Lessons From History, Relevant Today: Articles, Essays and Photos

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A recap of an event hosted by Retro Report and PBS Frontline

Under the Lanham Act of 1940, federal grants to child care centers totaled $52 million.

Black neighborhoods continue to show the impact of decades-old race restrictions created by the F.D.R. administration

How Retro Report’s Two-Year Project Gave an Inside Look at Evictions During the Pandemic

The F.D.A. warns that VAERS reports “cannot be used to determine if a vaccine caused or contributed to” bad outcomes.

‘Liberty is to faction what air is to fire’

We captured the experiences of vulnerable people across the country.

Raymond Bonner, a New York Times correspondent, was one of the first journalists to uncover evidence of a deadly rampage.

A reporter teams up with the American journalist who first broke the story of the El Mozote massacre, tracking El Salvador’s faltering efforts to hold the perpetrators accountable, in a new documentary from Retro Report, ProPublica and FRONTLINE.

“Sybil,” about a woman who claimed to have 16 distinct personalities, sold over 6 million copies.

The world must quit fossil fuels imminently to avoid a catastrophic global temperature increase, a report urges.

Renewed interest in unionizing is energizing the American labor movement

Momentum for removing highways is increasing, with racial justice movements amplifying the issue.

For over a century, decisions have favored states’ power.

New pool programs are working to overcome an alarming disparity: Black children drown at a rate far higher than that of white children

The Supreme Court rejected the agency’s latest eviction ban extension, putting hundreds of thousands of tenants at risk.

Officials who drove the decades-long war in Afghanistan look back on the strategic errors and misjudgments that led to a 20-year quagmire.

Conservative traditions clash with a push for modernization

A ragtag table tennis team that had to pay its own way to world events (and usually lost) helped to open the door for President Nixon’s 1972 visit.

Nazis burned down Berlin’s LGBT center, run by the “Einstein of Sex”

Today’s special education system was shaped five decades ago, when parents of children with disabilities fought for their right to learn.

The man who called himself a war criminal.

The Christian “purity” movement promoted a strict view of abstinence before marriage. But two decades later, some followers are grappling with unforeseen aftershocks.

“The Trial of the Chicago 7” omitted a spectacularly chaotic episode of the 1968 Democratic National Convention.

Covid-19 is exposing inequalities in healthcare that have roots in 1930s “Jim Crow medicine.”

Democrats and Republicans agree that the law doesn’t serve Americans but disagree on why. Will a repeal help any of their cases?

These city appointees, who enforce evictions and earn their incomes from fees, are once again emerging as symbols of housing insecurity.

To stop misinformation at its source, everyone (students especially) should learn how to verify information.

Our arcane – some say undemocratic – system dates back to the nation’s founding.

For decades evolution has been a contentious topic in American schools. Something seems to be changing.

Proposals giving tenants the right to purchase their building are being revived as Covid-19 puts renters at risk.

Millions of Americans risk losing their homes when back rent comes due in 2021. These two sheriffs, working decades apart, sought compassionate treatment for renters facing eviction.

Onstage sparring between politicians has been a part of U.S. elections for decades. Covid-19 could change that.

Educators and parents have let technology solve school in a pandemic. There’s a better way.

Researchers have found few health differences between survivors of the 1945 atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki – known as hibakusha – and other Japanese. But many suffer from lingering psychological effects.

The United States has a long history of voting by mail.

Hollywood’s fascination with diseases, infections and disease-infected zombies has a long history.

Only three past presidents have been served with subpoenas.

Dr. Anthony S. Fauci grappled with another health crisis decades ago. What he told Retro Report about the effort against AIDS could apply to the battle against the coronavirus.

Anger over policing and inequality boiled over more than 50 years ago, and a landmark report warned that it could happen again.

Like President Trump, former Mayor Frank Rizzo styled himself as a straight talker.

The 1807 Insurrection Act has sometimes been used to protect, not suppress, civil rights protests.

Baseball, football and college sports have been transformed by what’s in the headlines.

Immunizations have saved lives, and side effects are rare. But there have been missteps.

Over 100 Covid-19 vaccines are in the works. History suggests it could take years.

When a polio outbreak closed Chicago schools in 1937, teachers turned to technology.

Face-to face meetings are a long tradition, and changes have always been a hard sell.

Detecting points of contact has become a critical weapon in the fight against the coronavirus.

Like Typhoid Mary, some people are experts at passing along infection. No one knows why.

Handshakes, cheek kisses and high-fives are out. What should replace them?

As reports of attacks on Asian Americans rise, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has issued language guidelines.

An ideological split among Democrats emerged in the 2020 primary. In 1964, Republicans had to select Nelson Rockefeller, the establishment choice, or Barry Goldwater, a staunch conservative.

The activist folk singer Victor Jara was murdered in the days after a 1973 coup that brought Gen. Augusto Pinochet to power. A quest for his killers led to a Florida courtroom.

In the early 1970s, many evangelical Christians weren’t active in politics. Within a few years they had reshaped American politics for a generation.

