or keno in just about any watering hole. Gambling saloons had more areas devoted to these games of chance, as well as more expensive accoutrements such as a roulette table and a full orchestra.

For entertainment, some saloons had a piano, often of the self-operating "player piano" variety, while some put on spectacles of men or animals fighting each other. Variety and concert saloons were roomier venues with stages for performers to sing, dance, and act out plays such as Richard III or Uncle Tom's Cabin.

Then there were the pretty-waiter saloons, also known as "hurdy-gurdy houses," in which guests sought out female companionship to drink and dance with for an evening. These establishments centered around a dance floor, to the side of which sat a piano and its player along with rows of chairs for the women to rest between dances.

All in all, saloons provided a smorgasbord of experiences that could be as varied as their clientele of gamblers, prospectors, miners, cowhands, railroaders, traveling salesmen, and ladies of the night. Some included a barber's chair; others offered mailboxes, or perhaps a rack of newspapers. Even without displaying any particularly noticeable feature, many served a civic function by doubling as a voting booth or a courtroom.

In other words, Hollywood got only part of the story correct. Yes, the Old West saloon certainly had its mustachioed villains and reckless cowboys cheating at cards and throwing each other across tables, but the real history of the saloon, both as a social and civic hub and simply a place where a person could feel the ameliorative effects of a stiff drink, is far more complex.

6 Major Events That Happened 100 Years Ago

Agatha Christie mystery headline

Author Timothy Ott

January 8, 2026

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One hundred years isn’t a terribly long time in the grand scheme of things, but a look back at life in 1926 reveals just how much the world has changed in a century.

The global population was around 2 billion people in 1926, compared to more than 8 billion now. Global leaders included Japan’s Hirohito, then embarking on a tenure that made him the longest-reigning emperor in the country’s history, and England’s King George V, the grandfather of a future queen named Elizabeth.

In the United States, where Calvin Coolidge was serving as the 30th U.S. president, workers earned an average of 93.7 cents an hour. Those who saved up could buy a new car for under $1,000, while many could easily part with the 20 cents for a ticket to watch one of the new sound films of the day, featuring stars such as John Barrymore.

But as old-fashioned as some of those names and numbers seem now, the year also gave rise to seminal events that had major reverberations into the decades that followed. Here are six such moments, from the headline grabbers to the quiet groundbreakers, that unfurled in the gone-but-not-forgotten year of 1926.

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January 26: A Working Television Is Demonstrated

Building on the work of 19th-century German engineer Paul Nipkow, Scottish inventor John Logie Baird unveiled his “televisor” to members of the Royal Institution in London with a transmission of a ventriloquist dummy’s face. Baird’s creation worked by way of rotating disks that converted slivers of captured light into electrical signals, which were picked up by a receiver that reconverted them back into light and produced fuzzy but discernable images.

As for the dummy’s head, this was less a comment on the dangers facing future couch potatoes than the practical matter of the incandescent lights used to provide illumination being uncomfortably hot and bright. Developing technology soon made the process safer for the live humans being recorded, and within two years, Baird also achieved both the first color and first transatlantic television transmissions.

March 7: The First Transatlantic Phone Call

Following the successful one-way transmissions of electromagnetic voice messages from the United States to recipients in Europe in 1915 and 1923, AT&T engineers finally managed to foster the first two-way phone call between participants in New York and London.

According to observers, the subject matter of the consequential call was decidedly mundane for such a major moment, with the two sides reverting to the usual small talk of commiserating about the weather. The conversation has also been surprisingly downplayed in telecommunications history. A January 1927 call between the heads of AT&T and the British General Post Office, which paved the way for public use of the service, is often celebrated as the first “official” transatlantic phone call as it was more heavily publicized and marked the beginning of official transatlantic phone service.

March 10: The Book of the Month Club Launches

At a time when books were expensive and public libraries weren’t widespread, American advertising executive Harry Scherman unveiled a mail-order venture to bring reading material to the masses. His idea was a subscription service in which a panel of experts chose a hardcover book to be delivered to members every month, with the inaugural selection being Lolly Willowes, or the Loving Huntsman, by Sylvia Townsend Warner.

The Book of the Month Club quickly gained a following, with readers being introduced to now-classics such as Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind and J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye. By the late 1980s, the service boasted 1.5 million subscribers. Although the business cratered with the arrival of the internet and online competitors, a revamped Book of the Month (minus “Club”) returned in 2015 with a new business model to keep the business competitive into a new century.

