A quote by broadcast legend Walter Cronkite

A quote from sports journalist Stuart Scott

"In football, as in life, the hits you don’t see coming are the ones that do the most damage."

A quote by Alex Haley

"Either you deal with what is the reality, or you can be sure that the reality is going to deal with you."

A quote by award-winning actor Tom Hanks

"We are still in the position of waking up and having a choice. Do I make the world better today somehow, or do I not bother?"

Some of the 'Jeopardy!' host Alex Trebek's best quotes

"The secret to happiness, of course, is not getting what you want; it's wanting what you get."

'Voices ought not be measured by how pretty they are. Instead they matter only if they convince you that they are telling the truth.'

- Iconic singer Sam Cooke (1931–1964)

A quote by Ralph Bunche

"The well-being and the hopes of the peoples of the world can never be served until peace - as well as freedom, honor and self-respect - is secure."

'It's those who lie outside ordinary experience who have the most to teach us.'

- Author Malcolm Gladwell (1963 - present)

'Do one thing every day that scares you.'

-Mary Schmich (1953-present), a columnist for the Chicago Tribune

'Early to bed, early to rise, work like hell, and advertise.'

- Ted Turner, on his secret to success (1938-2026)

Watch the breaking news report of the revelation that brought down the Nixon presidency

In August 1974, following a unanimous Supreme Court ruling, the White House released the "smoking gun" tape—revealing Nixon's role in the cover-up. Watch the CBS News report from Aug. 5, 1974, detailing the fallout from the release of the tapes.

Watch a conservative icon interview Allen Ginsberg

At the height of the hippie movement, the conservative commentator and founder of National Review, William F. Buckley Jr., invited poet Allen Ginsberg to help him make sense of the countercultural moment. Over the course of a surreal hour, Ginsberg tries to find common ground with a skeptical Buckley.

'Mutual ignorance breeds mutual distrust.'

- Businessman Andrew Carnegie (1835–1919)

Senator John McCain on fighting

"In the end, it matters less that you can fight. What you fight for is the real test."

Watch one of the greatest live TV shots ever

While James Burke was filming the 1978 docuseries "Connections" at the site of a rocket launch, he pulled off a perfectly-timed gesture without use of a green screen. Some say its the greatest live shot ever in TV history.

Writer Gay Talese has unorthodox practices for researching his stories

Since Talese began working at the New York Times in the 1950s, he has woven eccentric details into his stories about the people he covers. His immersive journalistic methods, such as living in a nudist colony, sparked controversy, but also helped him uncover aspects of people's lives.

How to bridge political divides

Can people who believe in opposing ultimate views of the world really live in peace together? That's a core requirement of individuals living in pluralistic societies. Law professor Samar Ali and public affairs strategist Clint Brewer don't agree on much, but they're great friends. In this TED Talk, the two share why political polarization in the US isn’t as intractable as we might think. Learn some tips for getting along in the free world here.

'There's a hell of a distance between wise-cracking and wit. Wit has truth in it; wise-cracking is simply calisthenics with words.'

- Writer Dorothy Parker (1893-1967)

Science communicator Bill Nye (1955 - ) on science

"Science is the key to our future, and if you don’t believe in science, then you’re holding everybody back."

'Cold War Conversations' podcast shares voices from the conflict's frontlines

This award-winning podcast features gripping interviews with the people who lived through the Cold War—spies, soldiers, defectors, and civilians. Covering everything from the Berlin Wall to nuclear standoffs, it offers unfiltered, emotional accounts of Cold War life and conflict.

The words of Truth's Akron speech are disputed—compare the two versions

There are two versions of Truth's Akron speech: one written shortly after by a white abolitionist, and the other published 12 years later. The later version added a southern dialect and the phrase "Ain't I a Woman?"—raising questions about its authenticity.

Mark Twain once challenged a rival newspaper editor to a duel

While writing for a newspaper in Virginia City, Nevada, Twain published a story about a local fundraiser, accusing the paper’s rival of rescinding their donation. The problem was that the story was untrue: It was a hoax that he had concocted while drunk. The affair led to a protracted, public back-and-forth, with Twain challenging the editor of the rival paper to a duel; likewise, two other men challenged Twain to a duel. Twain ultimately left town, but wrote about the episode later on in an essay titled “How I Escaped Being Killed in a Duel.”

