We need historians because the past is never just the past. Every policy debate, public conversation, and cultural shift is shaped by what came before. Historians help us understand context, trace change over time, and recognize what’s at stake. #TalkAboutHumanities 🗃️

Oh ye gods...I should have packed #SteamedHams for lunch today! #Simpsons

"We think of the eugenicist and the disabled person antagonistically, as perpetrator and victim. But it turns out their aims and interactions have long been entangled." Today's #histSTM lunch read: @coreenanne.bsky.social & Alex Aylward's @aeon.co essay on disabled views of #eugenics in the UK 🗃️📜

"On the 12th of April, the Soviet Union orbited a spaceship around the Earth with a man on board. The astronaut is a Soviet citizen: Major Gagarin, Yuri Alekseevich." More #OnThisDay in space history via the Cosmosphere: cosmo.org/april-12-in-... #YurisNight #histSTM #histsci

A few photos from yesterday’s meeting of the Lone Star #hiscisci Group at SHSU. Special thanks to our host @midwifehistory.bsky.social and @pratik-hstm.bsky.social, whose talk left us eager to read his forthcoming book, Science as White Epistemology: Decolonizing the History of Science. #histSTM 🗃️📜

“History of science?! Only one regional conference in Texas would dare to discuss the history of science…” Made it to Huntsville for my 1st meeting of the Lone Star History of Science Group, featuring a talk by @pratik-hstm.bsky.social! lonestarhistoryofsciencegroup.blogspot.com #histSTM #histsci

First Plato—now Dr. Peterson—out the door at Texas A&M! Who’s next? Here is Dr. Peterson’s letter of resignation, which he just shared with the faculty.

"Flattening the departments that study, celebrate and teach about these cultures is a gutting loss for students, these academic fields and our state. But the implications go further..." Read @clairezagorski.bsky.social's editorial on the consolidation of UT's #humanities departments. #GiftLink 🎁🗃️📚

Pleasantly surprised that someone else remembers the proposed theme song for The Something of Boris! #JamesBond #QuantumOfSolace

Boosting the signal for any @utaustin.bsky.social colleagues, students, or early career scholars who might want to attend this panel! 🗃️📜🤘

10 years ago on a social media platform far, far away...The #Maintainers were trending! themaintainers.org/maintainers-... #histSTM #STS #maintenance #infrastructure

So...Congress?

"These humble sheets of 'early paper' revolutionized communication in the ancient world..." #ICYMI, @ransomcenter.bsky.social & @thejohnrylands.bsky.social have teamed up to curate a new exhibit opening this week in Austin. Click below for more info about Lives & Literacy in Ancient Egypt! 📜🗃️✍️

The John Rylands Library will make history in 2026 by taking its first major international exhibition to North America, in a groundbreaking collaboration with the The Harry Ransom Center at The University of Texas at Austin. The Rylands will also host a version of this exhibition in Autumn 2027.

My book's on the shortlist for the 2025 @thebsls.bsky.social Book Prize. Stiff competition though! Winners announced at the annual conference this Friday (www.bsls.ac.uk/2026/04/2025...).

Some say the world will end in tweets. Others say dank memes. Based on all the trolls I've seen, I hold with those who favor memes. But if this crisis must repeat I think I've seen enough hashtags To say that for destruction tweets Spread faster still And can't be beat.

After sharing some early Moon maps (Riccioli, Cassini, etc) during a recent rare book presentation, I really appreciate this screenshot of the Lunar Targeting Package, which helps the #ArtemisII team determine what features they are observing. More info via #NASA: science.nasa.gov/resource/art... 🌔

Literary trivia fans may know that Charles Dickens's pet raven (Grip) is on display @freelibrary.bsky.social. But was Grip's death the result of natural causes? Or was it the result of foul--or fowl--play? @midnightpals.bsky.social is on the case! More on Grip: www.atlasobscura.com/places/grip-...

"For all those millennia of Moon-gazing, there was an entire half of our natural satellite that no human had ever seen before..." Today's #histSTM & #astronomy lunch read: @inverting-vision.bsky.social presents a visual history of the far side of the #Moon just in time for the #ArtemisII flyby 🗃️📜🌑

Coming soon to a library near me-This new annotated edition of From the Earth to the Moon! It's edited by @anaklimchy.bsky.social (who taught the great #JulesVerne class I took @rosenbachmuseum.bsky.social) & features essays by @jordanbimm.bsky.social, @older.bsky.social & @historyasif.bsky.social.

Tam Tam chilaquiles could be a #Passover game changer! #cooking #TamTams #Pesach #CastIronCookingExperiment

"What I hadn’t anticipated was the number of times people would say, ‘I don’t know, I can’t remember; how, why would you expect me to remember that?’” Anyone who has ever conducted an #OralHistory can sympathize w/Thomas Kuhn's frustration while documenting the history of quantum #physics. #histSTM

Many thanks to @nicjohnramos.bsky.social for an excellent presentation on race & mental health in 1960s L.A. @utaustin.bsky.social's History of Sci., Tech., Env. & Med. Colloquium! Miss the talk? Check out his book, Health as Property (@ucpress.bsky.social, 2025): www.ucpress.edu/books/health... 🗃️

Two views of our planet. What a difference (nearly) 60 years makes! L: First full-disk picture of the Earth from a geostationary orbit (Dec. 1966, ATS-1) R: Photograph of the Earth taken by Reid Weisman (Apr. 2026, #ArtemisII) #histSTM #astronomy #Earth 🌎 #astrophotography #photography

Did they see all of us complaining about how hard writing was and think this was the solution we wanted when what we really wanted was robust funding for the arts and humanities and comments in MS Word footnotes?

