History

Aspen Ideas Festival: Are the founding fathers overrated?
David Rubenstein asks, and tries to answer, the question, "Are the Founding Fathers overrated?" He says they were talented and courageous people, who deserve all the credit they get for putting the country together and creating a durable constitution... but they could not figure out a way to deal with America's biggest original defect: slavery.
When sideshows ruled state fairs
In the 1950s and '60s, the U.S. had over 100 traveling sideshows — or "freak shows," as they were once known.
Truth, Politics and Power: A North Korea update
The U.S. and South Korea this week commenced computer-simulated military drills designed to prepare for a possible war with a nuclear-capable North Korea. Former NPR host Neal Conan explores the diplomatic and military situation with a former negotiator, a former high level Pentagon official and a historian.
Aspen Ideas Festival: Walter Isaacson on how we can be more like da Vinci
The best-selling biographer says that while we can't be Albert Einstein or Sir Isaac Newton, we can all try to be more like da Vinci. "We can try to be curious -- playfully curious and inquisitive, which was his ultimate trait," he said.
Humans vs. beavers: The battle of 1993
Culverts were created to help move water underneath roads, and turned out to be a dam-building beaver's paradise. In 1993, reporter Leif Enger reported on a victory for mankind in the beaver wars.
Aspen Ideas Festival: Henry Louis Gates Jr. on race and class in America
The Harvard professor and documentary filmmaker explores the question: What would we tell Martin Luther King Jr. if he came back and wanted to know what had happened?
America's history of impeaching presidents
An historian, a political scientist and NPR legal affairs reporter Nina Totenberg explain the presidential impeachment process, and our past two experiences: the impeachment trials of Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton.
At the Minnesota Capitol, a tale of two Perpich portraits
It took former-Gov. Rudy Perpich and his family 10 years to get a portrait of Perpich and his wife Lola hung in the halls of the Minnesota State Capitol.
Reporting, memories from the I-35W bridge collapse
A look back at MPR News' coverage of the day the I-35W bridge collapsed, as well as memories from those who lived and worked in the area the day it fell.