The Butterball Turkey Talk-Line fields cooking questions from anxious holiday hosts

Every Thanksgiving, Americans eat over 40 million turkeys

That's 50% of all whole turkeys sold in the US in a given year. (Most of the remaining 50% are purchased for Christmas.)

The efforts to save the wild turkey

An essential character in American tradition, the wild turkey is more than just the meat you eat on Thanksgiving. Listen to this four-part miniseries to learn what they symbolize, the long-lasting efforts to preserve this bird, and why their conservation matters.

The horror hotlines of the 1990s

Before the internet, 900-number hotlines were the way to retrieve instant information over the phone, whether for weather reports, movie information, or spooky horror stories. Callers could dial the number and hear ghost stories, experience interactive horrors, and more. This article reminisces about this extinct technology and how it paved the way for the internet.

The annual 'turkey pardon' officially began in 1989

President George HW Bush oversaw the first official pardon, but the tradition began years before that. This short video from PBS News explores the history of presidential pardons for the lucky birds. There’s no “fowl” language, but there are plenty of puns!

Auburn's public help desk landline has been ringing since 1953

The Foy Information Desk at Auburn University in Alabama receives roughly 1,000 calls a day from members of the public looking for answers on just about everything. Originally created to serve students, it eventually was opened up to the public, and continues to receive requests for answers, similar to a Google search, to a variety of questions.

Reexamine the Thanksgiving story through this interactive game

This interactive experience casts you as a high school journalist uncovering how the Thanksgiving narrative has become simplified. Through animations, maps, primary sources, expert interviews, and text-message riddles, the game turns historical investigation into an engaging, hands-on mystery.

Reporting food poisoning aids in limiting outbreaks

If you suspect you were sickened by meat or poultry or by other food products (or your pet was sickened), the US has different voluntary online reporting forms and hotlines you can call. There’s even one for concerns about potentially contaminated pet food products. If you were potentially sickened at a restaurant, however, you report that directly to state and local health departments, not the federal government.

Working as a mall elf is not always merry

Humorist David Sedaris’s classic radio piece on his time working as Crumpet the Elf at Santaland in a Macy’s revealed a darker side of Christmas, filled with tantrums and fights. First broadcast in 1992, Santaland Diaries was Sedaris’s breakout story, and NPR has annually aired the story ever since.

Explore what 20,000 letters to an advice columnist tell us about US anxieties and concerns.

This interactive story breaks down common themes—and specific questions—that were posed to Dear Abby, America's longest-running advice column.

Health food broke into the mainstream by the 1980s

A 1984 New York Times story noted that Americans were eating less red meat than a decade prior, and that, in general, the country was “talking, thinking and worrying about what they eat to a degree unique in the nation's history.” The feature then details foods that were then considered bizarre: whole-grain muffins, hummus, and a variety of vegetarian dishes. (Some readers may experience a paywall.)

20,000 letters to the advice columnist 'Dear Abby' provide insight into prevailing sex, religion, and LGBTQ fears, anxieties, and concerns from the 1950s onward.

Cow tongue was once a Thanksgiving delicacy

Cow feet and tongue were sometimes included in mincemeat pies—a popular 18th-century dish. Josefa Hale, who inspired Lincoln to declare Thanksgiving a holiday, said they were “indispensable; but [hoped] this rich, expensive, and exceedingly unhealthy diet will be used very sparingly...”

Intriguing facts about tomatoes

This episode of the Lunchbox Envy podcast dives deep into the world of tomatoes. Why do they taste nicer in certain settings? Do they "scream"? What are their health benefits? All of these questions and more are answered about the luscious red fruit. Listen and reflect on the historical and cultural significance of the tomato.

A list of the best toasts

Toasting is an art form, with the best toasts getting passed down through generations. This list was culled from hundreds of submissions and is organized by theme, tone, and objective. If you're looking to find a good line to use as the conclusion for your next speech, this might be your best bet.

Eating KFC is a Christmas tradition in Japan

Since a 1974 marketing campaign, eating KFC on Christmas has become a nationwide custom in Japan. Families place orders weeks in advance, and the holiday accounts for nearly a third of KFC Japan's total yearly sales.

The forgotten campaign to replace the Teddy Bear with 'Billy Possum'

After a 1909 pre-inauguration dinner for incoming President William Howard Taft featured possums and potatoes as the main course, Susie W. Allgood wanted to produce and market an alternative to the Teddy Roosevelt-inspired teddy bear: Billy Possum. Kids thought it looked too much like a rat.

Turkish delight recipes were initially kept secret

The chewy confection dates back to the 1700s, and initially was served at the sultan's court. The palace's secret recipes were eventually published in one of the earliest Ottoman cookbooks by Mehmet Kamil.

The James Beard Awards invited controversy by evaluating character

When the foundation initially asked judges to start considering chefs’ personal conduct in 2018, there was little pushback. By the time the 2023 awards rolled around, that was no longer the case. A chef’s nomination was pulled due to allegations of bullying, causing several previous winners to renounce their awards.

The Black Friday Archive collects Black Friday ads from the past 25 years

The archive features advertisements from notable retailers such as Bath & Body Works, Gap, and The Home Depot, among others. These ads span from the years 2000 to 2024, in addition to some from early holiday sales at Macy’s in 1963.

