reviews

Two-wheeled Triumph... Author:  Michael Kranish Most people find it hard to believe, but there was a brief moment in history when cycling was crazy popular all across America. By the end of the 19th century, bicycle technology had become sophisticated enough to allow athletes to propel themselves at dangerously high speeds around a smooth oval track on bikes that are pretty similar to what we ride today. The arrival of the automobile was still a decade or two in the future, so audiences who were looking for high-speed thrills thronged by the thousands to velodromes across the country, watching cyclists [...]

Mysteries and the Literati at the Algonquin Round Table Author: J. J. Murphy The who’s-who of the literary world, from fancy magazine authors to critics to poets all gather at the Algonquin Round Table for a bit of daily tête-à-tête and sarcasm. Imagine their shock then to discover a dead body – of a not so nice rival – stowed under their exclusive diner digs. That’s one way to ruin a meal. Enter the elusive William Faulkner, just a poor southern boy on a trip to the big bad city. He just may have seen something he shouldn’t have too, [...]

Lizzie Borden Took An Axe Author: Sarah Schmidt On August 4th, 1892 two brutal murders shook the ever so proper town of Fall River, Massachusetts and have since gone down as one of the most violent and unexplained homicides in America. I am, of course, talking about the infamous Lizzie Borden debacle. Lizzie, the peculiar “old-maid,” may have been tried and acquitted for the axe-murder of her father and stepmother but legend and popular opinion say otherwise. Who else, on that sultry summer day, had the opportunity? Who else had the motive? And so, Sarah Schmidt wants to give us [...]