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What Parents of Boys Should Know

Daughters tend to receive higher levels of affection and patience at home than sons. But the sons might need it more.

A Trip Into Alaska’s Copper River Valley in 1902

At the end of the 19th century, an estimated 100,000 people joined the Klondike Gold Rush, seeking their fortunes in the interior of Alaska and Canada’s Yukon territory. Many gold seekers who chose the arduous path inland from Alaska’s port of Valdez also discovered rich copper deposits along the way. The U.S. Army soon started work on the Valdez Trail, which would become the main route between the mining fields and Valdez. Several competing businesses rushed to build a railroad along the route. In 1902, one of those groups sent a team of photographers, the Miles Brothers, to document the town, the growing trail, the landscape, its newly arrived residents, and Alaska Natives. Prints of these photographs were collected into an album I was able to digitize recently at the U.S. National Archives, giving us a remarkable glimpse into daily life along a rough trail into the Alaskan interior, nearly 125 years ago.

The Writer Who Understood Aloneness

Mavis Gallant’s short stories are about people, especially women, who prefer to live on the social margins. I cherish one of them most of all.

How Scientists Can Be Good Citizens

We have a responsibility to ensure that our discoveries are used in the public interest. That isn’t always easy.

We’ve Been Thinking About Love All Wrong

What illness taught me about true friendship

A Defense Against Gaslighting Sociopaths

If you can recognize their signature move, then forewarned is forearmed.

Inside Mike Waltz’s White House Exit

Signalgate was the national security adviser’s most glaring mistake. But his problems ran deeper.

The Putinization of America

Trump’s deference to the Russian dictator has become full-blown imitation.

What the Press Got Wrong About Hitler

Journalists accurately reported that the führer was a “Little Man” whom the whole world was laughing at. It didn’t matter.

An ‘Impossible’ Disease Outbreak in the Alps

In one tiny town, more than a dozen people were diagnosed with the rare neurodegenerative disease ALS. Why?

A White House Briefing Straight From North Korea

How MAGA influencers have reshaped the press corps

Skin a Rabbit

A short story

Is Anthony Weiner Ready to Go Another Round?

The ex-congressman whose name became a punch line is running for New York’s city council. In some ways, he hasn’t changed a bit.

A Sea Story

One of the worst maritime disasters in European history took place two decades ago. It remains very much in the public eye. On a stormy night on the Baltic Sea, more than 850 people lost their lives when a luxurious ferry sank below the waves. From a mass of material, including official and unofficial reports and survivor testimony, our correspondent has distilled an account of the Estonia’s last moments—part of his continuing coverage for the magazine of anarchy on the high seas.

Why the Past 10 Years of American Life Have Been Uniquely Stupid

It’s not just a phase.

Harvard and the Making of the Unabomber

A series of purposely brutalizing psychological experiments may have confirmed Theodore Kaczynski’s still-forming belief in the evil of science while he was in college.

The Texas County Where ‘Everybody Has Somebody in Their Family’ With Dementia

And many people with the condition are cared for at home.

I Should Have Seen This Coming

When I joined the conservative movement in the 1980s, there were two types of people: those who cared earnestly about ideas, and those who wanted only to shock the left. The reactionary fringe has won.

The Great Language Flattening

Chatbots learned from human writing. Now it’s their turn to influence us.

Russia Is in Demographic Free Fall. Putin Isn’t Helping.

The Russian president is enacting one of the world’s most extreme natalism programs—and one of the weirdest.