Not sure if this is a naive or willful misunderstanding of the arguments re: colonialism and space, but, uh... "space colonies are guilty by association with the Belgian Congo" is not the claim these critics are making

Boosting the signal for any early modern horologists in the audience... 🕰️⌛⏰ #histSTM

Always nice to see @ransomcenter.bsky.social's collections featured in @nytimes.com! Read more about Joe Mantello's revival of #DeathOfASalesman, which drew inspiration from early scripts found in the Arthur Miller Papers: www.nytimes.com/2026/03/30/t... #Broadway #theater #humanities 🗃️📜

"I have been happier since I made this change than I ever have in my life, and I will continue this way as long as I live." Today's #histSTM, #histmed & #TransDayOfVisibility lunch read: @kcur.org tells the story of Alan Hart, who popularized the use of chest X-rays to screen for tuberculosis 🗃️📜🏳️‍⚧️

🎵 "He taught us music note by note So we could copy what he wrote." "His praise for me was always faint. Now my stuff's played and his stuff ain't!" 🎵 #PDQBach, Birthday Ode to Johann Sebastian "Big Daddy" #Bach (born #OnThisDay in 1685), S. 100 #comedy #ClassicalMusic

Briefly visited X this afternoon to commemorate my #Twitterversary and felt a bit like Bruce Wayne leaving roses in Crime Alley... #Batman #BatmanTheAnimatedSeries

Dear @uconn.bsky.social: Please don't cut the staff responsible for maintaining your natural history collections. (You don't want to be like Duke, do you?) Sincerely, -A Connecticut Yankee in the Lone Star State

What does "visual culture in Britain" look like today? If you can answer that question, you might be eligible for a fabulous cash prize, courtesy of @vcib.bsky.social! Click below for further details. Submissions are due April 27, 2026! #humanities #skystorians #VisualCulture 🗃️📜📚

George: Salsa is now the #1 condiment in America. Jerry: Do you know why? Because people like to say "salsa"... #Seinfeld

"At every level, concepts and technologies codevelop. Yet this extensive interpenetration of concepts and technical objects has not corresponded to sustained engagement between intellectual history and the history of technology..." [Boosting this #CFP for #histSTM, #histtech & #STS friends!] 🗃️📜⚙️

Last night, I attended a screening of #Magellan @austinfilm.bsky.social. It's a beautiful film & a powerful critique of colonialism & romanticized accounts of the Age of Discovery. It was also compelling enough to keep this song from running through my head during its 2h40m runtime. #Animaniacs

"[N]ow more than ever, we need the humanities. Because it teaches us human skills and what it is to be human. These will be the most valuable skills in the future; not just at work, but also to have a good life." (Thanks to @ecolleary.bsky.social for sharing this comic on IG.) #humanities 🗃️📜📚

Following up on my previous post: It appears that The Luddite Club has chapters in the US, Canada, Sweden, and Australia! (And yet they have a website...insert Sideshow Bob reference here?)

"Let us not ask what AI can do for Oberlin students, but what Oberlin students can do ourselves, while we still have the brain capacity to think on our own." (Wondering if Luddite clubs might spring up at other schools where students are similarly frustrated with administrators' #AI obsession...)

Why did it take so long for me to learn that @ransomcenter.bsky.social has a TV Scripts Collection, including teleplays and production materials from classic shows like #ILoveLucy, #HappyDays, #TheMaryTylerMooreShow, and #Columbo? Finding aid: research.hrc.utexas.edu/fasearch/fin... #TVHistory 🗃️📺📜

To all my #envhist friends en route to @aseh.bsky.social's annual meeting, I hope you have a great time in Kansas City! (Sightseeing and dining recommendations are available upon request...) #histsci #histSTM

"In its tireless support for AI, the University has essentially endorsed shortcuts and the outsourcing of academic thinking, threatening the very freedom of inquiry and open expression it claims to promote." A must-read editorial from the Daily Pennsylvanian! #histSTM #STS #AI

Sadly, the most frequently seen/read popular histories of science are created by scientists, who with the utmost respect, often do not know the subject (exceptions exist, of course, but its almost a general rule ime). History is more complex, dark, and not as linear, either, than often presented.

*Two images of the Crab Nebula (M1)* 1) Photograph taken by Isaac Roberts w/a 20-inch reflector (1895) 2) Photograph taken by #NASA using the Hubble Space Telescope (2024) More info on the latter: science.nasa.gov/missions/hub... (HT @astrojaz.bsky.social) #histSTM #histsci #astronomy #histastro

The AHA, @acls1919.bsky.social, and @modernlanguage.bsky.social welcome today’s ruling allowing video footage of depositions to be published online again. The depositions are evidence in our lawsuit to restore the function and funding of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

"My friends, the wireless I knew 45 years ago is not the radio of today. The television you know now as pioneers will not be the television of tomorrow." -David Sarnoff (If you're viewing this on a flat screen today, you should read The #TVsOfTomorrow, published #OnThisDay in 2018!) #histSTM 🗃️ 📺 🖥️

Reposting this poem that I wrote last fall because...well... [waves hands at the world]

Science is a product and reflection of the society it's part of. Western science therefore has a history of misogyny, colonialism and racism. No-one should pretend otherwise.

“Have you ever felt madness behind your eyes cold as a draught from a forgotten door, when you are talking intelligently to those who think you sane…” -The Lunatic Fringe (1956) by Christine Brooke-Rose. The British author & literary critic died #OnThisDay in 2012. #booksky #poetry 📚

After nearly a century, the Tiffany Network eliminates its radio news operation. (What would Ed Murrow think?) #histSTM #radio #CBS 🗃️📻