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March 16: The First Liquid-Fueled Rocket Flight

A visitor to an Auburn, Massachusetts, farm in late winter 1926 would have encountered the curious sight of a 10-foot rocket and its supporting metal frame standing out from the snow-covered field. Its owner, Clark University physics professor Robert H. Goddard, was a longtime rocketry enthusiast who was enamored with the idea of achieving high-altitude propulsion. Believing the solution lay in the utilization of liquids over traditional gunpowder fuel, Goddard built his own working projectile to be powered by tanks of gasoline and liquid oxygen.

As with the Wright brothers’ first airplane flight, the modest measurements logged for this particular effort — the rocket was airborne for 2.5 seconds and reached an altitude of 41 feet — paled in comparison with the historical impact of the undertaking. Although the U.S. government showed little interest in Goddard’s work, he was belatedly recognized as a pioneer in the field that made space travel possible.

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August 6: The First Woman To Swim Across the English Channel

Following the successful English Channel crossings of five male swimmers, American Olympic gold medalist Gertrude Ederle plunged into the water off France’s Cap Gris-Nez in her quest to become the first woman to accomplish the feat. Ederle had failed in a previous attempt, partly due to the thick one-piece bathing suit that slowed her down, but this time she embarked on the undertaking clad in a lighter one-piece suit and slathered in grease to protect against the cold water and jellyfish stings.

Buoyed by supplies of chicken legs and soup from the accompanying support boat, and by the promise of a new car from her father, an exhausted Ederle completed her 35-mile journey at Kingsdown, England, where an official reportedly asked for her passport. The “Queen of the Waves” received a more welcome reception back in the United States with a ticker-tape parade in New York City, while her time of 14 hours and 39 minutes remained a record — for men and women — until it was surpassed in 1951.

December 3: Agatha Christie Disappears

Already famed for her mystery novels, English author Agatha Christie offered up a whodunit of her own after slipping out of her Sunningdale home in England on a Friday evening and leaving her abandoned car to be found the following day. The subsequent search became international news, with fellow detective novelists Arthur Conan Doyle and Dorothy L. Sayers even enlisted to aid with their alleged expertise.

Following 11 days of speculation about her whereabouts and well-being, Christie was found at a Yorkshire spa, unhurt but said to be suffering from amnesia — a possible explanation for why she had registered under the name of her husband’s mistress. The author offered little public explanation of the matter, although she provided a possible clue to her reasons for suddenly vanishing when she divorced her husband less than two years later.

The Surprising Origins of 6 Popular Fairy Tales

Rumpelstiltskin, 1921

Author Timothy Ott

January 8, 2026

Love it?51

For many of us, fairy tales provide an introduction to the world of storytelling, with anecdotes of enchanted realms, scary monsters, and dashing princes delivering early lessons on worldly matters of good and evil.

But despite the simplicity of these stories, and the happily-ever-after versions that became widely known, the origins of fairy tales are often far more complex. Many evolved over hundreds or even thousands of years, while some, in earlier iterations, would be downright shocking to the delicate sensibilities of a preschool audience.

Here are six such fairy tales that originated well before Walt Disney first dreamed of singing dwarves, taking shape over many moons before winding their way into a children’s book near you.

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Rumpelstiltskin

According to one study, the elements of some famous fairy tales date back as far as 4,000 years ago, around the time early forms of the Germanic and Celtic language families were emerging. One of those tales is “Rumpelstiltskin,” with its narrative of a mysterious imp who spins straw into gold.

This particular story first appeared in print by way of 16th-century German satirist Johann Fischart, who described a game of “Rumpele stilt oder der Poppart” in which children pretend to be a noisy goblin. Like many fairy tales, “Rumpelstiltskin” became more widely known after being included in a collection of oral stories by German scholars Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, better known as the Brothers Grimm, who published multiple editions of their famed Children’s and Household Tales beginning in 1812.

Beauty and the Beast

Another fairy tale with possible Bronze Age origins, this story of a woman falling in love with a monster harboring a secret has echoes in the myth of Cupid and Psyche, detailed in the second-century novel Metamorphoses. The first known version of “Beauty and the Beast,” published in 1740 by France’s Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve, was a longer-winded story about a girl sent to live with a ghastly creature as punishment for her father stealing a rose.

