Michael Bierut visits James Biber’s “Book Cube” and talks with Biber about the books that have interested him and inspired him—from those that helped Biber decide to become an architect to the guidebooks he takes with him when visiting Rome.
Jill Bauerle
May 5, 2026
Violin Virtuoso
After 74 years of crafting violins, 98-year-old violin maker Joseph Rashid forms a foundation to keep his collection intact. Scottish fiddler Alasdair Fraser pays a visit to Rashid and tries out some of his prized violins. “You know, I am being seduced by the tone,” Fraser says, bow in hand. “I like a violin that pushes back at me.”
Part of a package that was published in The Union Newspaper, the story won a California Newspaper Publishers Association Award for Feature Writing in 2008.
Erin McCarthy, Mental Floss
“Just try not to tear up at the emotional reactions of members of the Galapagos Conservancy and Galapagos National Park Directorate when they see the taxidermy mount for the first time.”
May 5, 2026
Updating the “Moon Shadow” in Wolf Diorama
When new energy-efficient lights were installed in the Wolf diorama at the American Museum of Natural History, they created new shadows that weren’t consistent with the scene—a moonlit December night on the southern shore of Gunflint Lake in northern Minnesota. Here, Museum artist Stephen C. Quinn adds various pigments to the “snow” to re-create the illusion of shadows that would result from the Moon casting its eerie blue light on the wolves and surrounding trees.
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