Damn History / June 2025

Obscured by Smoke

A wonderful writer and friend of mine named Burl Gilyard died in May 2025. Burl’s career was varied and admirable, and you can read about it here.

His death made me recall that he is the only writer with whom I have collaborated in the creation of a magazine article. It began more than twenty years ago, when he and I decided we would enjoy writing something together. We focused on the popular-history story of a painting, Smoke over the Roofs by the French artist Fernand Léger, and a dispute over its ownership. We both wanted to see this tale reach publication.

We then successfully proposed the story to Mpls.St.Paul Magazine, one of our local city magazines. Burl and I had fun strategizing, developing, and reporting the story together – it felt refreshing after each of us had done solitary journalism for so long. But when it came time to write the story, Burl found he was too deeply committed to other work to continue our collaborative project. Missing him, I wrote it on my own. I turned in the assignment in early 2005 and awaited its publication.

Readers never saw the article. The publisher of Mpls.St.Paul, Burt Cohen, sat on the board of the Minneapolis Institute of Arts (which figures in the article), and Cohen objected to the story. The magazine killed it, and ever since it has occupied space in a succession of my hard drives.

So with a nod to Burl, I’ve decided to at last publish our story. You can read it here.

In Damn History you'll find, as usual, recommendations on good and popularly accessible historical reading, with tips on writing and updates on my own work.

 — Jack El-Hai

Follow me on X at @Jack_ElHai, on Bluesky at @jackelhai.bsky.social, and on Threads at @jackelhai1.

Contact me by email at [email protected]

Personal Notes

Read what it was like for me to tackle a book about Mayo Clinic’s first face transplant.

My essay covers the pleasures of using a random-number generator to select your next book to read.

Recent Popular History from All Over

You may find some of these articles behind a paywall if you’ve exceeded the publisher’s allowance of free views.

A missing woman has been found 60 years after her disappearance from Reedsburg, Wisconsin.

The dogs that ride the Moscow metro have a social history rooted in the Soviet past.

A rare old case history tells of severe bodily damage resulting from a falling book in a library.

Why has the present occupant of the White House moved a historic bust of Martin Luther King, Jr., out of the Oval Office?

A deep-cover KGB spy recruited his own son for espionage service.

A tobacco and snuff magnate dug an extraordinary collection of excavations in the bowels of the earth.

Authorities recently discovered crates of Nazi documents that have sat in an Argentine court’s basement since 1941.

Despair settled years ago within Palestinians pursuing nonviolent resistance.

An author used unreleased interviews with Nazi leaders to issue warnings for today.

Resources

The recipe for Georgia O’Keeffe’s Apples Helene and for 500 more of her culinary specialties are available for viewing. Elsewhere, see Harper Lee’s recipe for Crackling Bread.

Before writing long, try writing short.

Looking for your next history book to read?

Meet the historian who considers Joseph Stalin the most overrated historical figure.

Roxane Gay gives us a list of exemplary essays.

Historians of the future may have little to work from when researching the Trump administration.

What to do when a mindless bot writes a biography of…you.

Peruse an annual listing of the U.S. government agencies and public officials who have perfected the art of secrecy.

“Every word has consequences. Every silence, too.” – Jean-Paul Sartre

Housekeeping

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More next month, and thanks for looking. And you are welcome to forward Damn History in its entirety to anyone.

About me: I'm a history and science writer. I've contributed hundreds of articles to such publications as Smithsonian, The Atlantic, The Washington Post Magazine, Wired, Scientific American, Discover, GQ, Longreads and many others. My books include The Lost Brothers: A Family’s Decades-Long Search, The Lobotomist: A Maverick Medical Genius and His Tragic Quest to Rid the World of Mental Illness, Non-Stop: A Turbulent History of Northwest Airlines, and The Nazi and the Psychiatrist: Hermann Goering, Dr. Douglas M. Kelley, and a Fatal Meeting of Minds at the End of WW2.

I frequently give talks and lead workshops on the topics of my books as well as on the craft of nonfiction writing. To book me for your event, please contact Jayme Boucher, Hachette Speakers Bureau, at [email protected].

Please feel free to get in touch.