Another French novelist, Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont, produced a more succinct update in 1756, which became the definitive version following its first English printing the following year. It’s sometimes said that “Beauty and the Beast” was based on the true story of Petrus Gonsalvus, a 16th-century Canary Islands native who became a celebrity in France due to a condition that left his body covered in hair, although there is no conclusive evidence that he was the inspiration.

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Cinderella

The story of a royal seeking out the owner of a lone piece of footwear can be found in the ancient Egyptian tale of “Rhodopis,” recorded around the first century BCE/CE by the Roman geographer Strabo, and the story later surfaced in the ninth-century Chinese story of “Yeh-Shen.” However, it was the 17th-century Italian folklore collector Giambattista Basile who helped shape the modern version of the tale with its wicked stepsisters and a gussied-up protagonist dazzling at the palace ball in “Cenerentola.”

French author Charles Perrault further refined the plot points in his 1697 rendition, included in his collection Histoires ou contes du temps passé, which featured the renamed Cinderella, as well as the fairy godmother, pumpkin carriage, and infamous glass slippers. Although the Brothers Grimm also published the story, their versions included mutilations inflicted on the stepsisters that understandably failed to make it into later retellings for children.

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Rapunzel

The tale of “Rapunzel” is sometimes compared to that of St. Barbara, a third-century woman who was locked in a tower to prevent her from being influenced by the spread of Christianity. A stronger connection can be found in the 10th-century Persian epic poem “Shahnameh,” in which a princess lowers her hair from a palace roof to a pursuing prince.

However, it was once again Basile who gave us the contours of the modern story with “Petrosinella,” in which the titular long-haired princess is shuttered in a tower by an evil ogress. One German translation of the tale changed the heroine’s name to Rapunzel, which was then popularized by Brothers Grimm interpretations in the 19th century.

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Little Red Riding Hood

Who’s afraid of the big, bad wolf? A lot of people, apparently, as the story of the trickster predator has appeared in many forms in many cultures across millennia. One work cited as the earliest known precursor of “Little Red Riding Hood,” recorded by 11th-century teacher Egbert of Liège in modern-day Belgium, includes mention of a wandering girl in a red baptism tunic who falls into the clutches of a wolf.

Perrault published a far more developed story with the familiar beats of the wolf disguising himself as the grandmother and the “What big eyes you have!” back-and-forth, although his tale ends with the hungry animal simply gobbling up Little Red. The Brothers Grimm variants of “Little Red Cap” are even less appropriate for young ears, as they conclude with a punitive death for the wolf.

The Pied Piper

The story of the Pied Piper, a colorfully dressed musician who lures away the children of a town after he was failed to be paid for his services, earned a chapter from the Brothers Grimm before becoming the subject of a famous 1842 poem by Robert Browning. However, this is one fairy tale that has definitive roots in a real-life event.

According to records of the German town of Hamelin, on June 26, 1284, some 130 children were led away by a multicolored-clad piper and never returned. Historians have since tried to determine what may have transpired, with theories ranging from the vanishing being part of a population migration to a peculiar “dancing mania” that prompted afflicted people to flail around until the point of exhaustion or even death. But the real answer to this centuries-old mystery will likely never be known, adding another layer of intrigue to a fairy tale that retains an ominous undercurrent even today.

7 Unforgettable Photos From the Olympics

Olympian Bob Beamon, 1968

Author Timothy Ott

December 23, 2025

Love it?67

While most Olympic hopefuls spend years training in relative anonymity, the atmosphere changes considerably once the Games begin and the globe’s attention turns to this multinational sporting extravaganza. And with plenty of media around to document the proceedings for numerous publications and a massive TV audience, it’s inevitable that cameras capture the participants during moments of triumph, anguish, and everything in between.

Here are seven of the most memorable images to emerge from more than a century of world-class athletes giving it their all at the modern Olympic Games.

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Tommie Smith and John Carlos Salute Black Power (1968)

As much as the Olympics are meant to be a time to set aside political discontent in the spirit of international competition, such allowances are not always on the agenda for participants. They certainly weren’t for U.S. sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who celebrated their respective 200-meter gold and bronze medals at the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City by raising their fists on the podium in a gesture of Black Power.