Latkes, or fried potato pancakes, are eaten on Hanukkah to honor the miracle of the lasting oil

Deb Perelman, author of seminal food blog Smitten Kitchen, walks us through her foolproof recipe for classic potato pancakes. Among her tips: choose russet potatoes for a lighter latke, use a towel to wring the water out for extra crispiness, and add a sprinkle of baking powder for a little more lift.

Fast-casual restaurant Chili's is experiencing a resurgence, with its parent company recently reporting a nearly 32% increase in sales, thanks to passionate Gen Z fans on TikTok.

The first chili cook took place in a Texas ghost town

"The Great Chili Confrontation" happened October 21, 1967, in Terlingua, Texas, a small ghost town near Big Bend National Park. The showdown was between journalists H. Allen Smith, who wrote an article titled “Nobody Knows More About Chili Than I Do,” and Wick Fowler, a Texas reporter.

In 1957, the BBC conducted one of the first televised April fool pranks

The reputable broadcaster reported a story about a family in southern Switzerland harvesting spaghetti from a "spaghetti tree." Some viewers didn't appreciate the joke and felt angry about being misled.

The ‘Bullshit Bombers’ of the Vietnam War and their mountain ghost

Armed with marketing insight and leaflets, these US soldiers tried to use propaganda to get the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese military to abandon their weapons and leave the war. But what’s more effective than a leaflet’s promise of a decent cup of coffee amid bombing? Ghostly threats from the great beyond. Learn more about weaponized superstition in this 42-minute podcast episode.

Telehealth demand for GLP-1s for weight loss is booming as consumers seek easier access.

50 exit interview question ideas

When an employee leaves a company, it can leave leadership (not to mention their manager) with a lot of questions. Thankfully, that's what exit interviews are for. But if the person conducting the interview doesn't know the work-appropriate way to ask questions, or if they need to ensure they've covered all the bases, this list of more than 50 exit interview questions can help. Read it here.

Franklin D. Roosevelt used radio to connect directly with Americans through his 'Fireside Chats'

Beginning in 1933, FDR harnessed the new medium of radio to explain policies and reassure the public during the Great Depression and World War II. His conversational fireside chats revolutionized presidential communication.

Watch a pyrotechnician answer questions about fireworks

Professional pyrotechnician Patrick Cyrana answers the internet’s most curious questions about fireworks, from designing ghost effects and exploring how electronic firing systems work to explaining what it takes to create displays in the rain.

The history of many kitchen appliances involves unexpected discoveries and applications, including wartime radar turned hamster defroster and replacing an 'ice king' with heat-stealing boxes.

At the beginning of the 20th century, a group of young men ate standard American food—replete with food additives like borax and formaldehyde—as part of government research to better understand food safety.

In recent years a child anxiety expert has created and tested a novel phobia and anxiety treatment approach for children, focused on changing how parents respond to the fears.

This site reaches millions of visitors who are tired of AI chatbots and seeking human connection. Pretend to be an AI chatbot and ask questions, provide answers, and draw for people in real time.

Up to a million Girl Scouts sell about 200 million cookie boxes every spring, generating $800 million, largely because refusing a child is frowned upon

Power lines are dotted with large, brightly colored balls to improve the visibility of these thin wires to helicopters and small planes and help prevent potential crashes.

American short story writer Flannery O'Connor raised 40 peacocks, which became potent symbols for her fiction's elegant violence

Double world record holder Hunter Ewen helped conquer his fear of balloons, called globophobia, by training to win Guinness World Record titles for balloon inflation.

11 people died from firework injuries in the US in 2024.

Hear about the 250-year history of the United States Postal Service, complete with some of its strangest deliveries, important innovations, and the figures that made it an American institution.

Use this tool to calculate the dollar value of your parental mental load, from meal planning to coordinating after-school care, then see resources that help generate solutions.

Listen to an in-depth conversation on the links between Parkinson's disease and herbicide exposure and the challenging pace of scientific investigation.

When a Paris department store hesitated to sell Estée Lauder's perfume, she 'accidentally' broke a bottle, causing the smell to spread throughout the store and shoppers to start asking to buy the scent.

The United States has had a tumultuous relationship with Cuba since its 1959 revolution, highlighted by a nuclear crisis and a decades-long trade embargo.

Hotels in Cannes, the glamorous city on the French Riviera, hire hawks to ward off seagulls during the city's famous film festival.

Brian Wilson wrote the Beach Boys' 'Don't Worry Baby' for the Ronettes, but the legendary girl group rejected it.

See how Budweiser's famous Clydesdales spend their days at Warm Springs Ranch, where roughly 70 to 80 of the beer brand's giant horses can be found at any given time.

Cultural norms about how to handle the bodies of loved ones in communities in West Africa have hampered Ebola responses.

Objects can be 3D printed with light by projecting 2D computerized tomography (CT) scans onto rotating cylinders of resin, which solidify upon exposure.

El Niño, Spanish for 'the boy,' was named after Jesus Christ because the phenomenon resembled the weather changes observed around Christmastime.

To reduce wrinkles in clothing, research recommends gentle wash cycles with more water and tumble drying with smaller loads and longer times.

Abraham Lincoln was almost assassinated weeks before his inauguration as he traveled from Illinois to DC through Baltimore in 1861; it took two independent claims for Lincoln to be convinced the threat was real