"Where there is no imagination, there is no horror." —Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Inside the imagination, the unknown has much greater potential to frighten, and you can imagine your own scariest version. Nothing is more apt for getting chills in the brain than a good campfire story. The storyteller uses only his or her voice to…
#TBT: Happy Birthday, Michael Keaton!
Michael Keaton turned 65 this past Monday, so for this Throwback Thursday we're going to take a look at some films from his early career. Before Christian Bale or Ben Affleck sneered their way into the Batcave, Tim Burton's Batman reestablished the world's greatest detective as the dark and brooding character we know now, instead of the…
Campaigns, Elections, Primaries, Oh My: The Election Year Post
It's that time again: Time for every citizen of the United States to do their civic duty. No, not jury duty! I'm talking about voting. It's an election year and that means we'll be watching the highlights of our political process in action. On Tuesday, November 8, we'll elect a new president, one senator and…
#TBT: The Godfather Film Released
When Francis Ford Coppola became the go-to director for Paramount's next big picture—the film version of a pulpy novel called The Godfather by Mario Puzo—he was apprehensive. He thought it glorified violence and the criminal lifestyle and made Italian-Americans look bad. After a second read, he saw and put into the film the subtexts of family…
The Salem Witch Trials Began on a Leap Day
Did you know the first warrants in the Salem witch trials were issued February 29, 1692? That was 324 years ago—or 81 leap years ago. The era of Britain's settlement in the Americas has given history some excellent works of literature and art. Witches, or the people with strange abilities who made some kind of evil bargain with a…
6 Picks for Scary Movie Night
Every year, I like to have a scary movie night with friends. It can be fun to imagine that we're the archetypal victims, stuck in a cabin when all of the sudden the power goes out. Which one of us will survive? What is that shape over in the corner, just out of reach of…
#TBT: The World Wide Web Goes Live!
In early August 1991, the first webpage was served up from a neXT computer in a lab at the European Organization for Nuclear Research - CERN, and computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee's World Wide Web project had begun. A lot has changed since then, so for this Throwback Thursday, read more about the birth of the Internet…
Outsider Artist: Chicago’s Henry Darger
Anyone can become overwhelmed by the desire to express what is inside them in a creative way. Most often the best examples are highlighted in museums and art history courses and classes, but sometimes there are diamonds in the rough, or great works found in unlikely places. Whenever someone without a formal art education or…
The Literary Legacy of Waterloo
Imagine you're standing in a wet, grassy field on a small hill. From this hill, you look over a large camp. There is smoke from the campfires, or is it from the artillery? Soldiers are mustering themselves under the blue, white and red banners. 26,000 of them will be dead by dusk. June 18 marks the…
Orson Welles: 100 Years Since His Birth
Since Orson Welles' death in 1985, the impression he left on American cinematic aesthetic has become a canyon. We have an opportunity to look back on his life as we come to the centenary of his birth on May 6. Roger Ebert summarized Welles' life using one of Welles' own quotes, spoken to a sparse crowd in a…
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