The display wasn’t well received by the International Olympic Committee, and the two athletes were subsequently suspended from the U.S. team. Smith in particular suffered major career repercussions, as he was denied the chance to participate and defend his gold medal at the 1972 Olympics. Nevertheless, both stood by the salute that showcased their solidarity with fellow Black Americans and provided one of the most indelible moments in Olympic history.

Nadia Comăneci Showcases Her Perfect Form (1976)

Despite her successes at the 1975 European Championships, Romanian gymnast Nadia Comăneci was so thoroughly dominant at the 1976 Montreal Games that even the scoreboard operators were caught unprepared. On the very first day of the team competition, the 14-year-old delivered a flawless routine that resulted in the first perfect 10 awarded in Olympic gymnastic competition — only, the scoreboards weren’t capable of showing four digits (10.00), so they instead flashed the comically low score of 1.00.

Both the scorers and other gymnasts quickly realized they needed to up their game, as the graceful Comăneci went on to earn six more perfect scores for her performances en route to winning three gold medals in Montreal.

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The U.S. Men’s Hockey Team Celebrates the “Miracle on Ice” (1980)

Few believed that the U.S. men’s hockey team, composed largely of college players, stood a chance against the mighty USSR juggernaut in the 1980 Winter Olympics. The Soviets, after all, were returning seven players from the 1976 gold-medal-winning squad, and had recently annihilated the U.S. by a score of 10-3 in an exhibition game.

But the scrappy Americans pulled ahead in their medal-round match with two quick goals in the final period, before holding on for the 4-3 win to set off pandemonium among the decidedly partisan crowd at Lake Placid, New York. What’s often forgotten is that this wasn’t the final game; the Americans did take the gold a few days later with a 4-2 win over Finland, but the real prize for the players and fans came with the ultimate underdog win immortalized as the “Miracle on Ice.”

Greg Louganis Gets Too Close to the Diving Board (1988)

Competing in the preliminary round of the 3-meter springboard event in the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, U.S. athlete Greg Louganis encountered every diver’s worst nightmare when a botched somersault led to him slamming his head against the board.

Despite sustaining a concussion and a nasty gash, a stitched-up Louganis returned to the competition 35 minutes later to ace another dive and advance from the preliminaries. Louganis then shrugged off the scary incident to earn a gold medal in the event the following day, and he later claimed another gold in the 10-meter platform to close out his Olympic career in style.

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Kerri Strug Is Carried by Her Coach (1996)

After the U.S. women’s gymnastics team frittered away a once-commanding lead at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia, things took a turn for the worse when Kerri Strug flubbed a vault landing and, she later recalled, heard something snap in her left ankle. Thinking she still needed to complete a solid turn to carry the U.S. to gold, Strug managed to charge down the runway, flip over the vault, and stick the landing on one good foot.

It turned out the Americans would have won the event even without Strug’s heroics, and coach Béla Károlyi later came under heat for urging his charge to continue on what turned out to be a badly sprained ankle. Nevertheless, the picture of Károlyi carrying the tiny, injured gymnast to the podium has stood as a defining image of the 1996 Games, and an athlete’s willingness to lay her body on the line for Olympic glory.

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Usain Bolt Looks Back at the Pack (2016)

As much as sporting fans love to watch David upset Goliath, it’s also fun to watch generational talents demonstrate their transcendent abilities by repeatedly overwhelming the competition. Such was the case with Jamaican sprinter extraordinaire Usain Bolt, who blazed to eight gold medals and set a slew of world records over the course of his unparalleled career. Bolt himself couldn’t resist sneaking a peek at his challengers during the 100-meter semifinal of the 2016 Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, before adding to his accolades as the first man to win sprinting’s marquee event in three successive Olympics.

During the 1936 Berlin Olympics, a spectacle that Adolf Hitler had hoped would showcase the “supremacy” of Germany’s Aryan athletes, the Black U.S. track-and-field star Jesse Owens and his German competitor Luz Long formed an unlikely friendship in the face of racial prejudice. While the Berlin Games are largely remembered for Owens upstaging Hitler by winning four gold medals, they’re also remembered for the genuine bond shown between would-be adversaries Owens and Long. When Owens bested Long to win gold in the long jump, his German rival joined him to celebrate. The pair walked arm in arm around the Olympic stadium smiling, displaying sportsmanship and mutual respect in front of thousands of spectators in Nazi Germany.

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