Reporting on the Santa Cruz storms

The Pulitzer on the Road podcast interviews prizewinners for insights on their work and takes a deep dive into issues relevant to the awards. This episode focuses on Lookout Santa Cruz, a digital California-based outlet that won the Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News for its coverage of the devastating storms the region faced in early 2023. Lookout’s reporters discuss the importance of local news coverage.

The unavailability bias says what we don't see must not exist

Before social media, information was more scarce, and it was the norm not to know much about some controversy or episode. This led to a common prejudice: the availability bias, that what is at hand must be true (in business, the courts, finance, and many fields). With information overload today, the inverse occurs: when something is missing (like the photo of a suspect), it makes us think the suspect does not exist.

Norman Rockwell's 'Freedom of Speech' has become an internet meme

The famous painting, which portrays a man in work clothes speaking up in a crowd of men in suits, has become a companion image for internet users posting unpopular or controversial opinions. (Some users may experience a paywall.)

Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Edward Larson explores the Scopes Monkey Trial

The 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial was referred to as the "Trial of the Century" at the time, and has been since viewed as one of the origins of modern culture wars. A symbolic clash between science and religion during a period of rapid cultural change, the case became a flashpoint of differing ideologies.

A researcher recently discovered an interview from 1967 between groundbreaking journalist Joan Didion and the Grateful Dead, years before the band became an institution.

The tragic Pulitzer Prize-winning image 'The Vulture and the Little Girl' (1993) generated controversy, raised concerns about ethics in photography, and eventually led to the photographer's death.

Famed poet TS Eliot rejected the manuscript for George Orwell's political fable 'Animal Farm,' writing that its criticism of authoritarianism was not 'the right point of view.'

After NASA's Voyager 1 captured Earth as a single pixel as it left the solar system in 1990, astronomer Carl Sagan used the image to reflect on humanity's fragility and the responsibility to protect 'the only world we've ever known.'

Existentialist writer Jean-Paul Sartre coined the famous phrase 'Hell is—other people' in his play 'No Exit'

SpongeBob exemplifies Aristotle's philosophy for living well because he understands that happiness doesn't come from external factors like money, recognition, or power.

Mark Twain spent decades feuding with the US Postal Service, convinced its costs and regulations were bureaucratic overreach.

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

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.

'Saturday Night Fever,' the 1977 film that introduced disco to the mainstream, was based on a fabricated magazine story.

Exploring the Larry Bird punch that almost changed March Madness

How the most famous Ebola book, The Hot Zone, which sold 3.5 million copies and was translated into 30 languages, got aspects of the disease so wrong.

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

Search a massive database of over 4 decades of clues from the TV quiz show 'Jeopardy!'

Many legends about George Washington, including his supposed wooden teeth and the story of cutting down the cherry tree, lack evidence.

Dorothy's famous entrance into Oz in 'The Wizard of Oz' relied on analog tricks, including a body double and sepia-toned paint, as much as it did on technology

Chaos theory—informally known as the butterfly effect—is the reason why weather forecasts are presented with probabilities rather than certainties.

American dance legend Martha Graham, sometimes called 'the Picasso of dance,' refused to perform at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin and conceived the piece 'Chronicle' in response to the experience.

Legendary architect Frank Lloyd Wright designed the SC Johnson headquarters in Wisconsin, aiming to make a cathedral-like workplace

Netflix profits when you're not watching, and its movies are designed that way—read a detail-rich critical essay exposing lesser-known Netflix takes

The name 'Silicon Valley' arose from the founding of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Fairchild Semiconductor in 1956-57, founded near Stanford University in Palo Alto

In 1915, workers recovered a submarine-like vessel from the Chicago River, prompting fears of German espionage

Comedy legend Catherine O'Hara, star of 'Schitt's Creek' and 'Home Alone,' quit 'Saturday Night Live' after just one week to return to her old job.

A small portion of The Winstons' 'Amen, Brother,' an obscure '60s gospel record, is the basis for thousands of hip-hop tracks, making it one of the most sampled records ever that's informally known as 'the Amen break.'