99% Invisible

The story of the sinking of the SS Central America and the gold that sparked the first global financial panic, helped fuel the Civil War, and—over a century later—ruined one man’s life.

Across the West, there's a contentious debate playing out over how to adapt homes and neighborhoods to this era of increasingly extreme wildfire risk. In Berkeley, California, it's become a particularly emotional fight because of a very specific architectural history that began all the way back in the 1890s. Emmett Fitzgerald reports on the new rules about what plants you can grow around your house.

In the 1990s, AOL introduced millions of Americans to the internet with its ubiquitous free CDs, but how did the company that once dominated the internet nearly disappear?

Reporter Katie Thornton tells the story of Doktoro Esperanto’s dream, and what we can all still learn from Esperanto right now.

How a women’s prison in Greenwich Village, and its unusual open windows, helped shape queer community and the modern gay rights movement.

A closer look at the quirks, imperfections, and clever design solutions that have helped Frank Lloyd Wright’s Guggenheim Museum evolve over the decades.

A desert train built for Tony Hawk leads into the strange and thoughtful world of N.D. Austin, a designer of real-life experiences.

Football helmets can prevent devastating injuries, but they may also help make an inherently violent game feel safer than it really is.

A closer look at the messy, beautiful bricks hiding across Chicago.

Imbued in the Alcoholics Anonymous sobriety chip is a hidden history of America’s relationship to gender, religion, and morality.

How a Swiss mountain call crossed the Atlantic and helped define the sound of country music.

Former MythBuster Adam Savage joins Roman Mars to explore the history of the 500 Series Telephone and what we lost when we eventually decided to leave it behind.

How a movie prop became one of Philadelphia’s most beloved monuments, and sparked a decades-long fight over where it belonged.

How a single product—the hair relaxer—became a mirror for all of America's contradictions.

A legendary typeface, a spectacular friendship breakup, and one extremely committed act of revenge.

How should the military outfit its soldiers to make them as safe and effective as possible?

Every product has to be tested somehow, and sometimes that means finding increasingly creative ways to break it.

How the ceramic Dalmatian became the mascot for one of America's most popular game shows.

This week, two stories about the strange power of the 1-800 number.

How the time clock not only ignited a revolution in workplace efficiency and surveillance, but transformed our relationship to time itself.

Spolia, from a Liverpool neighborhood to ancient Rome.

Producer and reporter Ramtin Arablouei has a simple question: Why are so many NBA players wearing a compression sleeve on their arm?

Two rival paleontologists turn a hunt for dinosaur bones into an all-out scientific war.

Comedian Elliott Kalan joins Roman Mars to tell the story of how a politician who owed so much to a corrupt government system became the one to dismantle it, thanks to one woman: Julia Isabella Sand.

A devastating fire put one of Hong Kong's oldest building traditions on trial, but the real story runs much deeper.

Roman Mars and historian Seth Rockman trace the strange life of so-called "Negro cloth" — a textile category defined by nothing but who it was worn by.

Behind every perfect nature-inspired design is a far more complicated story.

In 1925, the world saw the birth of what just might be the greatest gadget in American History: the Brannock Device.

A simple cardboard box helped transform Finland into one of the best places in the world to raise a child.

In the early 1970s, Bruce Lee made nunchaku (nunchucks) cool, but the nunchucks craze coincided with something much bigger: the birth of a radical new Asian American identity.

Neil MacGregor reflects on creating the landmark series that changed how people think about history. Then, revisit the Rosetta Stone, the artifact that unlocked ancient Egypt.

In 1982, a twelve-year-old paperboy, Johnny Gosch, vanished from a quiet Iowa street and sparked an unlikely campaign: the faces of missing children printed on milk cartons by the billions.

A Louisiana man born into slavery designs an airship with hopes to take flight. Those plans are interrupted, but maybe not forever.

The teddy bear was a huge hit, and sparked an idea…maybe every president from then on should have their own viral stuffed animal.

We keep score of everything these days. But what happens when the numbers start changing what we actually care about?

Journalist Jack Hitt returns to tell the wild, tragic story of America’s forgotten proto-founding father and his inflammatory 1764 pamphlet.

Before the internet went global, one undersea gamble made it possible.

How was a household tool reimagined as a deadly weapon…that never actually existed?

Billions of state quarters disappeared from circulation...and that was exactly the plan.

Why did an ordinary schoolbook become so treasured that enslaved people risked their lives to possess it?

Love it or hate it, one buzzing horn changed the sound of the World Cup forever.

In 1861, one man and a “gas bag” filled with hydrogen sparked America's obsession with going higher, farther, into the unknown.

Behind every cheesy karaoke track was a surprisingly ambitious filmmaking experiment.

Unearthing a remarkable slave rebellion through dusty Civil War paperwork.

Canada reshaped its music industry with a quirky radio rule that changed who got heard.

A tiny screw. A precise angle. How America built a hidden empire, one standard at a time.

What started as a revolutionary treatment for river blindness became something far messier.

A locked iron safe, sealed for 100 years. What objects did Americans choose to remember?

As wild and random as they might seem, a lot of work—and even poetry—goes into coming up with today's catchiest, most unforgettable drug names.

100 objects. 100 stories. A new history of the US hiding in plain sight.