Benjamin Franklin's fight against a deadly virus: Colonial America was divided over smallpox inoculation, but he championed science to skeptics

When Bostonians in 1721 faced a deadly smallpox outbreak, a new procedure called inoculation was found to help fend off the disease. Not everyone was won over, and newspapers fed the controversy.

Christian Chauret, Dean of School of Sciences, Professor of Microbiology, Indiana University Kokomo • conversation
July 1, 2021 • ~11 min

Enslaved people's health was ignored from the country's beginning, laying the groundwork for today's health disparities

The health care inequities suffered by Black Americans today began centuries ago.

Eric Kyere, Assistant professor, social work, IUPUI • conversation
July 30, 2020 • ~6 min

Archaeologists have a lot of dates wrong for North American indigenous history – but we're using new techniques to get it right

Modern dating techniques are providing new time frames for indigenous settlements in Northeast North America, free from the Eurocentric bias that previously led to incorrect assumptions.

Sturt Manning, Director of the Cornell Tree Ring Laboratory and Professor of Classical Archaeology, Cornell University • conversation
April 29, 2020 • ~9 min

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