The origins of tamper-resistant packaging — exasperating yet reassuring — lie in a deadly episode in 1982, when cyanide-laced Tylenol killed seven people.

Redistricting battles over Congressional seats have roots in a Supreme Court decision 30 years ago.

As more nations seek the bomb, and as the United States and Russia expand their nuclear arsenals, veterans of the Cold War say the public is too complacent about the risk of nuclear catastrophe.

President Trump has used us-versus-them rhetoric to appeal to voters who are fed up with the status quo. We look at another politician who tapped into America’s divisions decades ago: George Wallace.

A growing skepticism of science has seeped into the classroom, and it’s revived attacks on one of the most established principles of biology – evolution.

Border fences, deportations, and putting “America First.” It all happened in the 1990s, and it started in California.

Live-streaming apps like Facebook Live and Periscope give us a voyeuristic peek into the lives of others. But what is our obligation when we encounter digital violence?

What do the C.I.A. and Nigerian imams have to do with the fight to end polio? Retro Report examines how the worlds of politics and public health can collide.

Retro Report explores decades of conspiracy theories – from the John F. Kennedy assassination to pizzagate – and what they can tell us about how we view the world today.

Practiced from the 1930s to the 1950s, a radical surgery — the lobotomy — forever changed our understanding and treatment of the mentally ill.

Taking a page from Nixon, President Trump is waging his own battle against leaks, which threatens to damage Americans’ right to know.

As the country prepares for the confirmation hearings of Judge Neil Gorsuch, Retro Report explores how the bitter hearings over Judge Robert Bork changed the way nominees answer questions.

The author Rachel Carson’s strike against the pesticide DDT turned her into both an environmental hero and a foil for those who believe regulation has gone too far. That fight is more relevant than ever.

Decades after Dr. Jonas Salk opposed patenting the polio vaccine, the pharmaceutical industry has changed. What does that mean for the development of innovative drugs and for people whose lives depend on them?

Over the last 30 years, schools across the country have enacted tough disciplinary policies. Did they go too far?

The moments we remember from political debates are embedded in our political folklore, from the knockout lines to the losing gaffes. But does media coverage often miss the real lessons they offer?

In 1976, Chicago provided vouchers to African-American families to move into predominantly white suburbs. Retro Report examines what happened, and how it influences policy today.

When Phyllis Schlafly fought the Equal Rights Amendment, which called for equality of rights “on account of sex,” it kicked off a battle that continues to influence political debate today.

The story of the veterans who witnessed secret atomic testing and how their decades-long struggle for recognition affects soldiers today.

In the 1960s, mind-altering drugs like LSD helped fuel the counterculture. Today, psychedelics are turning on a new generation – of scientists.

Bill Clinton’s 1996 welfare reform was supposed to move needy families off government handouts and onto a path out of poverty. Twenty years later, how has it turned out?

After a surge of teen violence in the early 1990s, some social scientists predicted the future was going to be a whole lot worse. Reality proved otherwise.

Carl Sagan and other Cold War scientists once feared that a nuclear war could plunge the world into a deadly ice age. Three decades later, does this theory still resonate?

The dramatic controversy surrounding the 2000 presidential election led to sweeping voting reforms, but opened the door to a new set of problems that continue to impact elections today.

In the 1970s, frustration over heroin related, urban crime led to the War on Drugs. Today, heroin is back. But the users, and the response, are very different.

In 1993, federal agents raided the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Tex., and generated a legacy of fear that continues to shape antigovernment groups today.CreditCredit…

In the 1960s, fears of overpopulation sparked campaigns for population control. But whatever became of the population bomb?

A 1993 E. coli outbreak linked to Jack in the Box hamburgers sickened 700 people and drew new attention to the dangers of food-borne illness. More than 20 years later, how far have we come?

Weeks before Selma’s Bloody Sunday in 1965, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. urged residents of Gee’s Bend, Ala., to vote, and fed a continuing fight over a small ferry that would last for decades.

An outbreak of measles that started at Disneyland has turned a spotlight on those who choose not to vaccinate their children. How did we get to a point where personal beliefs can triumph over science?

In the 1970s, the TV movie “Sybil” introduced much of the nation to multiple personality disorder and led to a controversy that continues to shape mental health issues.

In 1980, the murder of four American churchwomen focused attention on the United States’ involvement in El Salvador. Nearly 35 years later, the case continues to take surprising turns.

The Watergate campaign finance scandals led to a landmark law designed to limit the influence of money in politics. Forty years later, some say the scandal isn’t what’s illegal, it’s what’s legal.

SWAT teams were created in the 1960s to combat hostage-takings, sniper shootings, and violent unrest. But today they’re often used in more controversial police work.

Thirty years ago, on Jan. 28, 1986, seven astronauts “slipped the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God.” America’s space program was never the same.

The use of Agent Orange during the Vietnam War continues to cast a dark shadow over both American veterans and the Vietnamese.

More than three decades after the accident at Three Mile Island cast a shadow on the atomic dream, is America again ready to give nuclear energy a chance?